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Thread: Bill Monroe's guitar

  1. #26

    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by Gary Hedrick View Post
    I will look around my music area but I know I have something with a picture of Bill from the 30's playing a J 45 I think.....but it truly is one of the slope shoulder models....I'm sure a Tom Isenhour will have something showing him playing a Gibson guitar
    The album cover that I have is Bill holding, not a J-45, but rather, a Gibson J-50 in front of the WSM microphone, -remember a J-45 is dark, while the J-50 is natural color !

  2. #27
    Registered User f5loar's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    pretty sure the D28 is a wide neck making it after 1934 and before mid 1939. That would explain the forward bracing too. My guess is he got it around 1939 after leaving Charlie in 1938. And it could have been bought used too as some seem to think it was a 1936. Bill Monroe was not afraid of buying good used quality instruments! While Charlie was more of brand new type buyer. And I'd have to go back and look but seems I recall it was not a J50 but a J35 natural top based on the pickguard. He may have borrowed Cleo Davis's guitar for that photo as Monroe like to kick off Muleskinner back then and Cleo/Clyde Moody, etc would play his mandolin for that one song.

  3. #28
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    It has been at least a dozen years since I read the book, but I seem to remember a picture in Can't You Hear Me Callin'? showing Bill with the original band and a Gibson slope shoulder. (I am not sure if it was short-lived Kentuckians in Little Rock or the original Blue Grass Boys in Atlanta.) It was said that Bill had purchased the new axe for the guitar player (Cleo Davis?). I am pretty sure it was a Gibson AJ with a natural top, as it had the distinctive AJ position markers on the fretboard.

    Wonder whatever happened to that guitar 75 years later.

  4. #29

    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    I recall Howlin' Wolf kept a Fender Precision bass around because his players kept pawning theirs.

  5. #30
    Registered User f5loar's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Monroe also kept a 50's Vega banjo just in case he hired a boy with no banjo. Yeah it could be the AJ or J35. I'd have to see the photo to determine which one.

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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    deleted post as the points were already made earlier!
    Bernie
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    Registered User Joe Spann's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    I knew Cleo Davis during the last few years of his life. Beginning about 1981 he was part of the "Florida Opry" located between Auburndale and Lakeland, Florida. I played banjo on his part of the show every Saturday night for about a year. He was still using the Gibson guitar that Monroe gave him at that time. To the best of my knowledge he still owned it at the time of his death in 1986.

    Joe Spann

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  9. #33
    Registered User Zissou Intern's Avatar
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    There were not many natural topped Advanced Jumbos built back then. Imagine playing an AJ, given to you by Big Mon, for almost 50 years...
    Thanks for the information, Joe.
    ZI

  10. #34
    Registered User f5loar's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by Joe Spann View Post
    I knew Cleo Davis during the last few years of his life. Beginning about 1981 he was part of the "Florida Opry" located between Auburndale and Lakeland, Florida. I played banjo on his part of the show every Saturday night for about a year. He was still using the Gibson guitar that Monroe gave him at that time. To the best of my knowledge he still owned it at the time of his death in 1986.

    Joe Spann
    Where you able to date it and what model it was?

  11. #35
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    I just found a picture online of Bill and the original Bluegrass Boys, with Cleo Davis holding what appears to be an natural top J35. I don't know if it the same picture from Can't You Hear Me Callin?. I know longer have a copy of that book. I remembered it being an AJ; as I get older, memory grows, apparently, less reliable.

  12. #36
    Registered User Joe Spann's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by f5loar View Post
    Where you able to date it and what model it was?
    Sadly no. In 1981 I didn't know much about pre-war Gibson guitars. I remember it was in pretty rough shape.

    Joe Spann

  13. #37
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Many threads about Bill Monroe on guitar.
    "It's comparable to playing a cheese slicer."
    --M. Stillion

    "Bargain instruments are no bargains if you can't play them"
    --J. Garber

  14. #38
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Monroe and guitars.
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    "It's comparable to playing a cheese slicer."
    --M. Stillion

    "Bargain instruments are no bargains if you can't play them"
    --J. Garber

  15. #39
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Thanks for posting the band picture, Jim. That was the image I had seen. Does anyone know if it the same picture in Mr. Monroe's biography?

  16. #40
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    I actually thought Charlie Monroe played an OJ, not a AJ. The pics of his guitar as a member of the Monroe Brothers do not have the distinctive fingerboard inlays of the AJ. OJs were mahogany, AJs rosewood. Of course this from a time when anything goes and those assumptions may be dead wrong on a given guitar.
    2006 Duff F5
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  17. #41

    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by Darryl Wolfe View Post
    I fully agree with the concept of "Bills Guitar" being the Martin D-28 played by many of his guitarists. Although Allen may be correct stating '40's, I believe the guitar to be a '30's model. Myself and others have had many discussions on this subject and wonder if the community can establish any facts. It is said to have disappeared in the later '60's timeframe.
    ....Bill's famous Martin D-28 was a 1939,...supposedly stolen in 1965 ?,..Bill did supply Cleo Davis with a Gibson J-something, blonde,...probably the one pictured with Bill holding in front of the WSM microphone .

  18. #42
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by mando-tech View Post
    ....Bill's famous Martin D-28 was a 1939,...supposedly stolen in 1965 ?,..Bill did supply Cleo Davis with a Gibson J-something, blonde,...probably the one pictured with Bill holding in front of the WSM microphone .
    https://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/s...=1#post1317825
    "It's comparable to playing a cheese slicer."
    --M. Stillion

    "Bargain instruments are no bargains if you can't play them"
    --J. Garber

  19. #43

    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by GRW3 View Post
    If you take a look at one of the pictures of the early Bluegrass Boys in "Can't You Hear Me Calling?" the guitar player is playing a Gibson Dreadnaught. As I recall the book indicates that Monroe would occassionaly provide good instruments to his newest accolytes. Being of Scottish extraction, I doubt he would 'give' them the instrument so maybe this was one of his band instruments. Besides the Gibson I've seen a Youtube vid where guitar player is playing a Guild. While Martin fanatics would like you to believe they are the only suitable guitar for Bluegrass, that rule apparently was not established by WSM himself.
    Your comment of 'Being of Scottish extraction etc' is an insult to Scotland

    You should be ashamed of yourself

    Jimmy P

  20. #44
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by earthsave View Post
    Here's a pic of Cleo with what looks like a Gibson headstock.
    http://doodah.net/bgb/bgb39.html
    The guitar Cleo Davis is holding in this picture is definitely a J-35, probably brand new. It can be identified as a J-35 by the straight sided peghead with silkscreen logo, the dot inlays, and the large pickguard similar in shape to what Gibson used on the L-00's. The J-35 was available in catalog listings with a natural top starting in 1939. Many were made with natural tops.

    We have a firm date for the introduction of the J-45. It was introduced in August, 1942. J-45's have radiused peghead sides. They had a smaller teardrop shaped pickguard, somewhat similar to a Martin shape, from 1942 to 1954. The silkscreen logo was originally in gold script, and most, if not all of them had the "Only a Gibson is Good Enough" banner in the logo until 1946. By 1948 or '49, the modern block logo had replaced the script. A few early 40's J-50's with a natural finish are said to have been made, but the few that I have seen all had finishes that were suspect.

    A side note: There are some early pictures of Doc Watson with a J-45. Some folks believe that Doc borrowed the guitar from his neighbor, Clint Howard. It has been said that when Doc was first discovered, the only guitar that he owned was a Les Paul.

    Bill Monroe is playing his F-7 in the old Bluegrass Boys photo, and Amos Garren is playing what appears to be a high quality European bass, which may have been the most valuable instrument in the photo at the time it was taken.

    I have heard several rumors about what might have happened to Bill's old D-28. It was said to have been an unusually powerful guitar, which was one reason he preferred his guitar players to use it in those days of performing with a single microphone. I suppose the only person who knows what really happened to it is James Monroe.

    Charlie Monroe used several guitars over the course of his career. The ones that were photographed the most were a Gibson Jumbo and a Martin D-45. There are also several pictures of him playing a herringbone D-28.

    Does anyone know what happened to Bill's F-7?
    Last edited by rcc56; Oct-18-2018 at 1:23am.

  21. #45
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    I helped the Fretboard Journal folks interview Del McCoury last Spring and I asked him about Bill's D-28 herringbone that was stolen - he said it was a 1939 with a long pickguard and that it was Pete Rowen who had it at a party in Nashville and inadvertently left it, he came back for it but it was gone and it has not been seen since. The podcast interview (FJ Podcast #181) is here:

    https://www.fretboardjournal.com/pod...1-del-mccoury/

    The part where Del is talking about Bill's guitar starts at about 15:00. Ronnie talks about his F-5 Loar as well - and Rob talks about his Mastertone banjo.

    Mark

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  23. #46

    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by rcc56 View Post
    The guitar Cleo Davis is holding in this picture is definitely a J-35, probably brand new. It can be identified as a J-35 by the straight sided peghead with silkscreen logo, the dot inlays, and the large pickguard similar in shape to what Gibson used on the L-00's. The J-35 was available in catalog listings with a natural top starting in 1939. Many were made with natural tops.
    FWIW, Bob Dylan is pictured often early in his (folk) career with a natural top J-35, obviously purchased used for that "authentic wandering hobo vibe!"

  24. #47
    Registered User Hendrik Ahrend's Avatar
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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    It should be noted that Bill had two D28 Herringbones stolen. The first one was purchased in 1939 and got stolen in 1947, according to Earl Scruggs (in Ewing: Bill Monroe. The LIfe and Music of the Blue Grass Man, 139). Sometime in 1948-49 Bill would buy another D28, the instrument that got stolen out of James Monroes car while James and Peter Rowan attended a Nashville bar in late June early July 1966 (Ewing, 284).

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  26. #48

    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by allenhopkins View Post
    "Bill's guitar" -- meaning the one that he played on Muleskinner Blues and often took into the studio -- was a '40's vintage Martin D-28 "herringbone." Neil Rosenberg writes in Bill Monroe and the Blue Grass Boys: An Illustrated Discography (p.24):
    Monroe's battered Martin D-28 guitar was used on most recording sessions from the late forties until 1965 when it was stolen from James Monroe's car in Nashville.

    (Though I have heard suspicion cast on whether it was actually stolen, or perhaps sold surreptitiously...)

    Monroe had many many instruments given to him, and I believe he gave some of them to friends and other musicians. He may well have owned a Gibson Blue Ridge, and passed it on to a family member. Like the Ibanez mandolins discussed in another thread, these weren't identified with him, but the D-28 surely was; he had his guitarists record with it because he liked its sound.
    ,...thought it was common knowledge that Bill's D-28 was a 1939, and about the Gibson, that is the one he bought for Cleo to use when he first hired him !,...so likely it was a 1938 or earlier,...looks similar to a J-50, but since was no J-50 that early , had to be a J-35, etc.

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    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by allenhopkins View Post
    Monroe had many many instruments given to him, and I believe he gave some of them to friends and other musicians. He may well have owned a Gibson Blue Ridge, and passed it on to a family member. Like the Ibanez mandolins discussed in another thread, these weren't identified with him, but the D-28 surely was; he had his guitarists record with it because he liked its sound.
    My old radio boss was once offered the job of being Bill's manager; (shortly before Ralph Rinzler was hired - he turned the job down because he was smart enough to realize that the job would eventually go to somebody with more status in the music business).

    Anyhow, one day Bill was at the house of my old boss, noodling around on his mandolin when he noticed one of the kids watching him, awestruck by the sound of the mandolin. When Bill asked the child if he liked the mandolin, the child said 'Yes' and Bill promised to bring him a mandolin, the next time he was in the area . . . unfortunately, the promised exchange never happened. I suppose it would have been very cool to have owned a mandolin given to you by Bill Monroe.

  28. #50

    Default Re: Bill Monroe's guitar

    Quote Originally Posted by Gary Hedrick View Post
    by the way that Gibson guitar player in the "Can't You Hear me Callin' " is more than just a Bluegrass Boy.....that's Charlie Monroe playing that Gibson guitar
    ....-wrong !,...that recoding was well after the days when Charlie and Bill were together !

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