Beautifully crafted hand made instruments
Hello, This page highlights hand built instruments that are currently available for sale.
These are new instruments. For a more detailed description scroll to following page. If you are interested in purchasing one of these fine guitars please contact me at 973-445-0015.
Email; jayrose2@earthlink.net.
Prices quoted upon request.
Thank you,
Jay Rosenblatt
If you are interested in purchasing one of these fine guitars please contact me at 973-445-0015.
Busy, Busy Busy, Thats all I can say. The past three months have been work in preparation for my exhibit table at the Woodstock Luthiers Showcase in Woodstock, New York. October 24th, 25th and 26th,. I will have several guitars on display there. All are ready for sale with custom fit Ameritage cases. One just back from finish in the final stages of set-up. (second from left in photo) Hope to have that ready at showtime. The guitars that will be for sale at Woodstock will include a quilted maple parlor, a OOO sized curly maple and lutz spruce guitar, a alaskan sitka topped jumbo with Rosewood back and sides, an all Mahogany Tenor Ukulele and a Bearclaw and curly maple 00. (still under construction). Other items for sale will include LR Baggs pickups and pre-amps and Phil Jones Acoustic amplifiers.
About the guitars in the photo above, here are their ingredients. Maple Parlor Guitar. (far left in top photo) 
Bearclaw Sitka with Maple back and sides OO. (Second From left in top photo)
Big Maple, (second from right in photo at top)
The Prima Fino Geo, 45 year old Alaskan Sitka and East Indian Rosewood. (far right in top photo)
The guitars above when purchased will all come with custom fit Ameritage Cases. These are beautiful and Durable!
Currently on the workbench; In the works. I am currently working on a Mahogany and Sitka venetian cutaway acoustic model. This guitar features Honduran Mahogany back and sides matched to a light curly sitka soundboard. A maple and mahogany geometric rosette adorns the sound hole , curly maple binding with Rope purling and B/W fibre pull it all together. The back bracing is of mahogany with a hybrid X/ladder pattern. The soundboard bracing is forward-X pattern, scalloped and hand tuned sitka. Neck block and tail block of aged mahogany. The neck will be a 9 layer lamination with 40 year old Mahogany and maple strips.
Guitar Building class and Instruction. In the next few months I will be setting up a shop where I can teach guitar building and construction. Group classes of two people per class or individual instruction will be offered. Topics covered from bending sides to carving braces, fretwork to final assembly will be taught in the classes. You can build a guitar too! More information will follow. 
Getting out to play a bit enjoying the fruits of my labor playing my hand built guitars with some friends at Hat City Kitchen’s All Acoustic Open Mic, Orange, NJ
Below are some links to the fine vendors who have provided parts, woods, jigs, cases or finishing.
In conclusion; I hope you can make it up to Woodstock to see these instruments first hand. If you are a player, picker, professional musician or just like to have fun and enjoy music, please come up to Woodstock, New York next week. It will be a great day of music, musicians, and guitars, built by hand and being displayed by their builders. For moder details go to http://www.woodstockinvitational.com
Thanks for reading this blog. Have a great day!
Once again this year I will be exhibiting my guitars at the The Woodstock Invitational Luthiers Showcase 2014.
This event will showcase hand built acoustic guitars and acoustic stringed instruments by their builders.
It will take place in Woodstock, New York, October 24th., 25th., and 26th., 2014. Information can be found at http://www.woodstockinvitational.com.
The weekend is highlighted by musicians performing on the hand built instruments throughout the days.
If you love guitars, fine woodworking and great music this is the place to see and be. Hope to see you there.
Look for me in the Vendor Hall next to the main building. I will also have LR Baggs pickups and pre-amps for sale along with Phil Jones Pure Sound Acoustic amps.
Recently completed; I recently received one of my guitars from my finisher. This instrument came out beautifully. This large bodied guitar, 17 inched across the lower bout, features ;
AAAA Lutz spruce top with Black and white geometric rosette, Back and side are of AAAA Quilted maple. The neck is a 5 piece laminate of 40 year old mahogany with a double maple center strips, an ebony fingerboard with hand cut white gold MOP maple leafs motif, the head plate of ebony with a gold white MOP, JR logo, fingerboard is bound with ebony and a strip of maple, bridge of ebony, the body bound with ebony and b/w purfling and trim. Assembly of major body components are constructed with hide glue.
I recently completed the build of a Walnut parlor guitar. This is currently at the finishing shop getting a nitrocellulose finish.
This steel string acoustic features 50 year old american walnut back and sides, red spruce top, 12 fret to the body 24.9 inch scale length ebony fingerboard on a mahogany neck with slotted headstock, classical tuners with butter bean knobs. Traditional Russian handmade classical rosette, rosewood head plate with abalone JR logo, rosewood bridge, bone nut and saddle. This instrument will be ready for sale by June 2014
Looking back at 2013, it has been a very productive year in the guitar workshop and other areas of my luthier business.
Most recently I completed the closing of a new guitar body. This one is constructed of East Indian Rosewood. The soundboard is from a 40 year old Alaskan Sitka Float Log felled in the 70’s that I purchased from Alaska Specialty Woods in 2010. It has been on my shelf seasoning. The Braces are Sitka from the same supplier. This instrument will be less ornate than my previous builds without to much pearl or embellishments keeping my focus on the sound of this instrument.
The bridge-plate is Rosewood that matches the sides. The center strip is also cut from the remains of the back. The x brace has an ebony inlay into the joint for added stiffness at the center.
This newer body style is smaller and a little more rounded than my large body instruments. It sits comfortably in the lap and has enough body depth to provide a good bass response.
In progress right now is another parlor guitar. This instrument is about 2/3 through the process.
This instrument is constructed of 50 year old American Walnut back and sides. I received an 8 foot by 12″ x 5/4 board as a gift from a friend. There were long checking about a foot into each end of the board. After resawing the boards I was able to salvage 4 sets of backs and sides.
The wood was not quarter sawn but being such an old age is very stable and went together beautifully. The top of this guitar is Red Spruce that I acquired from Carl Barney. The rosette is a classical style, handmade rosette, of wood fiber and very beautiful from LMI. Currently the body is complete, the neck is done a temporarily installed. It needs the nut, bridge, saddle tuner and strings and an initial set up.
Another instrument almost near completion is this quilted maple large bodied guitar.
This one has a Lutz spruce top, ebony geometric rosette, ebony bindings, ebony fingerboard with maple strip inlay, hand cut mother-of-pearl maple leaf position markers, Chippendale headstock design and an ebony bridge.
These photos show it in a test assembly for preliminary setup and is now being spray finished by my good friend and luthier, Tony DiDomenico. This should be completed early 2014.
Earlier this year I finished this beautiful Quilted Maple parlor guitar.
This has a Lutz spruce top, AAAA Quilted Maple back and sides, hand carved mahogany neck with slotted headstock and Schertler tuners, hand made geometric rosette, hand toned back and sides with a golden amber stain. Ebony fingerboard, bridge and headstock, domino dot position markers, Ebony end-graft and ebony bindings .
You can see a full gallery of photos of this beauty here, http://jayrosenblatt.smugmug.com/Handbuiltguitars/Quilted-Maple-Guitar
I have other guitars and projects in the works. This year was also a good year for my repair business. There have been many repairs I have made to keep guitars playable for other musicians. Add to that the addition of the LR Baggs line of pickups and installations and having the Phil Jones line of amps available for sale and I think 2014 will continue to show growth in guitar building and repairs as well.
I want to thank you for reading my blog and I hope you enjoy these posts.
Wishing you all a Happy New year, a great year for playing, music and song.
All my best to you for peace, health and prosperity.
Sincerely,
Jay Rosenblatt.
This past October, 2013 was the Woodstock Invitational Luthiers Showcase in Woodstock, NY. I was thrilled to have a table there exhibiting my guitars. I also had LR Baggs pickups and pre-amps and Phil Jones amps for sale. Business was good.
Many people stopped by. It was a flurry of activity and conversation about guitars, pickups and amplification for three days. Many musicians played my guitars too with great enjoyment.
The amazing Vicki Genfan stopped by and played my Cocobolo and vine guitar. That was amazing. She is amazing. More about Vicki and her music here http://vickigenfan.com/
John Sebastian (The Lovin Spoonful ) also stopped by to say hello and pick a quick tune. Very nice of him indeed.
I was lucky to have Frank Sole, a fabulous guitar player and friend help me all three days of the event. Frank entertained visitors to my booth with his great talent and helped sell allot of amps.
Al Petteway stopped by to ask a few questions about my guitars for a moment. Learn more about Al here http://www.alandamy.com/
All in all it was a great event and I was glad to be part of it and hope to do it again next year.
On October 25th, 26th and 27, 2013 the Woodstock Invitational Luthiers Showcase will take place in Woodstock, New York.
This is an event where the finest in hand-built acoustic guitars and acoustic stringed instruments displayed by their builders and daily performances by many talented musicians come together. http://woodstockinvitational.com/about2013.html
I will have LR Baggs Pickups for sale at my table including the M1-A, The Lyric, The Anthem, Anthem SL, I-Beam and I will also have the Gigpro, Para DI and Venue DI pre-amps for sale. If you need a great acoustic pickup or pre-amp I recommend LR Baggs. You can find me and my exhibit in the Vendors Annex.
I will also have some of my guitars on display to play and to check out the pickups and amps.
Pictured here are some of the LR Baggs products I will have on sale.
Find out more about the LR Baggs product line here http://www.lrbaggs.com/
In my opinion LR Baggs makes the best acoustic pickups and Phil Jones make the most natural sounding amps for Guitars, Basses, and Violins. combine these two together and you have the best acoustic sound available from your instruments.
I recently became a distributor of Phil Jones Pure Sound Amps . I will have the CUB II AG 150 on display at my table and there will also be one in the main building amp room for testing and listening. You can order them from me at the show or by email or telephone. Please look for my information on my “About Page” on this blog.
Pictured here is the Phil Jones CUB AG-150 two channel amp. This is a sweetie of an amp, 100 watts in a very portable package weighing only 15 LBS. 6.8kg. Perfect for the musician that needs portability, great tone and the ability to plug a guitar and mic in when playing small clubs and gigs. It comes with a padded gig bag and an optional stand is available.
Find out more about Phil Jones Products here, http://www.philjonespuresound.com.
Last year at the Woodstock Invitational I made good friends with many of the other builders and also the vendors who will be providing tone woods and parts for the luthier. I got to personally meet John Sebastian who delighted me by playing one of my guitars. I listened to some great performances and was totaly inspired by the great and talented luthiers who participated in the event. Here are some of last years photos.
I hope you can make it to this wonderful event. Please stop by and meet me in the Vendors Annex. Happy playing. Enjoy!
Jay Rosenblatt, Luthier.
