Something entirely different - Mitsuhiro Uchida "Bendaway" Cedar/African Blackwood

[Dustinfurlow]

Hey AGF,

Thought I'd share something unusually rare and captivating. Safe to say I’ve never played or heard anything comparable to this. Some guitars just exist in their own realm and this is one of them—the first and possibly only guitar from legendary luthier Mitsuhiro Uchida I’ll ever get to play, as his work rarely leaves Japan. Many well known master-luthiers--Isaac Jang, Jordon McConnell, Donal McGreevy, and Michael Bashkin have sung his praises.



He has previously described his approach to voicing the sound of his guitars as visualizing light leaving the body…The trebles on this guitar are round and powerful, while the behavior of the midrange is warm and smooth like honey. The response for a light touch is lightning-fast, almost no latency between the attack and the sound. Wear some good headphones for the clips below…Bonkers!



Many may know of Uchida by his innovation of the “bendaway” which Isaac Jang has used for his guitars, but just look at the neck joint that flows into the body, the bridge carve, the rounded violin edges on the soundbox and the headstock design that ensures the strings pull relatively straight for better intonation!







This guitar is a treasure and I’ve been happy to spend some time with it here at Dream Guitars until it is sold. Has anyone else reading this gotten to play one of Mickey's guitars?