Boucher Torrified Maple

[St Paul Picker]

I just received on April 23rd, a new Boucher Grand Reserve torrefied maple from Sound Pure out of North Carolina. It is stunning! I normally play a Collings O2H-T or a Santa Cruz OO Eric Skye. First, Boucher guitars are every bit on the level with Collings and Santa Cruz which makes them quite a bit under-priced IMHO. After talking with the folks at Sound Pure (those guys are awesome!) about my preferences for a fingerstyle guitar, they recommended the Boucher as the best fingerstyle guitar in their shop-regardless of price. That's a heck of a claim considering their inventory. I can tell you the videos you see online are very accurate in terms of getting an appreciation of the sustain and the clarity of the notes. It is a bit brighter sounding because of the maple. I do intend to experiment with some different strings (John Pearse 600Ls and some Martin Marquis) to see how it reacts. The quality matches Collings and Santa Cruz step for step: AAAA woods, bone saddles and nuts, precise as hell Gotoh tuners. I normally want/need a short-scale guitar, but the neck on this guitar is so nicely contoured that even I can get my thumb around to grab some basses. Jazz blues sound awesome as well as any piano songs arranged for guitar. It definitely has a piano like clarity to it. I have owned a couple of Lowdens, but it plays way easier than those and doesn't have the overtones that Lowdens are known for (it is maple after all). Bottomline: If Boucher guitars were located in the US, you would be paying 7-9K for it instead of $5K. It's worth every penny and I suspect all of Boucher guitars are. FYI, I traded my Santa Cruz 1929 OOO (all hog) for it and don't regret it one bit. I can't recommend the folks at Sound Pure and Boucher guitars enough.

[NickTuneUp]

I had one in my studio for a bit and it was absolutely amazing. Everyone kept asking me to describe the tone. The best I could do is to describe it as incredibly clear. I think that's what people hear when they are comparing it to a "piano" like tone. I have a dreadnought on order with the torrefied maple. Really excited for that one. Here is a demo videos we did before it sold.

[vintageom]

I own a Boucher HG 56 12-fret 000 slotted headstock model. The guitar has wide open tone and sounds old and played-in without intentional factory wear and tear done to it.

It was not a guitar I was looking to try when I entered the shop. Collings, Martin, Bourgeois, Atkin, Lowden, and Santa Cruz were. I went home with the Boucher because it sounded the best.

The guitar is also visually stunning with flawless build detail. It is as perfect inside the box as outside, I have looked very closely. It is rare that I do not have to have a setup done on a new guitar. Mine did not need anything. It was perfectly setup off the wall of the shop. Once I got it home I tried a capo. This guitar suffers no ill-effect of using a capo high up the neck.. Every note rings pure and in tune across the 6 strings. That was a pleasant bonus.

I have spent a lot of money over several decades on famous headstock names and have passed on some little-known boutique builder’s guitars that sounded terrific and I finally used only my ears and hands on this one. No regrets.