Chartwell Guitar

2019 Andreas Kirmse double top

Woods:  South American rosewood back and sides, western red cedar over cedar top, Spanish cedar neck. French polish shellac throughout.

Specs: 650mm scale, 53mm nut, 44mm string spacing at nut, 58mm at saddle. Elevated fingerboard; arched, braceless back, 12 hole tie block with pearl inlay.  Modified radial bracing with rosewood struts running under bridge. Hiscox case.

Condition: new

Comment: this being the third Andreas Kirmse double top guitar to come into my shop, and being a custom order, I am very excited to present the purest of performance guitars–this Leipzig luthier is producing guitars that belong in the class of renowned German double top builders, such as Dammann, Wagner, Mueller, etc.  The warm, breathy voice that issues from this lovely instrument is unique to Andreas’s design, but the energy is what any guitarist, hobbyist or performer, would want. For those of us who drive Hondas, this is a Porsche.  Looking under the hood, however, yields interesting departures from the normal bracing pattern. The modified radial bracing star design hints at what Simon Marty made famous with his guitars, and the moulded, braceless back is another Australian influence.  The difference is in the weight and heft, this being a light instrument, thus eliminating the big, boomy, rounded response of the heavy Aussie instruments. Andreas has collaborated with Gregory Byers over the years, and my guess is this radial pattern is simply a variation on Byers’s lattice design. Both allow the top to be thinned to dangerous proportions; the rosewood struts that run under the bridge add stability just where it is needed.