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The Ultimate Guitar Book

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The First Paperback Edition of The Definitive Reference Work On The Guitar, And The Most Beautiful Book On The Subject Ever Produced

"When you get right down to it, these guitars represent something uniquely American . . . You're transported to a place where it's always Saturday night in the summertime, a place where cars are fast and girls are pretty. And when you pull into the parking lot and cut the engine, you can hear the music and know that everybody's inside, twisting the night away." --David Nicholson, Washington Post Book World

A stunning visual guide to the history and development of this instrument -featuring specially commissioned photographs of famous, rare, and vintage guitars, from the earliest acoustics to the latest electrics. Packed with construction and design information, and with detailed, informative profiles on everything from the legendary (Martin, Gibson, Fender) to the weird, the exotic, and the oddball (Burns, Hagstrom, Danelectro, to name a few), The Ultimate Guitar Book brings each instrument to life and makes immensely pleasurable browsing for players and collectors alike, from beginner to professional.

192 pages, Paperback

First published September 15, 1991

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About the author

Tony Bacon

59 books10 followers

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5 stars
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35 (40%)
3 stars
15 (17%)
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
Profile Image for Sean.
42 reviews
April 18, 2019
A crash course in guitar history more specifically electric guitars.
It is not a technical book, so there are no details or plans in crafting, repair and construction.
Good full color photos that show the beauty of all the various builds.
It does inspire ideas for potential construction if you are a budding luthier.

5 reviews
March 23, 2022
Lovely book with lots of beautiful photos. A short history of guitars, showing wonderful pictures about guitars from the 16th century until today. Electric, acoustic and electro-acoustic guitars, telling more about popular ones like Fender and Gibson.
Profile Image for mookie kong.
76 reviews
August 26, 2017
Very cool visual book of guitars. The text was good and informational, but it's the pictures that make the book so awesome.
Profile Image for Bence Tóth.
Author 2 books4 followers
December 13, 2019
A wonderful book that takes you to a world full of beauty. Perfectly illustrated, exciting book - one of the best of it's kind.
Profile Image for Luke.
5 reviews
April 18, 2012
I enjoyed this text because I have gotten into the guitar and it talks about all of the different guitars and how they are different. I especialy like the pages about gibson and the es 335. I think the way they explain all about the guitars history is cool. You can look up basicly any guitar and you can find all about it. I like how they have been so thorough.

Reading this text taught me about all the different types of guitars there are and how the electric guitar was made. It is fasinating how the electric guitar works. It doesn't actually use the sound of the guitar at all. It uses the vibrations of the strings and it amplifies the sound to make a note or a chord. The writer was very good at getting all the technical information across without making it boring.
Profile Image for Caitlin.
33 reviews10 followers
April 30, 2013
Nice introduction for a beginning guitar player, although my edition is from 1990 and an updated version might be more helpful!
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews

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