Modern ebony

chazmo

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Stewart-MacDonald has continued advertising their back/side wood sets and I just thought you guys would like to see this. I don't know how long it'll be up on the site, but below is the link to Stew-Mac to see all the Crelicam-sourced ebony sets they're offering.

Y'know, the days of ebony-colored ebony may be gone, but to me this stuff is just exquisite. Then again, I'm a sucker for bear-claw Sitka too. :) I just think this is incredibly beautiful stuff. Far more desirable (to me) than what flat ebony would've been for a guitar body/side tonewood. Maybe a flat-black fingerboard is more desirable, but clearly not for the body. Well, not to me anyway. I would think the same is true for furniture or whatever else ebony wood is used for!

These prices aren't exactly low, but if this is what it takes to maintain the supply of ebony in the modern world, then I have to say I'm not disappointed. I guess I'm still a Bob Taylor fan even if I don't particularly love their guitars. Can the same thing be done for rosewood and mahogany????

https://www.stewmac.com/Materials_a...il&utm_source=NPA&utm_content=0718_C_20180927
 

Westerly Wood

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Interestingly enuff, or maybe not, a bluegrass pro came over house last night to put my Santa Cruz thru its paces. I am selling it. It would be his "low-end" dread when he travels. He has some gigs overseas coming up so he dont want to bring his Collings or 1937 Martin D-18 with him. I was cracking up that this would be his bottom model he owns. Anyway he brought these guitars with him and an amp to make sure the Cruz was up to par. It sounded better than the D-18 of course but the Collings slope was so powerful. Anyway, he likes it but is going to mull it over and wait for $ from a gig upcoming he has in Boise. I know long story, but i mention all this, as I was sitting in our living room and listening to him really play, man the Cruz sounds great. but the ebony fretboard Hoover and co used on this 2008 example is so clean looking, so black.

anyway, i really enjoyed just listening to a bluegrass player really play his craft. it was a total joy. He even put EJ17s on it to really get the full test run, and he stayed at my house for 90 minutes. It was a blast. We will see if he buys it or not, but he is definitely the dude I want to sell it to as I know it will get really used. it will be his workhorse. He knows tony rice too or did at one point, and tony even used his Santa Cruz model he had way back, a tony rice model, but i do not remember the story well enuff to share.

to Chaz's point, the ebony on my Cruz is "exquisite"...

course if sale does go thru, i got most of the $ going someplace else, but a bit of it i plan on buying the '74 D35 on local CL :) if it still around...then I will have returned full circle to the Guild stash I had when I joined the LTG. not that that is my ultimate goal but I would have quite the nostalgic grin if that were the case in a week or two. I just do not need the expensive high end guitars guys anymore, my focus is so other wise now in life. And to have a couple old Westerly RI guild dreads for me and my kinds to play, well, count me grateful then.
 
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AcornHouse

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Remember, there are different kinds of ebony. This Crelicam ebony is coming from Cameroon. Gabon ebony is usually the blackest, but even that can be streaky, and finding an all black log big enough for a back is almost impossible. African Blackwood, a different species, is more common as a back/sides set, and can be blacker.
 

chazmo

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Chris, what I remember reading about the Crelicam ebony is that they've been incentivizing their cutters to harvest trees that were left in the forests because of their "impure," striped nature. I think these were from the same forests that they used to harvest the pure, black wood. So, likely same species, right?

I'm talking out my patootie of course. :) Just set me straight if I'm completely clueless.
 

AcornHouse

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Yes, both Diospyros crassiflora, but the Crelicam did have a var. name as well after that. So, same species. I wonder how the initial cutters knew the were impure stripey before harvesting?
 

chazmo

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Oh, right. They don't know until they cut 'em... My understanding was they cut them down and left 'em on the forest floor if they were striped, Chris. Horrible waste!
 

swiveltung

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Hard to find Ebony like the old stuff for sure. My 69(?) M75 Bluesbird (hollow) had an ebony board that was total black and smooth. It was hard to actually see grain in the wood. Kinda like Flat Black plastic.
 

Rayk

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Oh, right. They don't know until they cut 'em... My understanding was they cut them down and left 'em on the forest floor if they were striped, Chris. Horrible waste!

Yeah sad , I’m think Taylor has a vid of this and partly because of it they started using the colored Ebony trying to protect the tree ms and limit the waste .

A good watch but I don’t have the linkage .

The wood is gorgeous any way you look at it :)

Here’s a vid of Ben Wilborn with one of his Bantum acoustics with Ebony B&S which has a very cool look he just describes it as black and white .
 
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