AcornHouse
Venerated Member
Saw this pic of Carol Kaye in FB with what looks like a Starfire III 12 string. Custom order? Something else? Hans?
Carole Kay said:I got a Gibson 12-string acoustic and turned a Guild electric into a 12-string electric before they ever made electric 12-strings for studio work.
Saw this pic of Carol Kaye in FB with what looks like a Starfire III 12 string. Custom order? Something else? Hans?
So what did she play it on?
He calls her a 1959 one in a YouTube video. But also based on the pickguard I would say it is clearly a 1956 or latest an early 1957 one as in 1957 they started with the Chesterfield inlay or the diagonal script logo inlay. Bridge and pickups or just pickup covers are obviously replaced.This article about Ray Bonneville popped up while I was reading the "Vintage Guitar" article. In the photo, he appears to be playing a mid-50's Aristocrat M-75 with black pickup covers.
I was there in Fife and Nichols when Carol picked up the converted Guild 12. She was coming down the stairs from Milt Owens tiny shop above the guitar shop and Seymour Drugan, the store manager, introduced us. I was 14. Mr Drugan was a great subtle mentor to me, showing me that music was a life and guitars could be at the center of it. I hung around there whenever I could and I knew to be respectful there, if no where else; Mr. Drugan always introduced me to any stars that came in. Seeing Carol's converted 12 Guild let me to have Milt Owen do the same thing to a sunburst I bought a year or so later for that purpose. BTW, Milt Owen did something more interesting than Carol's explanation that he "fitted the extra six strings on the peghead." He actually extended the peghead by splicing in an extra piece of mahogany and refinishing the new longer head. That way he kept the logo and shape intact. Amazing work, beautifuly done; an inspiration for my later work as a luthier.Hello Chris,
That guitar was made during a period that Guild did not have an electric 12-string as part of the line. It was made from a T-100 by Milt Owen at the request of Carol Kaye.
Sincerely,
Hans Moust
www.guitarsgalore.nl
Carol Kaye is a legend, but I was surprised to learn that she played on early Mothers records. I didn't know Zappa ever used studio musicians on his albums.
"On the Freak Out! album Frank had his own bass player and drummer but the rest were studio musicians: Tommy Tedesco on lead guitar on Zappa's recordings, Dennis Budimir and Carol Kaye on 12-strings. . . ."
You mean Jimmy Carl Black and Elliot Ingber didn't play on the album?!
In addition to the Mothers, some tracks featured a "Mothers' Auxiliary" that consisted of additional session players, including noted "Wrecking Crew" members Gene Estes, Carol Kaye and Mac Rebennack (aka Dr. John), guitarist Neil Levang, and jazz-soul pianists Eugene DiNovi and Les McCann, with vocal contributions by Paul Butterfield, Kim Fowley, Jeannie Vassoir and future Mother Jim Sherwood. Several orchestral musicians, who were also mostly credited as members of the Auxiliary (including their contractor, Benjamin Barrett), also made contributions to several songs at certain sessions, chiefly in the form of backing tracks on those songs.
I'm actually kind of relieved to read this -- I discovered the Mothers as a teenager (starting with Absolutely Free when it was issued) and would -- for some reason -- have been kind of bummed out to know my assumptions about who played on them were wrong.
My favorite Mothers albums are still the first seven or eight. I stopped listening to Zappa, post Mothers, around Grand Wazoo.