Kyle | soldguitars

(FOR SALE)

1969 Framus 5/59 Sorella Archtop

#51053

"Kyle"

What a lovely, elegant guitar this is. It was made by the boys at Framus in West Germany in May 1969, and they did a cracking job. Of course, Framus are still making guitars in Germany (by hand ... very nicely), and also make Warwick bases, like "Claudia" and "Dionne". This feels great, sounds great and (I think ...) looks great too. At least it looks great NOW, given that I put in about 5 hours of minor repairs and clean-up / set-up time. Nasty.

So the story I got was that this was bought from new by my boy "old fat cockney Eric", who used to be in the British Army, and was posted to a German base in the late 60's. The British base was shared with some Yankee troops, and several of the swanky Yank boys owned Fenders and Gibsons. Back in those days, such things were PROPER luxury items over here, so old fat Cockney Eric (probably young thin Cockney Eric in the late 60's) bought the best that he could find locally ... and, as he was in Germamy, he opted for something German. And here she is. One previous owner, and (now) in great nick. The nitro finish is deep and awesome, and is cracking in places, but that's what happens to old nitro paint, and it's cool as a cucumber.

So. This is a single cutaway big-bodied archtop acoustic, with no internal bracing on the big chunk of timber that makes up the back of the body, and just a touch of bracing to strengthen the top, between the f-holes where the bridge sits. As should be the case of course, the timber bridge (which is adjustable for height) simply sits on top of the guitar, and isn't fastened to it at all, held in place only by the pressure from the strings. The bridge is the only point of contact with the top, as the tailpiece is attached to the base (next to the bottom strap pin) and the fingerboard isn't attached to the top, but floats over it. The idea is that the top is allowed to resonate fully for maximum volume and (ahem) "better tone". No shit. This is a LOUD guitar, and is warm, rich, zingy and complex.

Inside, it is all very tidy, with the non-braced back looking HUGE ... really a rather pleasant place to be, although I'm presuming that it's rather loud in there. The central section of the top between the immaculately cut f-holes is sagging a LITTLE (aren't we all?), presumably due to the stupidly high pressure from the strings pressing into the top through the bridge. Despite 45 years worth of muck and shite having inevitably found its way inside, I spent a fair while shaking it upside down to get the shite OUT from inside ... that brought back happy memories of trying to shake the "lost forever" plectrum out of my sister's cheap-ass acoustic when I was 7 years old. Aaah, happy days. Also, I don't know what the hell Eric used to clean it with, but it smells A LOT like a church .... all part of its charm I suppose.

The tailpiece is marked "Sorella", and is original. I suspect that the two-piece timber bridge assembly isn't original, but hey, this isn't a museum piece ... it's here to be played. The finish (which I mentioned is crazing nicely and is obviously nitrocellulose) was called "black rose", and is a nice deep red-to-black sunburst. The original pickguard was fitted when it got here, and attaches to the lower bout with a metal strut (Les Paul style) and to the bottom edge of the floating fretboard. Fair enough, but as it is as ugly as shit, it was removed and consigned to the equally ugly, beat-to-shit hardwood case (covered in German wartime transfers) that the guitar came in.

To cap this off with a bit of entirely useless trivia, these were made from 1958 through to 1972. This was an unusual purchase for me, given that it all happened within a couple of hours. I normally think carefully about throwing money at guitars. However, I developed a fancy for an old Archtop during a tea break at work, hit eBay, saw it, agreed a price (off eBay of course), then picked it up from my boy Eric on the way to my hotel that evening, as I had a case to work on away from home the next day. All happened within a few hours. And I'm very glad it did.