Fan of the Week

October 7th, 2011

Steve Howell is one of our long-time, great clients, living in East Texas.  We delivered his second Batson to him this week.  It is a Grand Concert Model of Brazilian Rosewood and Adirondack Spruce.

This is what Steve had to say about it:

“Well, I finally got a chance to sit down with my new guitar for a couple of hours and I have to tell you – I couldn’t be happier, man. I won’t take up your time tonight by calling up and going on and on about every single little thing, but I will tomorrow.

You and Cory are The Men Amongst Men. It was immediately my favorite out of the 15 guitars I own. Please let Cory know how grateful I am for the effort and workmanship of the two of you. I’m the president of your fan club.”

Steve is also a pretty incredible musician, taking great care to bring back some of music’s somewhat lost and forgotten gems, such as the Delta Blues, rural acoustic and traditional jazz.

Go to his website and check out some of his sample tracks on cdbaby.  http://www.stevehowell.ws/music.cfm

By the way, this is what Steve said of his first Batson (a Ziricote and Carpathian Spruce Parlor model)

“My Batson Parlor model is one incredibly sweet guitar. I have owned many high-end acoustics (major names and handmade by top luthiers) and archtops in the 47 years I’ve been playing guitar and this one is right up there with the very best of them.The workmanship is absolutely impeccable and the innovations that the Batsons have pioneered are not only practical, but advance the evolution of the construction and the sound of the instrument in very aesthetic ways. The tone directed straight toward the player’s ears is wonderful and intimate.

The cantilevered neck extension and tailpiece truly let the top sing just as advertised. The use of an incredibly designed tailpiece routing the strings into holes that bring the strings up over the bone in a traditional fixed bridge is a brilliant hybrid of the archtop design and traditional flattop design. It creates a string pull that is very responsive to the fingers but fights back just enough to allow the player to “dig in” if he wants to without creating a bunch of undesirable sounds. The Carpathian spruce top sings like an angel and the bearclaw woven into the grain is super cool. This is a truly beautiful, consummately playable tone machine.”

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