Kay Guitars, who put out Jimmy Reed and Howlin' Wolf models in the 1950s, released three different Barney Kessel models from '57 through '60, starting with the BK Pro and BK Artist up to the BK Jazz Special. Teenaged Eric Clapton is said to have played one of these and they are collector's items today.
Gibson Guitars introduced the Barney Kessel guitar (Regular and Custom models) in 1961 and continued in production through 1974. It was the guitar of choice for many top recording artists including Trini Lopez (who later got his own Gibson model)
Barney's favorite personal guitars that he played extensively, on his own records and world tours, are a 1946/47 Gibson ES 350 modified with a 1939 ES 150 Charlie Christian pickup. Another modification was the replacement of the factory rosewood fingerboard with an ebony board, with dot markers. And he replaced the original Kluson tuning pegs with open-backed Grovers. Kessel's other professional mainstay was an original custom made Ibanez prototype for a proposed Barney Kessel signature model, from the early '70s. His personal guitar collection includes a Roger guitar, made in Germany in the '50s; an Epiphone Broadway from the '30s; along with many others that he played on tons of hit records.
A descriptionof the guitar he is playing in the above video is in bold. Sorry to hijack this thread but Barney Kessel is cool.
Posted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 6:53 pm
by Auriemma
There was someone selling these a while back out of San Fran.
