Martin
If you say acoustic guitar, you might as well say Martin, because thanks to C.F. Martin, acoustic guitars are the way we all know and love them today.
At The Fellowship of Acoustics we are more than just fans of Martin guitars, we are deep admirers.
Why?
Because Martin is the inventor of the acoustic guitars as we know them today. Without the C.F. Martin & Co Guitar Company, we might still just be playing nylon strings because guitars with steel strings would simply break down within a few years, maybe months.
Without Martin, the most popular acoustic guitar model: the dreadnought would not exist, Eric Clapton 'Unplugged' was never recorded and John Mayer would be just an empty handed singer half the time.
We feel that thanks to Martin, the world just looks and sounds a little bit nicer.
History
If you buy a Martin guitar, you get more than an instrument. You will get a piece of almost two centuries of guitar history, because Christian Frederik Martin left Germany in 1833 to try his luck in the United States.
With great success, because Martin was one of the first luthiers to make a good steel string guitar thanks to a new bracing pattern: the X-bracing. Revolutionary then, but nowadays this is the standard for steel string guitars because it provides just the right firmness to resist the tension of the strings, while also leaving enough room for the top to vibrate.
The dreadnought
After the X-brace, another great discovery came from Nazareth, Pennsylvania. The dreadnought.
This Guitarmodel was conceived by Martin a little over a century ago to be able to compete with a banjo and a mandolin in a band without any amplification. The more classical guitar-based ‘concert’ model got somewhat lost in those ensembles. So Martin made the neck a little longer, the body a bit bigger and deeper and all of that just enough to still remain playable. After some experimenting the Orchestra Model D (for Dreadnought) was born.
Een gouden greep, want naast meer volume biedt een dreadnought ook een anders klinkende balans tussen de snaren. Akkoorden strummen klinkt vaak fraaier en als je er met plectrum hard ingaat, blijft een dreadnought goed overeind. Echte alleskunners! Het model is sindsdien het meest populaire
Het model is sindsdien het meest populaire model voor akoestische gitaristen, want ook andere bouwers doken er bovenop. Het maakt Martin een gitaarmerk dat veel is gekopieerd, maar zelden geëvenaard. De Martin D18 en de D28 zijn tot op de dag van vandaag de ‘Vader en Moeder aller dreadnoughts’
Choosing a Martin guitar
Due to its rich history and never ending innovation, Martin now offers a very wide range of guitars for every budget. The 'Little Martins' are a nice starting point due to its compact size and friendly price and certainly no toys! Ed Sheeran conquered the world with his Little Martin. Next in line are the Junior, Road, ‘1’, X and Re-Imagined-Serie with throughout the entire range a wide choice of models, tonewoods and so much more
In our store in Dedemsvaart we dedicated a special 'Martin-Room' to this brand allowing you to try as many as we can get our hands on, just like Hannah Mae!
Do you have special guitarwishes? Then the Martin Custom Shop offers the opportunity to realize that dream. The same team that builds guitars for John Mayer, Eric Clapton and many other great guitarplayers will then turn your wishes into tonewood! We can help with this once in a lifetime experience, because The Fellowship of Acoustics is one of the 35 dealers worldwide who can call themselve Martin Custom Shop Expert .
If you want to know more about the possibilities, please feel free to contact us..