Heritage guitars not only look and sound incredible but they are also priced affordably especially considering that they are made by some of Gibson’s old employees at Gibson’s old factory. When the Gibson Guitar Corporation closed its Kalamazoo, Michigan factory in September of 1984 and moved all production to its Nashville, Tennessee plant, some of the employees preferred to stay in Kalamazoo. Three men in particular, Jim Deurloo, Marvin Lamb, and JP Moats, decided to start a guitar manufacturing business and Heritage Guitar Inc. was born. The new guitar manufacturer purchased one of Gibson’s old factory buildings and by 1985 the first Heritage guitars were being produced.

I have always enjoyed the sound and feel of hollow body guitars and at one time my collection contained a trio of Gibson guitars; Tal Farlow, ES-295, and Howard Roberts in addition to a Gretsch Country Gentleman. One day while killing some time before leaving for vacation, I was awe struck by the large number of Heritage guitars my local LA dealer had in stock. I played a few and while they sounded great, they felt just “okay” in my hands, but that all changed when I cradled this 550 model. It was love at first sight and the workmanship, finish, neck profile and more importantly the sound (even unplugged) floored me. I was so into this guitar that twenty minutes passed before I even plugged the guitar in to an amplifier. I always loved the sound of a good hollow body guitar unplugged and it was rather ironic that what instantly sold me on this guitar was her amplified sound. By mistake, I had selected the amplifiers “dirty” setting rather than the warm jazz (clean) setting. I could not believe it as I heard the open E chord ring out with heavy distortion. The sound was identical to that heard on the Who song, “Who are You” and I later learned that Pete Townsend used a Gretsch 6120 for that recording. I could not resist and was playing Pete Townsend - Who riffs for ten minutes or more before the sales person encouraged me to check out her clean sounds. This guitar impressed me more than any other guitar I have ever played.

The sequence of events that followed were rather unfortunate, as the manager of the store accused me of wasting their time, assuming I had no intention of buying the guitar. While probably an innocent mistake on his part, it really set me off and after going ballistic, I stormed out of the store. My girlfriend finally calmed me down out in the parking lot when the manager came out and apologized. It proved to be an innocent misunderstanding, as he was not aware that I had been talking with the salesperson before playing the guitar. I suspect though, that my ten-minute marathon of playing “Who are You” at a high volume didn’t help matters, lol. While haggling over the “out the door” price, unfortunate event #2 occurred. Unknown to me, the price for Heritage guitars does not include a case and when he added on another $200 for a case I was mad as hell. After he assured me that the price for Heritage guitars did not include a case (I later found out that this was true) and throwing in two free sets of strings, I bought her and rushed home to play more Who songs. I was so into this guitar that I could not resist taking her on vacation with us later that week. Plus, it was a great conversation piece, noting how I had gone off on the manager.

The guitar is a 17” single cutaway with a laminated arch flamed maple top and back and features a multiple white bound top, single white bound back; solid curly maple rim and a single white bound pickguard. The pickguard, like the guitar body, is made from figured maple and finished in the same way. The soft shaped cutaway and the bound f-holes are classy touches and add to her overall elegance.

The three-piece curly maple neck is a little more beefy than my Charvels but still feels great. The guitar has a 25 ½” scale and the bound ebony fingerboard is completed with split block mother of pearl inlays. The headstock has a single white bound mother of pearl inlaid head veneer and the back of the headstock is painted black, as is commonly seen on Gibson jazz guitars.

There is not much more to say, top notch quality, cosmetically stunning and the sound unplugged or plugged makes this guitar a home run. I am still amazed how good this guitar sounds in both jazz and hard rock situations. To me though, every time I play this guitar through an amp, I cannot resist switching to the “dirty” channel and doing Who songs such as “Who are You” or “Baba O’Reilly”. Talk about a wolf in sheep’s clothing, who would have thought that this jazz guitar could rock so hard! The morals of this story are; buy a new guitar before you travel, do not let guitar store managers belittle you and don’t stereotype a guitar for certain sounds/styles. Oddly, I have since sold all my other jazz guitars except this one, yes, she is that good and I still enjoy playing her plugged or unplugged.