Posted by Manendra Pedris on February 2, 2015, 8:18 pm
This is the first ever photo I've seen of Jim playing an archtop guitar. From the headstock shape it seems to be a D'Angelico. Every other photo I've seen of him with a guitar, had him with a flattop. I was pleasantly surprised to see this.
I believe Jim is playing a Gibson ES 125, which was an archtop electric guitar and it may be the "T" model which had the florentine cutaway. (It looks like it in that photo). But that was actually Leo Jackson's guitar, which Leo only played up to about 1956. (This studio photo stems from the 1955-56 period). After that, Leo got a Fender Stratocaster, which he used until July, 1959 when he got out the Army and resumed working for Jim. Then Leo traded the Stratocaster for a Fender Jazzmaster.
For most of Jim's career he played an acoustic guitar, and you can see him doing this in the Oslo concert featured in the DVD I helped produce, "The Great Jim Reeves Anthology" 2014 edition, which has 30 live video performances by Jim. (Order it below).
"Wildwood Flower" was about the only song Jim could play the lead on and he practiced and practiced to be able to do it.
Jim was, however, an excellent rhythm guitar player and prided himself on being able to play "bar chords," in other words making chords without "open strings." He even played on the sessions of other artists, including Johnny Horton.
You may also have noticed something very unusual about the way Jim played guitar. As I describe in my book, he used a saxophone strap around his neck, and would loop it underneath his guitar and hook it to the bottom part of the sound hole. Thus the instrument rested on this strap. He could hook and unhook this so quickly you wouldn't notice it, and instead of letting it dangle in front of him when he wasn't playing guitar, he would put the loose end in the breast pocket of his jacket. Then when he'd get ready to play again, he'd take it out and fasten it to the underside of the guitar again.
The reason Jim did not like to use a conventional guitar strap is because of the fact that when he was a young man still living in Texas, he was involved in a car accident in which he broke his collar bone. (He hit a horse in the road and the horse's head came through the windshield and injured Reeves). Then, when he was at the doctor's having it set, Jim fell off the stool and re-broke it. So it never completely healed properly and there was a little knob on one side of his collarbone.
Edith Grace, one of his first serious girlfriends, told me how when she'd rest her head against his chest she could feel that little knob.
This injury bothered him the rest of his life. As Ted Staples, his close Texas buddy confirms, Jim also had a little bit of a limp from the leg injury he sustained on the baseball diamond, when he slipped and hurt the sciatic nerve in his leg. It ended his baseball career.
So despite the beautiful music he created, Jim had some physical ailments. These included ulcers that plagued him so badly he said he'd give a million dollars to get rid of them, an athlete's heart, nose bleeds in the later years of his life, a tendency to get what he called "that dreaded bronchial flu," ear aches and high blood pressure. He would get very sick from the shots he had to take in order to go on his foreign tours, and they would leave him bedridden. He also sometimes suffered while on the road, once performing with a 102 fever. Leo Jackson remembered a time or two Reeves got laryngitis but managed to perform anyway. And you know that the weekend before he got killed, he was suffering from a bad cold and went to the doctor on Friday, July 24th, and got a prescription for cough syrup. (I have the bottle with part of the syrup still in it).
Of course, the fans don't know all those things when they listen to the man sing. His voice was out of this world and it sounded so calm and in control...
Gee, you only asked about the guitar and I went off and did a dissertation! Hope I didn't bore you.
That guitar is definitely NOT a Gibson. That headstock design is characteristic of the D'Angelico. In fact, this guitar that Jim is playing must be Chet's guitar. Jim may have borrowed Chet's guitar for the session or just for a few minutes.
Check out the zoomed photo of the headstock design:
Now, here is a photo of Chet's 1950 D'Angelico Excel.
EVEN IF the guitar that Jim is playing is not Chet's guitar, it's DEFINITELY a D'Angelico. In addition to the headstock shape, compare the headstock inlay design as well as the length and shape of the name (logo) at the top of the headstock.
Look at the top part of the guitar Jim is holding, on the face, directly above the strings. There is something there that is not on the Atkins guitar you posted the picture of.
Jim did indeed play a Gibson on occasion and there are photos of him with it.
But you could be right about the make of the guitar he is holding. It's just very strange he'd be playing it on a session. I wonder what song he played this guitar on? Of course, we don't know but what this was just a posed picture for publicity reasons and not a real recording session. Notice there is nobody else in the studio. The photo was shot through the control room window.
Larry, that pic you posted of Jim with Chet does indeed clarify it's the same guitar he's holding in the pic I posted. If you look carefully at the pickguard in your photo and mine, the shape appears to be identical. As for the top part above the strings, that may be just a play on light. There may actually not be anything there.
I'm pretty sure the guitar in both photos (yours and mine) is one and the same.
Upon further inspection of my photo, I think what you see on the top face of the guitar above the strings is the reflection of the wall or whatever is on Jim's front-right. The reflection is deformed by the shape of the arch of the guitar top. The reflection begins above the strings and ends just below the f-shaped sound hole.
This is indeed the same guitar as the one Jim is holding in the photo you posted of Jim and Chet. In fact, the two photos may have been taken on the same day. The suit Jim is wearing appears to be the same on both photos.
It is amazing that Jim could perform while suffering from a cold, or a fever, or laryngitis. And especially while suffering from those things could even get close to his real voice.
Chet's guitar as shown in manendra's exhibition photo is quite different from that in larry's clarified photo - just look st the design elements on the body above and below the strings. Moreover I think the original photo is a recording session as the two onlooking figures have a formal stance in looking towards Jim. I guess these photos are from different sessions with different guitars? Regards Rodney
Yes, the body of Chet's 1950 D'Angelico Excel is different to the one Jim is holding. This difference became clear only after Larry posted that photo of Jim and Chet together with Jim holding a D'Angelico. Chet's guitar in the display case is electric. It has two pickups, a volume and tone control knobs, and a switch to select pickups. The D'Angelico Jim is holding seems to be a purely acoustic design with no signs of pickups or volume/tone control knobs.
BUT, the two guitars (in my photo with Jim and Larry's photo with Jim) are one and the same. And that guitar that Jim is holding is a D'Angelico.
I posted the photo of Chet's 1950 D'Angelico Excel mainly to illustrate the headstock and inlay design in order to identify the brand. This was before Larry posted that photo with Jim and Chet thus confirming the brand.
Significant differences remain between your picture of the guitar JR is playing at the mike and that of Larry's clarification photo. First in Larry's photo there are distinctive white marks to the left and right - these cannot be tricks of the light as there are no supporting shAdows to support the required angle of illumination. They are clearly some form of embossment not on the other guitar Second in Larry's picture below the strings on the main body is the white line rim(jagged) followed by the white line or rim of the main body - there is vid tally no difference in spacing on yjese white lines where it sits on Jim's knee yet in your picture there is a clear spacing. Hence the photos show similar but different guitars.
I found another photo online to support the fact that Jim is playing the same guitar. In fact, judging by Jim's and Chet's suits as well as floor pattern and carpet, it seems very clear to me that all three photos were taken the SAME DAY inside the studio.
Since my initial post, I found another photo from the same session and that photo gives a different perspective of the room setting as well as a clearer view of the guitar, which, being an archtop, I found Jim playing it to be unusual since this is the first an only instance I've seen of Jim playing an archtop guitar.
Also note the wall clock on the second photo. The time is close to 3 o'clock. I am assuming that to be 3 pm. Had this been Elvis, I'd have said it was 3 am! :-)
If one observes the floor pattern jim has moved considerably in position - one is checked the other plain. Moreover one has an overhead mic the other stand up. Moreover observe the fret board - the spacing on the fret board. Hord supports ie the white lines running across the fret board clearly have different spaces in comparison to your photos. Moreover I guess jim wore that suit on many different occasions, even his shoes appear different.
Yes, absolutely. On a different note it's interesting to see that the photo of jr facing ca is very staged - Chet has officious pens in his pocket He has a razor sharp shade in his hair His hand in his leg is so unnatural The sanel amp is stuck in to reflect the pickup on the guitar They both have identical suits ties and shirts Posers or what!
The lights in studio b were long fluorescents mounted in the high ceiling. Hence the dominant light direction was downwards. In the photo of jim sitting on the chair note the shadows of the chair legs are thus almost directly below the chair. This overhead lighting is also reflected in the relative brightness of Chet's hand and the darker tones underneath him of what he is sitting on. Hence the white object above the strings cannot be a reflection from where the observer/photo taker is placed. It is most likely a pickup - it was fairly common practice to mount fixed pickups in this location.
A brief history of this guitar
Posted by Manendra Pedris on February 6, 2015, 11:56 am, in reply to "Different guitars?"
I posted these photos on an archtop guitar group. A musician from Tennessee by the name of Michael Mosier had this to say about the guitar Jim is playing in those photos:
"It is Chet's with a new neck and top. The neck was broke in'53/'54. Gibson had the trussrod patent so DA didn't have one when made in 1950. Chet's was restored to an accoustic, this time, with the trussrod, and I can see its plate above the nut. The dead giveaway is the small F holes, which would be more responsive as an electric should he wish to make it so again. In '95, Chet and Paul Yandell would re-install the pickups, controls and vibrola. He would use it on Almost Alone."
Michael had obtained this information from Chet's last book, "Me and My Guitars."
According to Michael, the following clip is from Chet's first recording with his D'Angelico in January 1951:
I am always wary of definitive accounts from guys on these web sites who speak with conviction of what happened around 60 years ago. Looks like we have even more unknowns in Rumstelt fashion - bases on larry's book jr met ca for the first time 22 December 1955 in studio b, jr was 32 and ca was 31. Calayed on this session with his electric guitar so obviously doesnt tie up with the guy on the website. Ca was deputising so it is unlikely the photo of both was taken then However it may have been take Within the next say 3 years as Jim's toupe was bouffant as he still had hair around his temples to support the toupe - thereafter photos show more precariously situated wigs with the hairline rapidly receding at the sides. So: - we don't know the date of any of the 3 photos - we don't know who owned the guitars -we don't know if they were actual recording sessions This is getting weirder by the moment!
I'm staying out of this discussion as to guitars except to make the following observations:
The man sitting in the chair looking at some papers is Jim's friend Buddy Killen (my friend also), who at that point was employed by Tree Publishing, and is one of the first people Jim met when he came to Nashville in 1955.
Buddy began working at Tree in 1954 at a salary of only $35 but eventually purchased the company and sold it to Sony in 1989 for $40 million! Buddy also bailed Mary Reeves out of legal hot water when she was accused of fraudulently diverting an agricultural loan to another project, and almost went to jail. She needed to raise quick cash, so Buddy told me that without even seeing a list of all the songs in Jim's song publishing companies (Open Road, Acclaim, Tuckahoe), he bought them for tens of thousands of dollars and thus gave Mary cash to settle her legal woes. But in so doing it spelled the end for Mary.
As for the studio pictures, the one of Jim talking to Chet was definitely used for publicity purposes as it has appeared in country music magazines of the time.
The absence of any other musicians in the studio suggests this may have been a staged photo op; however, with Buddy sitting there, it's possible Jim was just doing some quick demos of some Tree songs. Early in his career he did indeed cut some demos at RCA though later used other studios, when "Studio B" became so busy.
To raise money, instead of liquidating real estate assets that she owned, Mary yielded to pressure from -- guess who -- to relinquish the song publishing companies that Jim founded. This gutted Jim Reeves Enterprises from a financial and morale standpoint and Mary never recovered from either. The scandal also was in the headlines and besmirched her public image in Nashville, which was probably even more important to Mary than the financial losses.
I'm not certain that 1957 is the correct date of that photo. I tend to think it appeared in a magazine earlier than that, but I don't have the time to go digging into my files to pin that down. Sorry. Maybe somebody else has more info on it.
on February 2, 2015, 8:18 pm
