Growing up in Southern California, I was surrounded by the collision of surfing, skateboard, auto craft, music, art and architecture cultures, as well as the people creating them. I didn’t much recognize these influential cultures for what they were when I was younger, having been blinded by the veil of familiarity. I figured my hometown experience was typical and assumed everywhere else was like that. Having grown older and seen a wider variety of places, the uniqueness of my hometown picture is in sharper focus. The sights, sounds, influence of this Southern California experience is unique in my opinion, and it certainly informed the creations designed and made here. As I see it, there are few instruments that could so seamlessly blend those influences as electric guitars.

I love the flowing, organic curves and broad expression of sound I was exposed to during my earlier experiences with electric guitars.

One common thread among many of these Southern California cultures is they inherently are accompanied by a level of subjectivity. Lots of sports or other pursuits are easy to measure with metrics like the time elapsed during a race or which contestant crossed the finish line first. A pursuit like surfing or music isn’t so easily evaluated, as the act is based in aesthetic value. How a player performs is going to launch evaluative questions about how a listener was moved, the emotion conveyed, the physical experience or bravado behind the effort as much as whatever technical merits might be there. As an aside, it’s fun to imagine putting an objective measurement to something like a musical context. Imagine all the musicians in a symphonic orchestra racing to see who could be the first player to arrive at the final note. Or judging a piece of music the winner because it had the highest number of notes played. Cacophony aside, it’s apparent to me that many of the activities and creations I’ve lived among shouldn’t be evaluated with objective measurements.

Knowing there are creations and activities where value is based on aesthetics over numbers offers freedom to choose what we enjoy — that which moves us. I think that is one of the aspects of building and playing guitars I like so much — we’re free to choose what we like for the simple reason that we like it. Maybe a player likes the color of one instrument best. Or the shape, or the way it feels under their fingertips, or the sound. Maybe they like that a musical hero played something reminiscent.

I love that each player gets to choose what resonates with them.

In my case, I love the flowing, organic curves and broad expression of sound I was exposed to during my earlier experiences with electric guitars. That’s certainly a reason my tools first began to carve away wood and create a cutaway like the one that became the compound contour shaping seen on some Builder’s Edition guitars like our new 814ce. The smooth, ergonomic contours and edges carry a hint of an electric guitar inspiration with a hint of classical violin tradition, put into the context of a thoroughly modern acoustic guitar. Regardless of what the exact catalyst is, I love that each player gets to choose what resonates with them.

These personal music and cultural inspirations are a driving force behind the recent electric guitar creations that have come from my shop and have warranted a new brand and identity —something we call Powers Electric. These guitars are firmly rooted in the Southern California world I grew up in, with the influences I’ve felt reflected into the instruments themselves. This effort has a taste of coming full circle for me, as these are a culmination of a few decades of learning and ideas channeled into an instrument I wanted when I was a kid. These are serious guitars, which translates to serious fun and games. This season, as we bring to the forefront new instruments we’ve been working on, both acoustic and now electric, I hope you find some fresh inspiration in making music with them and a spark of the joy that ignited your interest in playing guitar to begin with. Whether an acoustic or an electric, large or small, six strings, twelve or some other number, have fun making music. It’s good to play.

As wonderful as spoken and written stories are, in the form of a song, these stories take on a meaning far beyond the words sung, if words need to be used at all. These songs — these musical stories — are a driving reason behind the guitars we build. When I consider the innumerable variety and emotion conveyed each time a player sets their hands to the strings, the breadth of that expression seems to transcend boundaries. Each player, each story, is so unique.

As a response to the variety of songs that are played, it feels that there needs to be a wide variety of instruments with unique voices. Each guitar we make has a reason to exist, as the many emotions of music are best presented with sounds that support the song. The attributes of different guitars may seem similar at a glance, and to be totally fair, the distinctions between instruments can be subtle at times. True as that may be, there is a parallel in the subjects of the stories we tell, such as those recounting a tale of love lost or found. There is a theme universal enough to be familiar to all, yet so deeply personal and individual as to be a defining moment in a person’s life. Instruments are a little like that. They can appear similar in some respects, but when experienced directly, we realize each is a unique individual.

Guitars can appear similar in some respects, but when experienced directly, we realize each is a unique individual.

Recently, I was reading through a book written by Iain McGilchrist called The Master and His Emissary, in which he studies the twin-hemisphere nature of the human mind and the influence of this structure on our experience. While describing how the mind tends to categorize inanimate objects, he points out that two categories, food and musical instruments, are interestingly grouped among living things. This detail struck me as interesting because it spoke to the highly personal and intimate relationship musicians have with their instruments as well as the continuously evolving nature of that relationship. The stories we tell through our songs are part of a much longer epic that continues to unfold. In some way, it is as if a story told through a song is a communication that remains alive and growing.

These guitars we make are brought into being to help musicians tell their stories. The many and varied personal connections are told in counterpoint to the impersonal headlines we face each day. I’m hardly alone in hearing headlines shouting for my attention nearly every direction I turn, most of them wanting to deliver information about a problem somewhere. Against this backdrop of impersonal communication, a musician’s deeply personal narrative feels like nothing less than a bold act of courage.

I’m reminded of a short piece penned by Longfellow titled “The Arrow and the Song”:

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.

Among other themes, this poem speaks to the fact that we don’t always know where, how or whom our stories will impact. Yet in the face of this uncertainty, musicians can take a courageous step and share their songs with those who might listen and continue to grow with their music and instruments.

For this reason, among others, we at Taylor Guitars feel very fortunate to be building the instruments presented in our latest collection and showcased in our product guide. There are guitars of many different influences, woods, sounds and feels in order to meet a musician where their songs take them. Some instruments are built with humble materials and modest appointments. Others are built with more lavish trimmings to delight the holder. Whatever place you find yourself in, wherever your music takes you, we hope to be an encouragement for you to play, share your songs, and tell your stories.

As a balance to this, I’ve noticed that the things you need to overcome those challenges usually come around at just the right time. Most often, they come in the form of people who have something to teach you. That’s precisely where I find myself fortunate. As far back as I can recall, people have arrived on the scene with lessons to teach me. Some teach by providing an opportunity for observation, and some by directly investing in your effort. The lessons are as endless as the thoughts we think, but we’re richer by far when we include the input of others and allow ourselves to be shaped in a positive way by their influence. 

One such person is my wife Maaren. She’s about the most wonderful person in the entire world (I confess I’m biased) and full of insight, even when she’s not paying attention to it. I often hear her reiterate to our kids the phrase, “Just do the work that’s in front of you, and it’ll get done.” I can’t think of a better way to express the type of thinking that is needed to creatively overcome the tasks that we face. 

In fact, this seems to be the attitude shared by the all the entrepreneurial folks I’ve been privileged to learn from. They simply get on with the work that is needed. They’re not going to wait for some imagined permission from an outside authority to get to work; they simply go about the business of doing what needs to be done. It reminds me of a distinction I read somewhere that a professional knows what they need to get a job done, but an entrepreneur uses what they have at hand to get the job completed.

Bob and Kurt are two people I’ve been deeply privileged to spend time with and learn from. They’ve spent, and continue to spend, hours, days, years attending to the tasks in front of them, overcoming each challenge in order to stay moving in the direction they want to go, which is building a great guitar company. For decades, they’ve worked side by side, focusing on the diverse jobs in front of each of them in pursuit of one central purpose: to design, build and sell instruments that are fundamentally aligned with the way musicians use instruments, and to do this in a way that provides the most good to our forest resources, suppliers, employees, dealers and musicians. It’s a tall order, broken down into innumerable individual jobs over a lifetime of work. But what great work it is to do! 

As far back as I can remember, I’ve loved doing the work of making guitars, whether the mundane chores or working through the novel challenges of each day. For nearly a dozen years now, it’s been a joy to do this work alongside Kurt and Bob and see how their efforts complement each other. It’s as if each task accomplished fills in one more pane in a larger paint-by-numbers picture. They’ve generously included me in their work, and I’m grateful for their effort and teaching. I’ve been thrilled to share in this work and contribute my efforts toward our common goal of making great instruments for musicians to use, while also using those efforts as a means to share with those around us. These are great days at Taylor Guitars, and we’re happy to share them with you all.

Stepping into the first room of active instrument building is a fresh-level sensory experience. Walking through a mill that’s teeming with woods and their aromas from around the world, you’ll enter a wood-holding area, where ready-to-use woods are acclimated and cataloged like volumes in a library. Further on through our factory, you’ll step into worlds of different sounds and sights — the quiet tranquility of a room where braces are attached; the calculated precision of neck shaping; the bustle and whir of finishing, polishing and tuning up strings. Everywhere you look here at Taylor, creative work is bringing guitars to life.

To me, all of this is as it should be. The desire to create something beautiful and useful is a strong impulse — one that is simultaneously primal as well as artful, refined and celebrated. The method of making comes in lots of forms. Some projects are formed with hands alone, or with brushes, tools and instruments, or even a factory full of machines. In an introduction to “The Unknown Craftsman: A Japanese Insight into Beauty,” a collection of Sōetsu Yanagi writings, potter and author Bernard Leach defines craft as “good work proceeding from the whole man, heart, head and hand in proper balance.” Rather than a strict adherence to a specific method, set of tools or even industry, the desire to create something vibrantly wonderful that benefits and enriches the user is an instinct as old as time.

The desire to create something vibrantly wonderful that enriches the user is an instinct as old as time.

This desire to create starts from a young age. With three young kids, my home is seldom tidy, although that’s not for lack of cleaning effort. The creative process tends to be worked out in bursts of energy that typically involve paint spills, drips of glue and cast-off pieces of countless different materials. From somewhere within the disarray of materials emerges what I like to describe as maker’s joy — a curiously profound sense of excitement that accompanies a fresh creation. In our home, this excitement is heard everywhere as shouts followed by, “Come see what I’ve made!”

I suspect this is true for most young kids, but interestingly enough, the same sensation tends to follow most makers engaged in a craft. Songwriters and composers are not immune to it. Musicians and painters know the feeling well. So do machinists, welders, hot rod mechanics, carpenters and guitar makers. We love to do our work and be immersed in the process.

Having oriented a life around this endeavor, I’ve had time and occasion to observe that the process of making can be catalyzed by the simple fact that you have materials something might be made from as much as by a desire to make a specific thing. It was never so clear as with a recent conversation with our seven-year-old daughter when she wandered into the old barn I use as a home shop. The conversation went something like this:

“Dad, I want a piece of wood.”

“Well, what would you like to make?”

“I don’t know yet. What do you have that I can use?”

There it was — the desire to create something was there, even though she hadn’t a clue as to what object was going to emerge from her effort. She would be led into that creative place by whatever material was available. Similarly, a surfboard-making friend recently dropped off a sculpted foam surfboard core ready to be coated in fiberglass at my shop. He returned to his home shop with a wedge from a cedar tree that couldn’t be turned into guitar tops. While the wood’s destiny was still undecided, it was clear the raw material could serve as a catalyst for a project simply for the fact that the wood has a wonderful aroma, which could guide what it turned into.

Musicians are often spurred by a similar scenario. Some songs might be written from a desire to speak about a subject or put an emotion into a musical narrative. Just as often, I’ve watched songs be written for the simple fact that an appealing melody was hummed, or the sound of a certain chord or rhythm had a quality that offered an opportunity. It was in this same spirit that our newly reconceived 700 Series guitars took form. Colleagues began sawing into these Hawaiian koa timbers, which revealed beautiful colors and grain. Swirls and stripes of woods telling stories of growth, seasons, storms and passing years. The wood was practically begging to be turned into something beautiful and deeply musical. Now, a few years since we started sawing into these trees, we’re feeling the excitement of maker’s joy in these new instruments. It’s our hope that whether found in one of these fresh guitar designs or a perennial favorite instrument, you will find some maker’s joy of your own — the inspiration to finger a new melody, strum a fresh rhythm, and savor a harmonious new chord.        

While that sense of anticipation and arrival is a natural rhythm, making guitars and playing music seem to be steeped in a more extended path of continuity. Sure, there are the anticipation and enjoyment of stringing up a new instrument for the first time after hours at the bench turn into weeks and months, or playing a new song after diligent practice. But rather than a natural end point like a finish line at a race, this is simply the next step on an unending trail to explore.

There is no point where instrument making is truly finished, just like there is no real end point where music has been learned. Creating music, like creating instruments, is a never-ending pursuit of more: more understanding, broadening ability, new ideas to explore, new pieces to build. Along the way, it’s experienced in micro-sized rhythms of work and reward: gluing up a fretboard and appreciating it done well; installing frets and admiring their smooth consistency; or playing a new string of chords and appreciating how one falls into the next in a fresh way.

When I was growing up, my dad, a carpenter, often told me to learn to love working, because life was full of working. While these words could easily be mistaken for a dour resignation, the sentiment was sage advice and always laced with optimism and opportunity. The real message was one of encouragement: to appreciate and celebrate the myriad of small tasks performed in pursuit of some beautiful, larger project. It makes perfect sense. In my dad’s case, his effort as a carpenter was to create a beautiful home. That’s a big project, but one that can be broken down into thousands of small jobs, each of which can be enjoyed, nail by nail, board by board.

Building a guitar is also a big project, but likewise can be broken down into small actions, each with a joy of its own, just like learning and playing music.

Perhaps even more than building houses or guitars, playing music is a trail with no ultimate destination. I’ve been privileged to share music with musicians of fantastic ability, and one common lesson I’ve learned is they are never done. There is no point where they stop playing after having learned all they need to know and played all the songs that needed playing. Far from it — musicians continue onward, refining their ability, delving into new styles and influences, broadening the sounds they can contribute to their art. While I was in college, one music professor summed it up by asking rhetorically, “How many times can you practice a C major scale, the simplest of all scales? Not enough.”

I’ve been privileged to share music with musicians of fantastic ability, and one common lesson I’ve learned is they are never done.

With this idea of continuously evolving work in mind, it’s easy to picture a world of projects that are continuously reinvented, as if only those things that already exist can be used as a platform for new work. In some cases, this is a great approach. I love to hear a favorite song or melody refreshed with a new feel or instrumentation. As guitar makers, we love to draw from our body of work and freshen up a favorite piece with new inspiration and a different look or sound. But alongside those existing pieces, we love the vibrancy of new additions into our portfolio of work. A new creation doesn’t diminish or make obsolete an older one, just as a newly penned song doesn’t detract from a perennial favorite in a setlist. They simply add to the catalog of choices.

In perusing our latest lineup of instruments, I’m confronted by the surprising number of choices. Realizing just how many different versions of guitars we’re making is nearly overwhelming and for a fleeting moment leaves me wondering just how we arrived where we are. Considering each guitar in turn serves to remind us that they all have a purpose and are the result of our continuous work as guitar makers. Tending to each fretboard, fret, soundboard, neck or string was a small task to enjoy in our guitar-making life. Some of these models are the favorites we return to time and again. Others, like our new Grand Theater guitars made from walnut or mahogany, are additions with fresh sounds for our enjoyment. Our new flametop Grand Pacific wears its maple top and steps forward as a newcomer in our repertoire of hardwood-top guitars, revealing a character all its own.

Whether a new instrument or an enduring favorite in our catalog, here at Taylor, we are privileged to savor all the steps that go into the creation of each one of our guitars. And we love hearing the songs musicians bring from the ones they choose for their music.