”When this wild, obviously custom built guitar came into our world, I knew that we had to have it. Built in the mid-1950's, it has been attributed to being built either by or for Sebastiano “Johnny” Melita, who was of course the designer of the Melita bridge. While we don't have documentation of this, the story absolutely makes sense when you study the instrument.
Izzy Miller
Today our welcome guest is a unique, absolutely unprecedented guitar: a splendid Melita solid body owned by our friend Izzy Miller, a great hunter and collector of fine instruments.
He will tell us about it himself:
«When this wild, obviously custom built guitar came into our world, I knew that we had to have it. Built in the mid-1950’s, it has been attributed to being built either by or for Sebastiano “Johnny” Melita, who was of course the designer of the Melita bridge. While we don’t have documentation of this, the story absolutely makes sense when you study the instrument.
We will start with the fact that the original Melita bridge found on this instrument includes the *stupid rare* original string mute, which we have only seen on a few other Melita bridges over the years.
We are sure that Melita was in well with Gretsch at this point, which explains the early metal Gretsch knobs that lack the G or arrow branding to the tops, the DeArmond Dynasonic pickup (it originally carried a pair of them as evidenced under the non-original and non-working Hofner replacement), and the Grover keys (which were found on a number of Gretsch instruments).
The Gretsch association also makes sense when it comes to the two-piece neck construction and the shape of the neck heel and end cap. The Philadelphia connection is further corroborated by the mid-1970’s Philadelphia newspaper page that we found in one of the back cavities.
The tailpiece is homemade and is a pretty impressive piece in itself. The original aluminum nut appears to be an early homemade attempt at an adjustable nut. It, along with the tailpiece, is very, very cool.
It appears that Mr. Melita had this built and then used it to test ideas over the years. The hole in the pickguard goes into the body as well, but nothing appears to have ever been wired up there.
The black plastic plate on the back and the routing underneath look to be a later attempt at weight relief, as the guitar is solid maple and a bit on the heavy side. The neck is chunky and has a slight v-shape to it as it heads towards the body. On top of feeling great, look at that flame in the maple!
The instrument lacks an adjustable truss rod and the neck has a slight bit of relief in it. Paired with the original brass frets that show a decent amount of wear, the action is low where it should be but it is quite buzzy up and down the fretboard.
It’s obvious that this instrument was played fairly heavily and we are sure that someone out there has more pieces to this mysterious story…»
Thanks to Izzy for the history and images of this unique and fascinating instrument.
Click on the link to visit Izzy Miller’s Facebook page
