Just got this Grammer Merle Haggard model guitar back from an extensive repair/restoration done by Eugene Moles in Nashville, and I’m stoked!
The Merle Haggard Grammer was an extremely short-lived artist model made around 1970. Merle was going through his Jimmie Rodgers obsession at the time, and he wanted a small-bodied acoustic like the Martin 000-18 that Jimmie used. Although Grammer used extremely high-quality materials (the bookmatched Brazilian rosewood on the back is insane!), Grammer was also going through some growing pains during this time.
Although the Merle Haggard model was ambitious, the few guitars that were made (it is estimated only fifteen or twenty were ever produced) all suffered from issues like cracked tops and sides. The model never appeared in a Grammer catalog—the company sent out a glossy 8×10 photo to dealers before deciding that the Merle Haggard model Grammer would never go beyond the prototype stage. (the glossy photo I own has the retail cost written on the back—$475.00—an absolute fortune in 1970).
I found this example on Craigslist here in LA about a year and a half ago. It was cheap, but there was a reason it was cheap. The top was cracked, the neck angle needed to be reset, and the guitar sounded thuddy and dead, which I reckoned was because of the super-heavy braces and a thick block under the bridge. I took it to Eugene Moles in Nashville and told him to fix it up real nice, and to try and make it sound better by making a new, thinner bridge block under the top and to scallop the braces.
This was a huge job! Eugene had to take the back off the guitar to get at the braces and the bridge plate. He had to reset the neck. He had to make a completely new bridge for it so it would match the height of the reset neck. Lastly, lots of cosmetic work to make it look good after it was all put together. Eugene did a hell of a job! It plays and sounds great! Thanks Eugene!
With so few of these Merle Haggard models known to exist, and the story that my guitar came from a well-known Los Angeles-area country disc jockey and record producer from the 1970s, of course there is the off chance that this guitar might have been Merle’s personal Grammer guitar…who knows? No way to prove it, but there’s only fifteen or twenty of these out there. I’m really happy to have this one, it’s a lovely companion piece to my Grammer Johnny Cash model, which is another rare one, and another story for another day….
