Guild Guitar Company

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The Guild Guitar Company is a USA-based guitar manufacturer begun in 1952 by Alfred Dronge. The first Guild workshop was located in New York City and produced exclusively crafted guitars from carefully chosen woods, hand wound pickups and fine lacquers.^[1]

Incorporating and merging the needs of both the jazz and rock and roll musician, the Guild company produces well made, warm tone electric and acoustic guitars. For some time this production took place in the hallowed Westerly, Rhode Island workshops. Acquired in 1995 by the Fender Musical Instruments Corporation, all Guild production was eventually moved to the Corona, CA factory. In 2004, FMIC acquired the assets of Washington-based Tacoma Guitar Company and all American Guild acoustic production has since been moved to Tacoma, WA. The 42,000 square-foot Tacoma facility is now one of the largest volume manufacturers of acoustic guitars in the United States.

For a short time Guild designed insturments were manufactured in Korea under the DeArmond brand name. These insturments display DeArmond inlaid on the headstock while the truss rod cover shows the Guild name and logo. In 2005, Fender introduced the Chinese-built Guild GAD series acoustic guitars.

The company is probably most well noted for its acoustic guitars. In particular, the F50 and D50 models are very highly regarded. Musicians such as Stevie Ray Vaughan, Nick Drake, Martha Wainwright, John Denver, Brian May, Paul Collins, Kim Thayil, Roger Hodgson, Slash, and Eric Clapton have utilised various acoustic Guild guitars. Guild also produces a series of solid and hollow body electric guitars, and its electric guitars have also seen considerable fame. Arguably the most popular of these electric guitars, the Guild Starfire (and its subsequent editions) became a trademark product, being used by such notables as Dave Davies of British rock group The Kinks, Buddy Guy and Tom Fogerty of American band Creedence Clearwater Revival. A battered blond Guild has been used by Tom Waits since his early days (he could be seen playing a Guild throughout his recent Real Gone Tour). Paul Collins' Beat features Guild acoustic guitars on the cover art to their Live In Spain CD. More recently Guild also created several replicas of Brian May's Red Special handmade guitars throughout the 1980's and 90's, and was known in the grunge era for creating the S-100, the trademark guitar of Soundgarden's Kim Thayil.

The Guild Starfire bass was used by Jefferson Airplane/Hot Tuna bassist Jack Casady (albeit heavily modified), Teton Brown bassist John Geltmeyer and Grateful Dead bassist Phil Lesh. Casady was to later use a custom built Guild Flying V Bass during the mid 1970's.

The distinctive Guild S-200 Thunderbird was used by Muddy Waters in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and can be seen on the back cover of his "Electric Mud" album. It is/was also used by Fred Cole, the guitarist in the now-defunct punk band, Dead Moon. Interestingly, Starfires can be seen on the covers of both The Kinks' Kontroversy and the Creedence album Cosmo's Factory, and a Guild M-20 acoustic guitar can be seen held on the cover of Nick Drake's Bryter Layter.

Hank Hill of King of the Hill is perhaps the only cartoon guitarist to actually have a real model instead of a generic-looking guitar. He owns a 1963 Guild solid top acoustic nicknamed "Betsy". It is one of his most cherished possessions. However, the guitar he plays, as drawn, could not have existed from that era, as Flattops did not come with cutaways as regular features until some time in the 1980's, and have never incorporated tailpiece bridges.