Paul Reed Smith

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article or section needs sources or references that appear in reliable, third-party publications. Alone, primary sources and sources affiliated with the subject of the article are not sufficient for an accurate encyclopedia article. Please include more appropriate citations from reliable sources.
This article has been tagged since December 2006.

This article is about Paul Reed Smith, a luthier. For the article about the company that bears his name, see PRS Guitars.

Paul Reed Smith (February 18, 1956) is one of the world's premier luthiers and the founder and owner of PRS Guitars. His electric guitars are played by the likes of Alex Lifeson, Carlos Santana, Al Di Meola, Dave Navarro, Mark Tremonti, Mikael Åkerfeldt, Peter Lindgren, Steven Wilson, Tim Mahoney, Marcos Curiel,Larry Lalonde,and Chad Kroeger

Smith is originally from Bowie, Maryland. He made his first guitar while at St. Mary's College of Maryland, and continued to build guitars after he finished college, making them one at a time, one a month. Together with another local, John "Orkie" Ingram, they formed the nucleus of what would become Paul Reed Smith Guitars.

Bringing their instruments backstage at concerts, Smith convinced musicians to critique his guitars. With this feedback he refined his guitar design. Smith got his big break when Carlos Santana agreed to try one of his guitars. The story goes that Carlos thought the first guitar played so well it must have been an "accident of God", so he ordered a second instrument. That was an "accident of God" too, so he ordered a third, a doubleneck guitar. On the third try, Carlos realized that Paul was for real.

Smith then contacted Ted McCarty, former president of Gibson and creator of the Explorer, ES-335 and Flying V guitars, and McCarty became his mentor and adviser. The result of their collaboration was the current line of PRS Guitars, which include solid- and hollow-body guitars.