1959 Sunburst Les Paul Standard   Monday, April 16, 2007

The Guitar in question in an original unbroken 1959 Les Paul Standard with the following exceptions as to its total originality.

1.    Plastic parts. The pickup rings, switch plate,knobs,truss rod covers,pickguard,jack plate are not original to the guitar. You may obtain the original plastic for this guitar from Lou Gatanas from whom we purchased the guitar in the year 2000. The truss rod cover is of the original type as is the switch tip.

2.    The tuners are of the original type with single ring plastic knobs and Kluson Deluxe designation on the back. The front bushings are of a different type indicating that there may have been other types of tuners on the guitar at one time which probably required the enlargement of the holes to 3/8 to facilitate Grover or other keys. No holes are visible on the back of the headstock.

3.    Electronics The guitar has original pots,switch,and capacitors, as well as the pointer washers on the front. The wiring appears stock but it must be assumed that some of it may have been taken out at one time for some of the overspraying and finishing of the back. The solder joints appear to be old. The pickups are in fact original PAF type pickups with a reading of 8.21K on the neck pickup and  9.0K on the bridge measures through the jack.

4.    The bridge and tailpiece are original as are the studs for the tailpiece

5.    The guitar has been refretted several times resulting in some of the higher inlays being thinned out a bit. The inlays are original

6.    The finish The neck has been refinished on the back and the serial number restamped The proper font was not available at the time This was not an important issue then. The front of headstock has not been refinished The front of the body has not been refinished but was slightly oversprayed when the back of the neck was refinished. The work was done very well.

7.    The weight is 9 lbs 2 oz

8.    It has a Bigsby Removal

9. The neck has been reset and rebound. who ever did that must have taken 1/8 off of the butt resulting in having to move the bridge back 1/8"  (note the smaller gap between the end of the tenon and the body.)

Provenance.

Although this guitar is well known in the “Burst Community” as the Christopher Cross Burst no attempts have been made to verify this authenticity. I have as  acquaintances many people who were associated with Chris and even worked with him and observed this guitar. On occasion it was even loaned to other famous players for their use. It is not the policy of Solidbody Guitar to buy “celebrity owned instruments” and then use that celebrity to inflate the price of the instrument in order to get more money for it. We highly recommend that this or any other instrument be purchased on its merits as an instrument. The originality, sound, feel, and responsiveness are good reasons to choose an instrument. In today’s market I am never asked 2 questions which were of supreme importance when I was buying old guitars for myself. “How does it sound, and How does it play” Having personally owned 13 Sunburst Les Paul Standards and played and sold many more I would rate this one in the upper 10% as far as these two factors. The Guitar in question is firm as to the selling price which makes it the least expensive unbroken Burst for sale in the world.

I hope this information has helped your decision on this guitar. It is an incredible guitar with a reasonable price which should help get it into the capable hands of a player.

Thanks Kenny Rardin Mgr. Solidbody Guitar.Com Inc.