Features of original Busato-Guitars (1/3)

Alike in our article-series about "Features of original Selmer-Guitars", "Features of orirginal Favino-Guitars" and "Features of original DiMauro-Guitars", here in these article-series we briefly describe the details of original Busato-Guitars.

Busato-Guitars, named after their creator the italian luthier Bartolo Barnabe "Pablo" Busato, were one of the first acoustic Jazzguitars that were "strongly inspired" by the original Selmer-Guitars of the famous italian luthier Mario Maccafferri (see also Busato-Guitars).

A long time it was of doubt if there really existed a person called "Busato" or if this has just been a workshop with this name, as there  existed several adresses and workshops of that name.

At the same time that Busato built guitars there were also Mandolins, Banjos and Uprightbasses beeing produced under his name. Even some Busato-Accordeons existed that were made on his order by some other makers or company (propably Castagnolo or Fratelli Crosio), which were sold under his name and in his workshops. So later on it was found out that Barnabe Busato truely existed. Busato died in Paris in 1960 (see also Busato-history).

In these further article(s) of the Busato-series we focus and briefly describe the details and features of original Busato-Guitars with exact description and images.

Because Bartolo Busato built many different guitar-models himself and let build by co-workers in his workshops, plus additionally it is known that he had built special edition-guitars for customers "on demand", today it´s a fact that there are all kinds of different Busato-guitars around that don´t have the typical features that Busato-guitars normally have, nevertheless they actually have been built in his workshops. Also there were guitars been made in his workshops for big musicstores in Paris and elsewhere which were sold under other brands for example Sonora, Symphonia, Paris Musical or Beuscher.
In all there are more Busao-guitars then one might think, surely according to Busato´s long living- and working-period. Busatos were built between 1930 until 1959 in different sizes and all kind of shapes.

General Features

In the early 1930ies of his working-period Busato also produced some unusual shapes like the so called "Oblong-Modele" (see image at next page) as well as a couple of rare F-hole-Models.

Very often many his guitars are just labeled as "1936" or "1940" the year they were built in, as often it´s Label inside the body misses.

The most Busato-Models generally differ only in the way of their makings and features.

Model-Variantions

From the early 1940ies Busato mainly produced five different Variations of his guitarmodels:

• Model 43 ("Moyen Modele"), mostly made out of Mahagoni, often with a pickguard and the typical BB-Tailpiece. Tuners were simple DeLaruelle with yellow tuning pegs.
• Model 43 BIS, same size for sides 40cm, sides made from Mahagoni, brasilian Rosewood or Maple and tuners by SB Bilardi or BB DeLaruelle with caps.
• Model 44, the famous "Grand Modele" with size of sides 41 cm and often (not always) 2 Braces at the bottom. Very othen these models were built with a three-piece-neck made from brasilian Rosewood with a stripe of black ebony in the middle, equipped with golden BB-tuners ("Grand Modele Deluxe"), actually all these original made by Salvatore Bilardi (same as for Favino).
• Model 45, same Model like 44 but with additionally white bindings
• Modele 46, in black Finish, a special pickguard and white bindings (see photo next page)

Read more ->Features of original Busato-Guitars (2/3)

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