SPECIAL: GUITARS
April 15 2007
VOLUME 24 NO.4

THE MAGAZINE FOR MUSICAL INSTRUMENT AND SOUND PRODUCT MERCHANDISERS

 

   
 

VIDEO WEBCAST
-
First ever M.I. video webcast
-Join the Vnewsletter


VIDEO WEBCAST
NAMM 2010
Jan. 14-16, 2010 ConventionTV@NAMM
-Show US YOURTUBES
VIEWING/VOTING
SHOW US YOUR TUBES
!!VOTE NOW!!

-
-

-Table of Contents
-Digital Issue Download

FEATURE
We Cover it All!
For the second time, we honor instruments that get zero or little press...

A ‘Super’ Party on Kent Island
Experience PRS loaded up on celebrities, new products and much more. Get the full scoop...

‘Father of RMM’ Passes
Karl Bruhn, a tireless music industry devotee, mentored many and made awareness of health and wellness together a lifelong initiative.
Don’t ‘Skip’ this Story!
Skip’s Music Celebrates 30th Anniversary of its Special Event
Celebrating the 30th anniversary of your store being in business is an impressive feat. Celebrating the 30th anniversary of an idea you had at your store is utterly...
I Just Wanna Bang
on the Drums All Day
How is the Percussion Industry Doing? 2010 has been a tale of three seasons for many retailers to whom we’ve spoken. Sales for many in the first three months of the calendar year...
Your One-Stop Shop For The Holidays!
Heathcare Provision Could
Be a Nightmare

America the Beautiful

Not Doubting Thomas
Mendello Retires, Thomas Named Fender CEO

Music City Mystery


-The Latest, Industry, Dealers, People and Product Buzz and Showcases.

COLUMNS
-The Music & Sound Independent Retailer: We bring back our popular Independent Retailer Round-table. Providing four pages worth of answers are Gordy Wilcher & Lisa Kirkwood.
-Five Minutes With: We lend our ears to Marty Garcia, Founder and CEO of Future Sonics.
-MI Spy: Spy makes a visit to New York City to check out stores in both downtown and midtown. Service has to be good to win over discerning New Yorkers, right? We’ll find out.
-Dan the Man: Dan Ferrisi, with the help of occasional strategically placed SAT vocabulary words, discusses the prospect that the industry may have lost luster since a promising and upbeat January NAMM show.
-Birth of a Product Two former PRS veterans combined forces to found Knaggs Guitars. The story behind the Maryland- based company, which debuted a line of products at Musikmesse.
-
Sales Guru: Sales persistence pays off. Just ask Gene Fresco
-Veddatorial: Dan Vedda provides a can’t-be-missed Summer NAMM synopsis.



FORMIDABLE FEMALES

-Catherine Polk: I’ve always had a great love for music. I come from a musical family of four girls. We mostly had a vocal background, but most of us played the piano. Also, my grandfather would...
-Cyndi Fritz: She never had a dream of becoming the next Janis Joplin. Although she has eclectic musical interests, a career in music was not necessarily on her radar. Cyndi Fritz was....
Janet Deering: When Janet Deering took an aptitude test at the conclusion of her high school career, she was told agriculture or sales were....
-Kathy How: Now here’s a story you don’t hear connected to MI every day. A woman who grew up in Cape Town, South Africa, studied medicine and later moved to England.
-Sarah Heil:We’ve all heard the stories about people beginning in the mailroom and later becoming the CEO of a major corporation. Those people are rare, but it does happen.
-Sue Avant is a trailblazer. She’s also someone who
has varied interests. And she is, indeed, formidable.


-Subscribe, Renew, Manage
-
-ConventionTV Online
-
ISSUE ARCHIVES
-download archived issues
-
MUSIC & SOUND AWARDS
-And the Winners are...
-
INFORMATION
-contact The Retailer
-advertisers information
-
-BlueBook Online
-Sound & Communications Online
-
DJ TIMES / DJ EXPO
-DJ Times Online
-Int'l DJ Expo 2009
-America's Best DJ
-
CLUB WORLD
-Club World Online
-Club World Awards 2009.
-
 

This site archives its
publications with Adobe
Acrobat ver. 5 compatible.
Adobe Acrobat is FREE from Adobe Systems Inc.

 
 
Standing Ovation
Ovation & GC team up for electric-acoustic hybrid VXT
[April 2007 - Page 1]

If you ask Rick Hall, Ovation’s guitar product manager, “Ovation always tends to surprise people.” Well, it certainly has a surprise for us now. Ovation, under the umbrella of Kaman Music, and Guitar Center have combined forces to release the VXT, a six-string electric-acoustic hybrid guitar intended to appeal to a younger audience. And although musicians won’t exactly be buying this “first real six string at the five and dime,” like Bryan Adams in the “Summer of ’69,” it is certainly considered affordable for a professional model. The guitar, with a MAP price of $1,599 and a retail price of $2,499, including a hardshell case, will be at every GC store, www.guitarcenter.com, and Musician’s Friend on May 1. GC will hold exclusive sales rights to the guitar for an expected 45 to 60 days. After that period, independent and international dealers can jump in, but Hall said, “GC will retain first purchase rights.”

photo1

Ovation debuted the product for the first time in a press-only event that took place at Kaman headquarters in Bloomfield, Conn., on Feb. 27. The guitars were seen for the first time after a projector was recessed in the Kaman conference room. Demonstrations by guitarists Matt Smith, a New York City session musician; Greg Orred, Chris Piquette, and 19-year-old Branford, Conn., resident Mike Ranieri followed. A trip to the Ovation factory, housed in a pre-Civil War building nestled near a ski resort, subsequently took place in New Hartford, Conn.

photo2

The history of the VXT dates back about a year and a-half. “Kaman is a major vendor for us,” said Michael Doyle, GC’s vice president of product marketing. “[My coworker, GC’s VP of product merchandising] Keith Brawley and I toured the factory and saw a body blank.

“We asked what it was,” continued Doyle.
“A member of the Viper family,” we were told.
“We had tremendous success with the Taylor T5 and saw a growing market for hybrid guitars. Kaman had the essence of a great new product with that body.”

Some of the key features of the VXT include the Ovation trademarked ridge, a rosewood fingerboard, a three-way switch, a solid spruce top, Honduras mahogany neck and body, two Seymour Duncan ’59 humbuckers, and a Fishman Power Bridge. Ovation chose the Duncan humbuckers for a “crisp yet warm,” sound from the hollowed-out body, as opposed to a “muddy” sound that could result otherwise. According to the company, the Fishman Power Bridge provides an excellent acoustic sound without piezo “thwack—even with heavy-handed picking or plucking.” The guitar is available in black and Teardrop Burst colors.

( continued, next page >> )

[ pages: 1 - 2 ]

|


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
       
   
© 2010 The Music and Sound Retailer
Published by Testa Communications
Port Washington, New York 11050
516.767.2500 | 800.937.7678