In March of 2013 I travelled to the SXSW Music, Movies and Interactive conference and festival in Austin, TX.  Having been fortunate to have attended many times in the past this time I was planning a little something special…

I had been thinking for some time that I would love to find my perfect acoustic guitar and prior to going to SXSW I had been doing a great deal of research about the best, handmade instruments.  For a number of reasons Collings Guitars were topping my list after dismissing the big manufacturers like Gibson, Martin and Taylor for various reasons.  Instead the small to mid-sized boutique makers like Bourgeois, Santa Cruz, Breedlove, Froggy Bottom, Larivee along with Collings were where I had been focussing my research and attention mainly because I wanted a properly sourced, handmade instrument from a luthier that produced consistently great products like any of these shops do.  Unfortunately, living where I do in Southwestern Ontario finding somewhere to try any of these instruments requires substantial time and effort. Now that I was in Austin I decided to contact Collings and see if I could get a tour of their shop and see where the magic happens.  They agreed and everything was arranged for that Friday morning.

It was a fantastic tour and I learnt a ton about how they build such amazing guitars and mandolins by hand.  I even had an opportunity to briefly meet the man himself – Bill Collings.  However, this is not the purpose of this post, so I will save the rest of this story and all the photos from my tour for another day and another blog entry.  Instead, I want to talk about what happened after my tour.

Having seen how beautiful, hand-crafted guitars like Collings are made I was now itching to get to try some.  In deference to their dealers Collings won’t let you buy a guitar from them directly instead referring you to one of their dealers’ stores.  The closest and highly recommended dealer was the Hill Country Guitar shop in Wimberley TX now (sadly) relocated to Austin.  I decided I must make my way there at once!

After a sandwich and a short drive through the beautiful Hill Country region I arrived in Wimberley.  I marched around the small village of Wimberley trying in vain to find this elusive guitar shop.  After asking directions twice I finally realized that it must be the old stone building in the field back behind the main street.  Indeed it was and what a fabulous guitar shop!  The whole vibe of the place was perfect and the massive collection of gorgeous guitars immediately blew me away!  It smelled great too – I truly love the smell of wood, especially from fine instruments.  There had to be 40+ Collings in the main room and a couple more large rooms filled with amazing instruments – this was going to be great!

I was warmly welcomed by Kevin Jones and invited to try as many guitars as I would like.  I immediately spied a beautiful Collings SJ Indian Rosewood/Sitka Spruce guitar and found a comfortable place to sit and try it out.  It was love at first chord.  I couldn’t believe the feel and tone of this instrument.  And it was within a price point that fit my budget – not that I’d really set one (dangerous!).

After playing the SJ for awhile I started to try out numerous other guitars, but the SJ was really sticking with me.  There were a couple other Collings and a Froggy Bottom that sounded and felt great too, but with price tags approaching that of a small car those had to be ruled out right away.  While on this adventure in tone many hours passed and I had an opportunity to speak with Kevin on and off throughout the afternoon as well as a few other folks who had been on the Collings tour with me that morning.  Kevin was very complimentary about my playing style and he and some of the other customers likened it to Nick Drake.  Higher praise I cannot think of and these guitars and the feel of that place on a warm spring afternoon in Texas was definitely helping me channel my inner folkie.

In speaking with Kevin I learnt that he had been building ‘walkabout’ dulcimers in upstate Washington for many years as the Olympia Dulcimer Company and continued to build them from his shop in Wimberley.  In fact, several of his instruments were hanging above the fireplace in the shop near the door.

I went over and admired them and wondered what they would sound like.  However, since I was on a mission to find my perfect acoustic guitar I didn’t want to be distracted from my goal.  I tried several more beautiful guitars including some gorgeous ones from a local luthier named John Allison.  In fact, as I narrowed the field on my favourites, one of the Allison’s became a strong contender.  As it turned out a local musician came in and asked me to demo that very Allison for him and he decided to buy it after ruling out a Martin and a Santa Cruz!  It now seemed obvious that the very first instrument I tried – the Collings SJ Indian was going to be making the long journey north to Canada to join me there after I returned home.

It was now well past closing time, and myself and the gentlemen who purchased the Allison were busily finishing up our transactions.  Kevin and shop owner Dwayne were very patient and assured me my new SJ would be safely packaged and carefully shipped by ground to my home first thing Monday.  Satisfied that everything was in order I went to leave that magical shop in the fields of Wimberley TX.  And as I went through the aluminum screen-door, with it’s guitar motif, I looked up at Kevin’s ODC dulcimers and regretted not trying them after all, but was determined to learn more about what a walkabout dulcimer is and maybe someday add one to my collection.