At a Glance

The Specs:
12-fret 00 body size. Solid mahogany top, back, sides, neck, and body binding. Ebony fretboard, pyramid bridge, bridge pins, tuner buttons, and head plate. Scalloped bracing. Bone nut and saddle. 24³/₄-inch scale. 1³/₄-inch nut width. 2³/₁₆-inch string spacing at the saddle. Nitrocellulose lacquer finish. Santa Cruz Guitar Company nickel/ebony vintage-style open-gear tuners. Light-gauge Elixir 80/20 Bronze strings. Made in USA.

This Is Cool:
All-mahogany styling with complex, overtone-rich sound.

Watch For:
V neck may be uncomfortable for some hands.

Price:
$3,500 list/$3,150 street.

Maker:
Santa Cruz Guitar Co.: (831) 425-0999; santacruzguitar.com.

Santa Cruz 00 1929 Review

It’s been eight decades since guitar companies like Martin, Gibson, and Epiphone began increasing their use of mahogany as a way to make instruments more affordable to musicians whose livelihood had been crippled by the Great Depression, ensuring their own survival in the process. While mahogany has become a standard back-and-side wood on flattop guitars, all-mahogany guitars are much less common. Recently, the Santa Cruz Guitar Company, recognizing the seriousness of the recent economic downturn, introduced the 1929, a 12-fret, 00-size steel-string (the model is also available in 0 and 000 sizes) that “honors the simple and elegant presence” of Depression-era mahogany-topped guitars like Martin’s 17 Series and Gibson’s L-0. And while the 1929 has a suitably vintage vibe and austere simplicity, you don’t need to be down and out to appreciate the classic style and sweet sound of this guitar.

Simple Elegance

The 1929 can rightfully be described as “unadorned,” but Santa Cruz’s design includes a few brilliant touches that give the guitar a timeless elegance. Binding the mahogany body with mahogany may seem obvious and almost overly subtle, but it gives the guitar a sense of completeness and care. With its all-ebony head plate, tuner buttons, pyramid bridge, and fretboard, as well as a redesigned script headstock logo, the 1929 has the head-turning stylishness of a perfectly tailored Italian suit. Construction-wise, Santa Cruz has clearly cut no corners. Everything is beautifully put together, and the materials are uniformly top-notch.

The 12-fret 00 body is immediately comfortable in the lap, inspiring you to hunch over and lean into the small guitar; the 1929 makes a very cozy playing partner. The 1³/₄-inch nut width, 24³/₄-inch short scale, and perfectly dialed-in action also make playing the 1929 an effortless experience—it’s easy to glide up and down the fretboard or add subtle bends and vibrato to held notes, and picking fingers fit neatly between the strings. The only downside to the design, which was remarked upon by more than one person who played it in the Acoustic Guitar office, is the 1929’s rather sharp V neck shape. While it’s fine for players with large hands and a “cowboy” hand position with the thumb protruding upward behind the neck, a player with more classical hand position whose thumb tends to wind up in the middle of the neck may find the pointed V uncomfortable or fatiguing. But Santa Cruz specializes in custom work, so ordering a 1929 with a different neck shape would be an easy task.

Complex Overtones, Punchy Midrange

While I have some experience with 12-fret 00’s and am not usually surprised by the amount of sound that can be produced by a “small” guitar, I was not quite prepared for the richness and balance of the mahogany-topped 1929. Traditionally, mahogany-topped guitars like the Martin 00-17 have been favored by blues and folk guitarists looking for a biting and well-defined midrange. Remembering the 1929’s inspiration, I dug into it on some old-time Jimmie Rodgers–style cowboy chords and bass runs (Rodgers played a Martin 2-17 at the beginning of his career) and some simple bluesy fingerpicking. The guitar’s response was exceptional; notes seemed to leap off the top of the guitar and sail across the room with the projection and maturity of a guitar made in, oh, say, 1929. However, the guitar’s overtone-rich and balanced complexity was just as suitable for a subdued fingerstyle approach with lush, extended chords and moving voices. The only style of guitar playing that may not be ideally suited to this guitar is aggressive bluegrass flatpicking, where a more pronounced bass range is usually preferred. Other than that, the 1929 settled right into anything I could dream up to play on it. Its dynamic range is particularly impressive. While it sounds so sweet at low volume that you’re tempted to stay there, it even sounds great on heavily strummed pop and folk accompaniment. The guitar simply gets louder the more you dig in, and will probably only break up at a large, raucous jam.

All-Mahogany Versatility

The 00 1929 may have been designed with economic constraints in mind, but its balanced sound and aptitude for multiple styles make it worth a look for anyone interested in a small guitar. For those whose aesthetic matches the classic vintage vibe of the 1929, it’s a must-have.