Harmony Stella Parlor Guitar 1960’s - Great Player! - Beautiful Condition! - Time Traveler! -

This one is great! Cool little Harmony parlor guitar from the early 60's, it plays and sounds great and it's in really beautiful condition. It would look right in place on a movie set from the early 60's, it's got a great voice and it plays very slick!

When it comes to the whole world of Harmony, Kay, Silvertone, Airline, and whatever other USA-made department store guitars from the 60’s that were made, you gotta take the ones that survived until now all case by case. Back in the day they weren’t thought of as being nice. They were in the shadow of “real” guitars, and a lot of them were neglected or in some cases purposely destroyed. The concept of smashing a guitar has for the most part passed. Sure, Pheobe Bridgers smashed one on SNL a year ago or so, but there was a time where it was standard fare for at least one if not multiple guitars to be smashed in the course of a show. I met these super burnt old dudes when I was working at the first guitar store I ever worked at, and one of them saw a Silvertone hanging from the wall and unsolicitedly launched into a huge story complete with loud sound effects about how his friends and him smashed the same guitar but then regretted it because they saw a picture of Jimmy Page holding one in a magazine. Smashing things can be a cathartic experience I guess, but the whole thing about a guitar is that maybe you should achieve that cathartic experience through playing the guitar. You can smash it once, but here’s the thing you can play it many times. These 50’s/60’s USA made department store guitars were unfortunately the perfect age to be candidates for guitar smashing in the 80’s and early 90’s. They weren’t totally worth anything at the time, they weren’t in style in the era of pointy shredders, there was no concept of vintage it was still “used gear,” and so they met their untimely end. A lot of others were just left in a hot garage for 20 years while the Fender Strat was kept in a case under the bed, and then they would slowly dry out and warp. So it can be tough to find one that’s still a nice instrument, and this one totally rules. It’s been lovingly played and appreciated the way it should have, it’s an awesome guitar.

As an instrument, this one is awesome. Neck is miraculously straight as an arrow, it’s crazy. The action is like butter, the neck feels beautiful and fast, and it has a cool little tone to it. I really wanted to put silk and steel strings on it which would be so awesome, but I was out so I went with nylon. It sounds great and mellow with nylon, but it would get a really folky and beautiful voice with silk and steel. I normally wouldn't recommend to switch between silk and steel and nylon on a guitar, but this one is a stout and robust little guitar, it can handle a bit more tension from a set of silk and steels no problem. It’s got some general aesthetic wear throughout, but it’s totally free of cracks and is a super healthy guitar! I absolutely love this one and can’t say enough good things about it. All original right down to the tuning keys and the really beautiful original pickguard. The pickguards are usually missing and it's good to see this one looking so great. Great guitar!