Benoit Custom 8 String Resonator Guitar, Engraved, Gold-plated, Macassar Ebony

This is not a left-handed square-neck resonator guitar. It was custom made for a disabled player who had a hard time reaching the high frets. Turns out to be a great idea! The left side cutaway really helps if you play sitting down! This was made by Carroll Benoit, a Cajun resonator guitar builder from East Texas with a reputation for excellent work. Have a look at the photos of the cover plate and tailpiece. Benoit did that engraving himself, then had it gold-plated. It has eight individual Waverly tuners On a slotted headstock! Benoit has retired, and I don’t know when this was built. It is in a Martin case that Benoit rebuilt to fit this instrument perfectly. The neck is glued up from five pieces of wood, capped with an ebony fretboard. The “frets” are actually abalone inlay. The body is solid Indonesian Macassar Ebony, striped, and there is a veneer of the same wood on the headstock. This striped ebony splits a bit easily, and if you look at the closeups, you may note cracks between the tail of the guitar and the cutout for the cone and from the top of the cone cutout to the bass side sound hole and up to the upper end of the guitar. This is where there is the least wood, and it couldn’t handle the string tension. All of these cracks have been glued and cleated the whole length of the cracks, so they shouldn’t recur, and it’s been a year since the repairs. I’ve lowered the price by $500 because of the repairs.

I have this tuned, from the bass, G B D E G B D G. That is, it’s a G6 tuning with an extra high G. If you aren’t used to a 6th tuning, that E lets you play the relative minor triad of G (Em) without moving the steel. E G B. Or if you add the D string, it’s a minor 7th. I love the high G, as it completes the octave from G to G. If you aren’t used to 6th tunings and usually play six string open G, it will take a couple hours of playing to get used to it, but I love having that E string. Well, and that high G, too. The neck is very wide so that the distance between the strings can be the same throughout the string length. That distance is actually 24/64” (3/8”), compared to 20/64” for the Byrl I usually play. So the string spacing is actually wide, though it seems narrower at first because there are eight of them.

This is a loud instrument with a beautiful warm, orchestral tone. It whines appropriately over the cone, but it has more of a modern sound with a strong bass, like a Beard, rather than like a 30s Dobro. I’m selling this because I bought an amazing Byrl like Rob Ickes’ a week after I bought this, and this one isn’t getting played. It has a pickup attached to the cone nut and a tail-pin jack, but I haven’t tried it.