George Wilkinson asks:
Can any one shed a little light on this Bass 7 by Rosetti made by Egmond? My friend found it at the back of a garage while cleaning it out, I've tried but have had little result in finding out much about it, so now I am asking the experts.Well, we're not really experts, just enthusiasts and we are learning more and more about guitars every day. You have already correctly identified the bass as an Egmond Bass 7 despite the Rosetti brandname. Rosetti were - and still are - a UK-based musical instrument distributor.
The Egmond Bass 7 dates (at least as far back) to 1961 when Egmond opened their new factory in Best, The Netherlands. It was part of Egmond's "7" series which also included the Lucky 7 and Solid 7 guitars. In fact, the Bass 7 could be considered the bass version of the Solid 7. Paul McCartney's first "bass" was actually an Egmond Solid 7 guitar strung with piano strings - maybe he didn't realise that they actually produced the Bass 7. (Speaking of Paul McCartney, we notice that the bass in the photo has also been strung for a left-handed player).
Despite the "Solid" name, all these guitars were actually hollow-bodied, but with only the Lucky 7 having f-holes to indicate its hollow-body status. Furthermore, these instruments did not have truss rods so any movement or twisting of the neck would be difficult to correct. This may well be part of the reason we don't see so many of these Egmonds these days - if the neck twisted or bowed it would be useless and the guitar may well end up being binned.
For further information please see www.egmondguitars.nl and www.egmond.se - I sometimes wonder what we would do for information if it wasn't for fan sites like these!
G L Wilson
© 2012, Guitarz - The Original Guitar Blog - 10 years and counting!
http://guitarz.blogspot.co.uk/2011/01/rosetti-bass-7-by-egmond.html
ReplyDeleteJust to confuse things further, there's also a slab-bodied single-cutaway version of the Bass 7 (copy and paste the link I gave above) - I think this may have been a later version with perhaps a solid plywood body (?) but check with those guys at the websites I mentioned, as they are more likely to know. Certainly in one photograph dated 1961 we see a twin-cutaway Bass 7, so that's why I'm assuming it came first. UNLESS the single-cutaway design pre-dates the opening of the best factory, but the very slim slab-body looks unlikely to have been hollow which all the earlier Egmonds were.
George has posted this on our Facebook page:
ReplyDelete"Thanks for the info on the guitar,just thought I'd up date you on something you put in your answer, while I was cleaning the neck the other day I decided to take a peek under the truss rod cover as you said they where not known to have a truss rod, and low and behold to my surprise it does it has a flat head tension screw, thanks again for the info"
I had a Bass 7 in 1964 with a DIN socket instead of a jack socket; it was junk.
ReplyDeleteMy husband has the same guitar, do you still have it? He was wondering if you were going to sell it.
ReplyDelete