Gibson ES-175 Electric Guitar

I love this guitar, its sound, its design- everything! It is perfect. There is nothing that I dislike though it was not a new guitar.

This guitar is a classic, pure and simple. It is a dream guitar for a jazz player who appreciates the sound of an archtop. The guitars made by Gibson in the mid 50's to mid 60's were crafted for players. They were spare with varnish which allows the woods to deliver warm, rich and pure sound.
I purchased this guitar for my daughter, a talented and dedicated jazz guitarist. She is thrilled to own it.
Collectors revere the ES-175, but I believe that anyone who owns a fine a guitar as this one does it no service by protecting it behind glass. It must be played.

There exist numerous reasons to like these guitars. They've been around forever which is proof in itself of the worthiness of this model. If you're a jazz musician then you're already aware of the tone and versatility of this instrument. If you're a Yes fan like me then you're aware that Steve Howe played his 175 for most of that work. Still, I wouldn't classify the 175 as an everyday guitar - at least for me - for the following reasons. First is value; this is not an inexpensive guitar. Mine's so pretty I hesitate to take it out as much as I should just because I'm afraid that I'll somehow mess it up. (To those who may enjoy more pristine haunts, I salute you as I've still young children and other "obstacles" to maintaining clean, unblemished instruments in my abode.) Once past that, I tend to jump around from style to style as I play and the 175 is more if a niche instrument to me. I find that I can approximate the 175 tone to a degree on my CS-336, and it (and my LP) are more manageable when it comes to size. I'm not suggesting that these guitars are superior, just more versatile to my particular style of playing, that being of limited duration (preventing me on most occassions from swapping guitars) and multiple styles (the ES-175 doesn't distort well.) I'll be the first to admit that the 175 sounds truly wonderful through my Marshall TSL100 clean, but I just don't play clean for very long at a time! So, is it a wonderful instrument, one that will never go out of vogue, one with a distinctive tone set and playability? Yes! Is this the guitar for the person who will own but one instrument? No; unless that person is into jazz...then what else would you need?