And now for something completely acoustic. Well almost completely.

chilliepot

Well here we go. This is my stable full of beauties.
First in line is my Yamaha FG 300 Red Label. They dont make them like this any more. Famous for that fancy scratch board. Its amazing how many people remark on it. They are also famous for being badly stuck on.

Then 2 nylon strung guitars a Hohner on the left. Hohner being more well known for Mouth-organs. And a Kawai. Kawai being more well-known for pianos! The Hohner was quite bashed around when I found it and I had to touch it up a bit and its still has a few battle scars.
All from the 1970s.

I have this Aria Pro ii. Not bad actually, though Aria is better known for classical guitars. I plug it into a Roland x15 when I want to make a noise.

When I cant carry a guitar I put one of these in my pocket. These are 3 soprano ukuleles. One of these days Im gonna get me a travel guitar because I prefer 6 strings and I kinda like steel. The one on the left is a Juan Gomez from Barcelona. I put on 'nylgut' strings made by Aquilla. They are the best thing for a ukulele. A nylon developed with the characteristics of old fashioned gut strings. They don't stretch as you pluck them like regular nylon does. The middle one is a nameless wonder made of ply ( Its not bad man!). And the one on the right is one I made from cherry wood.

These are 2 that I made. A piccolo balalaika. A balalaika. Really! It only has 3 strings! Still, it looks kinda cute. And then there is the cherry uke.

Bob-Dubery

Nice! Aria were actually making some very nice electrics, of their own design, in the early 80s. Same as Ibanez and Yamaha were, but Aria didn't seem to catch on in the same way. One of my first guitars was an Aria dreadnought - I remember it because it had a zero fret.

If you like Ukes (now why would I say that?) then check out the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain - they're well represented on youtube.

If you like balaikas then check out the UOGB's version of Formby's "Standing On the Corner" which they turn into a cossack dance and on which they sound more like the Balalaika Orchestra of Great Britain.

I saw them in London a couple of years ago. A real fun gig. They had a sopranino uke on stage with them, and made a great show of concealing it inside of dinner jackets and so on. It got used on a couple of numbers too. They also have a couple of resonator ukes.

chilliepot

Hey thanks for that. Ill check out those balalaikas. I have another one on the work bench. A full size one. I dont actually play a balalaika I just thought it would be fun to make one.