MARTIN ARCHIVES
The Martin Inception™ Series reflects the company’ s exploration of new materials and manufacturing methods alongside its long-standing guitar-making traditions.
I0000000000000000000034H from the late 1930s, the D-28s and D-45s and 000-28s of that period, are among the most coveted acoustic instruments on earth. But the reputation obscures a different and equally true thing about the company, which is that it has been a source of major acoustic guitar innovation throughout its history, and continues to be.
“ The acoustic guitar wouldn’ t be what it is today without Martin originating the orchestra models, the dreadnoughts,” Ahner says, and he’ s not reciting a marketing line. He means it in the specific, traceable way that the archive makes available: the forms are there, the correspondence is there, the production records are there. Martin invented the vocabulary that every other acoustic guitar builder has been working within or against ever since.
The SC-13E is the current exhibit in the case for Martin as innovator. Released in 2019 and the best-selling acoustic-electric of 2020, the SC introduced a 13thfret neck joint, a shortened body, a new approach to the neck-to-body connection that opened up access to the upper frets in a way traditional acoustic architecture had never managed, and a pickup system designed from the ground up. It was a reimagining of what an acoustic guitar could be structurally, not an extension of existing models. In a hundred years, some future archivist will be showing those to guitar historians the way Ahner now shows visitors the 1916 dreadnought form. The company’ s Inception Series takes a parallel approach, using domestic hardwoods and alternative construction techniques, including skeleton bracing and sonic channels, to make guitars that sound like traditional Martins without relying on the traditional materials. Mahogany and rosewood grow slowly. Maple and other domestic hardwoods grow faster and are more consistently available. The engineering challenge is making the tonal result comparable, and the results, by most accounts, have been strong. Ahner frames this as continuous
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