Harmony Archtopshave always been favorites. These fine guitars were a standard offering in the Harmony lineup. The Broadway and Montclair were great mid priced archtops, the Catalina was pretty daring in the finish department and the Patrician emerged as the finest and best. All were offered in what Harmony called "auditorium" size. The following are pictures of Harmony Archtop guitars.
HARMONY BROADWAY ARCHTOPS
Nice Broadway, minus pickguard
Broadway models were extra shiny well built models that let you know that this wasn't juniors Archtone. The fancy black/white checker like binding and the rich wood grain under the gleaming finish was enough to make almost any guitar player lust for it. And the name..... Broadway!
The Broadway has a super high gloss finish.
Harmony Montclair Archtops
Sorry, no pictures as of yet!
Harmony Catalina Archtops
The Catalina was introduced in the Two Tone era of the 50's. The paint job would better suit a 1957 Studebaker Champion than a guitar, but it is interesting! This is your basic dressed up Archtone.
..............
The Catalina is a sought after model since it is unusual, and there is no denying what decade the design belonged to! Good clean Catalinas are getting pretty scarce!
Nice Silvertone Model
Harmony Archtop guitars tend to sound pretty good, but are not as loud as a modern dreadnought design flat top guitar. It is not only a matter of volume, but a matter of what tones actually "cut through". Modern flat top acoustic guitars are primarily designed for "flat picking". They have a resonant bottom end and a bright top end. Archtop guitars cannot keep up with them for this purpose, but, if you know why archtop guitars are designed the way they are, you can optimize your instrument by using your guitar as it was designed.
In the early days of radio, the hertz spectrum reproduction was very limited, lots of mids, very little low or high end. These guitars were designed to rule the middle ground, and they do. When playing a heavy rhythm style, they have no equal in the midrange department. To optimize the low and high end, use a good bright phosphor bronze string. For better volume, use a heavy gauge string. The heavier the string, the better tone the string has. For lead guitar, these guitars like 11-52, for rhythm try 12-56 gauge strings.
The Caribbean was a strange design that makes as good as a wall hanger as a functional instrument.
Patrician
The Patrician was one of the "glamour" guitars
in the Harmony lineup. They were well built and still have a pleasing tone.
Better workmanship as well as better materials went into making each Patrician.
A Great Picture of Todd's Guitar.
(See story below)
A 1960 Harmony Patrician Acoustic Archtop (model
1407), owned by Todd
Young of Pickering, Ontario, Canada.
"When I first acquired this guitar I was very
impressed with its
construction and tone. Truth was I never
realized just how nice it was
until I had the neck straightened and the
bridge properly positioned by
a professional luthier shop. I put on
a set of light gauge strings and
this baby plays like a dream!"
"One other mystery with this guitar:
I can clearly make out the word
"Lipsky" stamped on the back in each F hole.
Has anyone ever seen or
heard of such a thing with Harmony guitars?
I was wondering if it might
be an inspection stamp or perhaps the actual
luthier at Harmony? Any
thoughts on this would be greatly appreciated.
As usual...every Harmony
guitar has it's own special secrets!
If you're still out there Lipsky,
you sure knew how to make guitars and this
one is proof of that!
Thanks!"
Todd holstead_young@sympatico.ca
If anyone knows anything about a "Lipsky stamp"
inside Harmony guitars, please contact Todd.
Todd Young from Ontario, Canada with his nice Patrician archtop.
WANTED:
To Whom It May Concern (posted Feb 10, 2003):
I have a Harmony Patrician acoustic archtop
guitar (model 1407) and I am
currently looking for an ORIGINAL pickguard
for it. This pickguard is a
dark tortoiseshell and has a distinctive
"P" logo on the lower portion,
along with a small floral pattern. The
pickguard can be clearly seen in
this graphic from the Harmony catalog
(shown above).
If you have such a part available for
sale (perfect, imperfect or
otherwise) or know where I might obtain one
please e-mail me at
holstead_young@sympatico.ca
Any information that you could provide
would be very much appreciated.
Thanks (and thanks to Jim for posting
this request on my behalf.)
Todd Young
Pickering, Ontario, Canada
What A Guitar!
The Patrician model was in its own class. It was fancy, well designed and better built than most Harmony models. Although Harmony is thought of as a "low end" instrument, I dare anyone to consider the Patrician as "low end"!
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