Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 54

COLUMN The (Way) Back Beat
production beginning in 1901. Dyer was a fullline jobber said to be the largest music distributor
west of Chicago - and sold musical goods under
many brands including guitars labeled "Stetson" (the Larsons built some of these). While
most sellers offered a limited selection of harp
guitars - often a single model - Dyer marketed
an entire line. Their striking design originally
followed a patent belonging to maverick luthier
Chris Knutsen in Port Townsend, Washington,
who licensed it to the St. Paul firm. This is all
but lost to history, but the Norwegian-born
Knutsen had been experimenting with harp
guitars for years before applying for patents in
1896 and '97 centered around an upper extension
to the guitar body called the "one-arm guitar,"
the second including sub-bass strings. Knutsen
was one of the most creative (if not technically
skilled) luthiers of the era and his take on the harp
guitar was original, often eccentric to the point
of weird. Over the next 30-plus years, Knutsen
designed and hand-built many outlandish
instruments - some with not only sub-bass but
"super-treble" strings, along the way inventing
what most know as the Weissenborn Hawaiian
guitar. Compared to the Larsons, his workmanship was often crude, cheap, and sloppy, but he
never stopped brainstorming.
Most 1890s harp guitars were built on a double-neck format, in the German tradition. The
upper body arm designed by Knutsen allowed
for the instrument to be lighter and
more resonant, and its enlarged
sound chamber helped amplify
the sub-bass strings. He sold
his idea to Dyer, the firm
credited as his distributor
circa 1899. There's no record
of how long this arrangement lasted, but Knutsen's
imprecise workmanship and
deliveries likely proved problematic. Based on the first
illustrated ads, from late 1901,
the Larsons were already
building the Symphony
Harps, though Dyer
claimed themselves as
manufacturer. Early
models were visually similar to the
Kuntsen style and
carried labels signed
Dyer endorser
Charles Knauff
in 1907 (top left),
the Style 7 in Dyer's
1908 catalog (bottom),
and the amazing Style 8.

VINTAGE GUITAR

54

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Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open

Contents
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - Cover
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - IFC
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 3
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 4
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 5
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 6
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 7
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 8
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 9
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - Contents
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 11
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Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - IBC
Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - BC
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