Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open - 58

COLUMN The (Way) Back Beat
A Stahl-branded
harp guitar
(left), a Maurer
with two necks,
and yet another
Larson harp
variation.

fanciful down-curving bridge. The exact body
shapes also differ on extant twin-neck examples,
at least one being bizarrely tight-waisted! While
the brothers worked together, it seems to have
been younger sibling August who was the primary
idea man - or at least appeared as "inventor" on
patent applications. The first patent, awarded in
1904, primarily covered the laminated top braces.
The next, filed in June '09 and awarded April '12,
was for a more involved (outlandish?) idea sometimes dubbed the Picasso guitar - a doubleneck
consisting of one guitar body built inside another!
August's reasoning for the concept, as stated in the
application, was that the full-body cavity provided
resonance for the sub-bass strings would be too
large to properly voice the treble strings, hence
a double sound chamber. The 12" internal body
was designed to maintain the brilliance of treble
tones when blended with the deeper resonance of
the outer body. It would be interesting to know
if he intended this design to rectify a perceived

fault of Dyer instruments - after all, by the time
this application was filed, the brothers had been
working on them for years. Most players might
disagree, though modern performer Stacy Hobbs
uses a 1909 Stahl double-chamber guitar with a
uniquely spectacular sound. At any rate, August's
idea was interesting, conceptually, but few appear were built. Some examples simply lack the
internal body, calling into question the patent's
finely-argued logic. And not all use the stepped
lower bout, showing a more-conventional
rounded bottom edge. The dark-topped example
shown above carries the Stahl brand with an
upper support arm instead of a second neck,
while the "natural" doubleneck is a Maurer
and a third example has a different upper body,
extending the spruce soundboard over the upper
neck. The Brothers' lack of sales push (these do
not appear to have been advertised at all) meant
little demand for August's brainchild, whatever
its sonic merits.

VINTAGE GUITAR

September 2017

Of all these instruments, 100-plus years
on, the Dyer Symphony is considered the
best player's piece, and originals remain
in demand even among modern versions
and descendants. The long upper extension
on the body, combined with superbly light
construction, provides a tone without peer,
even if one ignores the extra bass strings!
It's possible that August himself might have
preferred his own double-body creation, but
the Dyer Symphony Harp Guitar - a design
born of the combination of the Larson's
artistry, Chris Knutsen's mad genius, and the
Dyer Brothers' sales acumen, remains one of
the greatest - and most distinctive - of all
American fretted instruments.
Special thanks to Gregg Miner for sharing his research
and image library. Readers with an interest in the harp
guitar are strongly encouraged to explore Gregg's
encyclopedic website, harpguitars.net.

Vintage Guitar - September 2017 - open

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