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Stella and Sovereign guitars were also made by the Harmony Guitar company and many of those models were then transferred over to the Asian market. Identifying an Asian Made Harmony Guitar Check the headstock where the name 'Harmony' is embossed. Mapamap europa serial numbers. Lowe's kitchen design software free. 2017-9-15 Although Harmony Guitars was originally established in 1892 in the U.S., any Harmony guitar that has that phrase, 'est. 1892' is actually an Asian-made guitar. In the 1970s, the company name, Harmony, was sold for use on Asian produced guitars, shortly after the American Harmony Guitar Company ceased operation.
H1270 - Sovereign jumbo 12 string
It’s the model H1270, which was THE great classic Harmony 12 string. It dates from the late 60s, early 70s. Several big name musicians have chosen to play this model (look at the Peter Townsend article below). If you check one of these beauties out you’ll know why Peter, among many others loved it so much. It is one cool instrument with a funky sound all it's own.
This one is made of all solid wood mahogany back and sides, spruce top, mahogany neck, rosewood fingerboard and ladder braced. All very nice looking woods without a single crack. The back is a single piece of mahogany. The body is a small jumbo size 16” lower bout. There is some finish checking, normal for a guitar of this age.
The bridge is an obvious replacement. It’s fixed in place, not the floater this guitar would have had originally. I've had a different saddle put in which perfected the intonation all the way up the neck, making it a great players guitar. You won't find this handy feature on the original, older guitars.
The guitar has an amazingly comfortable feel to it with the narrow waist and the short neck. The fingerboard is 2” wide at the nut and although the neck is tad beefy the action - 3/32 at the 12th fret - makes the guitar is very easy to play.
Some of the tuners have extra play in them but they're quite functionable, keeping the guitar in perfect tune. The truss rod works too.
Serial Number: 9879H1203
This one is made of all solid wood mahogany back and sides, spruce top, mahogany neck, rosewood fingerboard and ladder braced. All very nice looking woods without a single crack. The back is a single piece of mahogany. The body is a small jumbo size 16” lower bout. There is some finish checking, normal for a guitar of this age.
The bridge is an obvious replacement. It’s fixed in place, not the floater this guitar would have had originally. I've had a different saddle put in which perfected the intonation all the way up the neck, making it a great players guitar. You won't find this handy feature on the original, older guitars.
The guitar has an amazingly comfortable feel to it with the narrow waist and the short neck. The fingerboard is 2” wide at the nut and although the neck is tad beefy the action - 3/32 at the 12th fret - makes the guitar is very easy to play.
Some of the tuners have extra play in them but they're quite functionable, keeping the guitar in perfect tune. The truss rod works too.
Serial Number: 9879H1203
Listen to the incredible tone of this guitar. It's one of the BEST 12 string guitars I've ever played!
Here is the original 'Care and Use' pamphlet that came with the guitar!!
![Harmony sovereign guitar decal Harmony sovereign guitar decal](https://reverb-res.cloudinary.com/image/upload/s--JzFx7KZP--/a_exif,c_limit,e_unsharp_mask:80,f_auto,fl_progressive,g_south,h_620,q_90,w_620/v1453859938/cphiznyzvqw3lmlx7pru.jpg)
Here's Peter Townsend of The Who posing with the very same model with a different pickguard. This Harmony 12-string that became Peter's staple, go to guitar in the sixties and seventies. Peter was a huge fan of Leadbelly, and the Harmony was as close as he could get to Leadbelly's big Stella. You can see more pics of Pete and read the story of his love for this guitar here:
http://www.thewho.net/whotabs/gear/guitar/harmony12.html
Back in 2009, my wife and I spent a long weekend visiting with friends at the Sycamore Haven House Bed & Breakfast. In case you're not familiar with it, this is a wonderful getaway location, in the small Chesapeake Bay town of Susan, Virginia. As with most long weekend pleasure trips, Friday and Saturday were spectacular, and Sunday morning came way too quickly. http://www.thewho.net/whotabs/gear/guitar/harmony12.html
After a nice breakfast, we said goodbyes to our friends and the innskeeper. Before the ride back home, my wife and I made a stop in town to pick up souvenirs. While waiting for one of the small shoppes to open, we spent some time in a consignment shop. That's where I first saw her, cleverly leaning against an armless Victorian occasional chair. It was love at first sight, and at once I felt as if a greater reason for my trip to the southern Chesapeake area had been revealed.
I picked her up and looked her over, carefully checking out the features and overall condition of this old guitar. Her size, shape, coloring and construction details were all similar to that of the legendary pre-war OOO and OM Martin models. Her chunky ladder bracing and pinless bridge told me she was about 50 or more years old, and it was clear she had seen some use, abuse and neglect over the years. Although I wasn't entirely sure of what I had found, thoughts of making some minor repairs to transform an under-valued diamond-in-the-rough into a rare and playable vintage instrument raced through my mind. Except for a few character marks, dings, dents and some buckle rash, her finish was in great condition and she had no visible structural cracks or damage. Her neck had a bit too much relief to be playable, she had some top bulging behind the bridge, and there were signs of some slight neck/body joint separation. But, a truss rod cover on her headstock gave me some hope that a neck adjustment might be enough to bring her action down to something playable. I carefully tuned her well-worn strings, about three half steps down from concert pitch, just long enough to finger a few licks and some open chords.
Almost completely lost in her warm even tone, I realized I also had an audience, as I recognized the sultry/sweet southern accent of a mature woman's voice telling me my playing sounded 'real nice'. The woman identified herself as the store owner, offered to help me with anything I was interested in, and encouraged me to keep playing while she watched and listened. Recognizing she was interested in making a sale, I thanked her for the compliment and countered that this guitar would take a lot of work to truly be playable. The tag stated a firm but reasonable asking price, and the woman continued to appear less interested in making a sale than being serenaded. Considering my options, I decided to not let this one get away, and convinced myself, if nothing else, this guitar would make a great wall hanging. After the long ride home, I placed her on a wall hanger, letting her acclimate to the less humid air of the North Carolina Piedmont while I started looking into identifying the model and age of this mature beauty.
Thank god for the Internet! After doing some research, I realized what I had found is a Harmony H1203 'Western Special' Sovereign. A combination of solid tone woods and mass-production techniques gave Harmony instruments a practical blend of rich sound quality in an affordable price range. These instruments are part of a long list of guitars with similar tonal range referred to as 'blues boxes', commonly used by delta blues musicians that made popular music in the early to mid 1900's. Popular musicians since then have borrowed heavily from the delta blues style. Most notably, we find a lot of the delta blues in the blend of styles we commonly refer to as rock and roll. Rumor has it that Jimmy Page used a Harmony H1260 'Jumbo' Sovereign while recording 'Stairway to Heaven'. With lineage like that, I once again felt justified in my purchase of this old guitar.
Figuring out the age of this old guitar was my next challenge. According to the information I found on the Harmony Database, she appears to have been built in the late 1950's or early 1960's. I have not found any date or model number stamps inside the sound box, but a date stamp on the top panel might exist, covered by a brace, end block or neck block. If so, I hope I will never need to disassemble her enough to find out her true age. Suffice to say, this old guitar appears to have been built no earlier than in 1956 and no later than in 1966. I moved on, looking into what it would take to repair this old guitar. I cleared off my work bench, laid out a clean towel, and took a good, long look at this old guitar.
Her action at the 14th fret was close to double what it should be.
I put a straight edge up to her neck and could see a huge amount of relief.
In this light it was also easier to see how much her top had deformed over the years.
Now that her woods had acclimated to the lower humidity, I could see separation at the heel of her neck joint.
Some of her back bracing appeared loose as well.
Harmony Sovereign Guitar 1950s
But, my biggest surprise came when I removed her cover plate, and found a broken truss rod.Harmony Sovereign Guitar F-70nf
Convinced that this old guitar needed much more repairs than what I could do myself, I brought her to the folks at Hanson and Crawford's in downtown Raleigh. This is a small shop that does repairs and custom work by appointment. Walking in to their basement unit entrance, I was greeted by the smell of freshly cut wood, glue and paint. The two owners were both working hard, and looked up briefly enough from what they were doing to ask if they could help me with something. After carefully looking over what I had brought, they politely said it would cost more than this old guitar was worth to make the necessary repairs. However, they took the time to come up with a laundry list of repairs and associated costs, and a grand total of just over $1,000.00.