Selmer Orchestre Petite Bouche #403 from 1934, in excellent preserved and playable condition.
The early 1930s saw the explosion of jazz orchestras, and with it an ever-increasing demand for guitars capable of competing in terms loudness with the brass and woodwind sections of the ensembles. The Americans were the first to provide musicians with such instruments, with archtop guitars such as the Gibson L-5 that would become the tools of choice for the burgeoning jazz guitar scene. Instrument manufacturers in Europe were not long to follow suite, and it was Ben Davis, the sales director of the English branch of Selmer, who would be among the first to recognize the need of musicians for instruments that offered ever more sonic power. He met Mario Maccaferri, an Italian concert pianist and luthier from the province of Ferrara, who was living in London in the late 1920s to teach guitar and perform. Maccaferri already had several years of experience as a luthier, having learned his techniques from Luigi Mozzani, a renowned craftsman based in Cento (Maccaferri’s hometown). He presented Ben Davis with a concept of innovative guitars that he had developed based on his apprenticeship with Mozzani, featuring a cutaway and an internal resonator, two features that were very modern for the time in terms of playability and acoustic amplification processes.
A contract was signed between Selmer and Maccaferri, and the latter moved to France in 1932 where he took charge of the new workshop dedicated to the construction of guitars in Selmer’s factory in Mantes-la-Ville. This collaboration would last two years, during which a whole range of instruments was produced, including classical concert guitars, tenor guitars, Hawaiian guitars, and Orchestre jazz guitars. The latter would quickly be seized by guitarists from dance bands, previously accustomed to the use of the banjo and banjo-guitar, who would find their marks on Selmers set up with steel strings with all that they have to offer in terms of musicality and ease for solo playing compared to the banjo. It was this instrument that Django Reinhardt would eminently take up, as well as his musicians within the Quintette du Hot Club de France and all their entourage in the pre-war years until the early 1950s – taking the Selmer guitar to its peak in a musical expression unequaled to this day.
Here we find one of the rarest variations of the Selmer steel-string guitar, the one that probably illustrates most explicitly what is known as the transition period – that is, the one that extends between Maccaferri’s departure in 1934 and the late 1930s, when the final appearance of the Selmer model with 14 frets and a small oval soundhole was formalized. We can observe a very particular combination of characteristics: the neck still has all of the attributes of the Maccaferri era with a fairly rectangular profile, wider at the nut than later productions, joined to the body at the 12th fret; a small oval soundhole, introduced to replace the large soundhole initially present on Selmer models to accommodate the internal resonator – this element was promptly cast aside by the workers assembling the guitars after Maccaferri’s departure, leading to the modification of the soundhole from 1934, the instrument presented here is therefore one of the very first examples built with the “Petite Bouche”; the label stuck inside on the back includes the name of the model Orchestre as well as the serial number of the guitar, but the name of Maccaferri is now removed with a stroke of ink.
This guitar remains magnificently preserved to this day with all of its original parts, including its varnish, its tuners and its tailpiece stamped with the Selmer brand. It has passed through our workshop where we have meticulously applied ourselves to its full restoration for playing, taking care to preserve its integrity while guaranteeing its perfect stability and impeccable functioning as a musical instrument: the neck angle has been reset in order to find a desirable action while maintaining good string angle on the bridge; the instrument has been fully refretted; a new string guide nut has been made and adjusted onto the instrument. We note the traces of an old pickguard having slightly altered the varnish of the soundboard – the guitar nevertheless retains all of its original French polish varnish.
Sold in a modern hardshell case, accompanied by its certificate of authenticity by Jérôme Casanova.
