Super-Rare 'Ebony' Finished Guild Starfire lV

1966 Guild Starfire IV Ebony.

This super rare, custom-color guitar weighs just 7.60 lbs. and features a mahogany body with a solid wooden block inside. Three-piece mahogany and maple neck with a nut width of just over 1 5/8 inches, a scale length of 24 3/4 inches and a wonderful medium profile. Single-bound rosewood fretboard with 22 original medium-thin frets and inlaid pearl dot position markers. Headstock with inlaid pearl "Guild" logo and pearl 'Chesterfield' inlay. Specific shaped black aluminium truss-rod cover with "Starfire" in silver, secured by two screws. Serial number "EL 939" stamped in blind on back of headstock. Individual Grover open-back StaTite tuners with oval metal buttons. The top and back edges are bound with three-ply white and black ivoroid. Two Guild HB-1 (full-size) humbucking pickups with outputs of 7.11k and 6.45k. The pickups are positioned to achieve maximum bass on the neck pickup and maximum treble on the bridge pickup. Transparent acrylic (or Lucite) stairstep pickguard painted black from the underside after a "Star" and "Guild" logo have been silk-screened in gold. Four controls (two volume, two tone) plus three-way pickup selector switch on the treble horn. Guild black plastic control knobs with "G" logo on a silver disc. Guild Adjustomatic bridge on height-adjustable rosewood base and Guild "Harp" tailpiece. All hardware chrome-plated. Inside the bass 'f' hole is the oval white Guild, Hoboken, New Jersey label with model "Starfire lV Ebony" and serial number "EL 939" written in black ink. There are two areas of slight separation (1 /16 inch) of the binding in the two top cutaways and another in the back, bass side cutaway. There is some light belt-buckle wear on the back with just one small area 3/4 x 1/4 inch through the finish. There area couple of tiny blemishes on the top but overall this forty-nine year old, super-rare 'Ebony' finish guitar is in exceptionally fine (9.00) condition. Housed in its original four-latch, shaped black softshell case with orange plush lining (9.00).

"In late 1963 two new models were added to the Guild line [the Starfire IV and the Starfire V]. They were similar to the double-cutaway models that the Gibson company had come out with in the late '50s and which were becoming extremely popular. At the suggestion of Mark Dronge Guild came out with their version of a thinline semi-hollowbody guitar. Apart from the double cutaways, they were also different in construction from the single-cutaway version in that they had a block of wood on the inside of the body. This block that connected the top and the back of the instrument, ran from the neck to the tailblock. It was put there to reduce feedback and to give the instrument more sustain... The Starfire V, launched shortly after the SF-IV, was similar but had a few extras like a Bigsby, a master volume and the more deluxe Kolb tuners… The instrument had an all-maple body, usually with very attractive grain, although some instruments with mahogany bodies have been reported." (Hans Moust, The Guild Guitar Book, pp. 87 and 89).

These Guild HB-1 pickups are what the Guild afficionados lust for… they have that perfect rich humbuckin' blues tone that cuts through the mix with powerful depth and biting attack…

Buddy Guy, Lightning Hopkins and Jerry Garcia all played a Guild Starfire V at some time…

According to a November 1966 Guild price list, the Starfire lV with a standard finish retailed at $395.00