This clean 1963 Gibson Hummingbird, purchased with the $50 top of the line Faultless hardshell case, has just come from (I'm told) the family of the original owner. I'm always a Gibson guitar buyer but I'm especially looking for vintage Gibson Hummingbird guitars from the 1960s. You can contact me here to sell a vintage Gibson guitar.
It's survived in wonderful condition retaining all its original parts except for the plastic bridge. We sourced a real vintage correct, 1960s Gibson made Rosewood ADJ bridge to replace the original plastic bridge to retain vintage collectibility and benefit tonally from the superior contact with the top. Now it's in excellent playing condition and has all the warm, rumbly tone that Gibson designed it for. There are a few top dings from the case lid and two of the original tuner buttons have shrunk a bit. The frets show almost no playing wear and the neck is straight with proper action.
From the 1962 Gibson catalog, "A fabulous new acoustical guitar - one of the finest made for voice accompaniment. The sound is big, and round, and full with the deep rumbly bass so prized by guitar players." Indeed, Gibson designed the square shoulder body shape to emphasize the bass frequencies and leave room in the mid and top end frequency range for a tenor voice. As the Fabulous Flat-tops book explains, the widest bout is slightly smaller, the waist slightly wider, and the shoulders also wider than the round shoulder body shape. Although, both the Gibson literature and Fabulous Flat-tops book missed the mark on the scale length of the Hummingbird which is of course 25 1/2" instead of 24 3/4". Gibson produced 1453 Hummingbirds in 1963 according to the Gibson's Fabulous Flat-tops book.
