2000 years old and sounds great!

Julian Henslee, Vice President of Tacoma Guitars, built this guitar for me in 2004 as a custom job.  The back & sides are highly figured pre-WWII Brazilian Rosewood and the top is an incredible 2000 year old piece of ancient Red Cedar.  The 2000 year old wood was retrieved from the bottom of a cold river bed.  A 600 year old cedar tree had grown on top of it and died.  Based on the age of the tree growing on top and the number of rings in the tree below, the wood has been dated to be between 1900-2000 years old. 

People talk about old growth wood and how it sounds so good.  The most likely reason for this is ring density.  Prior to 1920, wood grew in dense forests with a lot of competition for light and resources.  This meant that the trees grew slower.  A tree ring is produced every year that the tree lives.  Because the trees grew slowly, the ring density is up to 3 times that of modern day farmed wood.  Wood farmed today is planted in areas that are conducive to speedy growth as this is the quickest path to a return on investment.  Dense wood sounds substantially better though.  I think it is one main reasons that Stradivarius instruments sound so good.  This guitar sounds quite incredible.  It is the best sounding acoustic guitar I have ever heard.

Build materials & Quality = 10+

Sound = 10

Playability = 10

Appearance = 10

Overall design = 10