❌SOLD❌ Gibson ES350 Electric Archtop Sunburst 1951

Here’s a real beauty – a Gibson ES350 Electric Archtop built during 1951 at the historic Parsons Street shop in Kalamazoo, Michigan. The ES-350 was built from 1947 to 1956, and for 1957 received a thinner body and new name – the ES-350T, the T standing for Thinline.   This model was played extensively by top artists like Barney Kessel, Chuck Berry, B B King and Tal Farlow.

At its 1947 introduction, the Gibson ES350 was named the ‘ES-350 Premiere’ and was a full body, single cutaway archtop with a single P-90 pickup in the neck position. For 1949, it received a second pickup. Construction was typical of Gibson’s electric archtop production, with Laminate Maple for the top, sides and back, part of an attempt to reduce feedback at stage volumes. From 1952 to 1956, a Spruce top was fitted rather than Laminate Maple. The neck is a three piece Maple construction with a Walnut center strip. The bound Rosewood fingerboard with split-parallelogram position markers has a full 25.5 inch scale length. The bridge was also Rosewood for most of the production run, but the 1956 model had a Tune-O-Matic bridge top. The electronics feature a pair of P-90 pickups and individual Volume controls, and unusually, a master Tone control is mounted on the cutaway. There is no pickup selector switch.

This Gibson ES350 dates to 1951 and is in overall good condition. It was professionally refretted at some point and fret wear is light. The refretting process gives a bit more playing surface, because the way Gibson mounts frets on bound fingerboards leaves a ‘nub’ of binding to cover the fret end. That ‘nub’ is lost during the refret process, and the fret bead then extends right to the edge of the fingerboard. There is finger wear to the board. The sunburst finish is original and is in good shape, with natural lacquer checking and some small dents and dings. The wear on the neck finish is as one would expect from 69 years of use. The guitar plays well and cleanly and the P-90s sound great.

The original brown Gibson hard shell case is included with this Gibson ES350 and we’ve rated the case in 7/10 condition.