GEAR 2021:After a sneak peak during his performance at out UK Guitar Show, Jon Gomm's first signature guitar with Ibanez has finally been unveiled - and the JGM10 is a progressive design for one of the world's greatest acoustic guitar players.
"It has the perfect scale and string spacing for modern fingerstyle playing"
The video above gives an insight into the level of passion and detail that went into the guitar; it's a guitar that has to serve percussive fingerstyle players, not just Jon.
"The JGM10 has deeper bass and brighter harmonics for a full sound when playing solo guitar music," says Jon. "It has louder frets (yes, that's a thing!) for clearer hammer-ons. It has a unique body and bridge ergonomically designed for percussive playing.
- NAMM 2021 is cancelled, but we'll be covering all the big January gear announcements right here on MusicRadar.
"It has the perfect scale and string spacing for modern fingerstyle playing," he adds. "It has a more stable neck for retuning. It has a unique triple-source pickup system by Fishman - Rare Earth humbucker, condenser mic and Powertap body sensor - wired so you can use one regular cable, or split into stereo, or even split into three. And it has a cool headstock shape I drew on my touchscreen laptop my mum bought me for my birthday.
"[It's] made with incredible woods painstakingly chosen via blind testing: Thermo-Aged Sitka spruce top, pau ferro body (looks and sounds gorgeous), five-piece mahogany / pau ferro neck, Macassar ebony fretboard and bridge.
"Developing this guitar with Ibanez has been an incredible experience. Their patience and expertise are limitless. They have not once asked me to compromise on any aspect of the design. Every idea I had was tried. Everything was chosen by painstaking testing: Woods, necks, pickups, bridges, everything.
"My dream is that this guitar will remove limitations for modern fingerstyle acoustic guitarists"
"My dream is that this guitar will remove limitations for modern fingerstyle acoustic guitarists, in the same way that Ibanez electric guitars did for my progressive electric guitar heroes. It's such an honour for me to be a part of the Ibanez family with those heroes today.
"I love this guitar. I hope you will too. "
The JGM-10 is available to order now and we're seeing street prices around £2,779 / $3,399. For more on Ibanez head to Ibanez.com .
“We were forcing some of these ideas into the wrong context”: Andy Powers on how the difficulties of designing a new Taylor electric led to the launch of Powers Electric
“I’m a Nirvana fan, but it was just a regular guitar to me”: Opeth frontman Mikael Åkerfeldt left unimpressed by Kurt Cobain’s “haunted” Martin acoustic
