A Burns Trio in Action
Posted: 05 Jan 2015, 22:39On Sunday at our monthly Northern Ireland Shadows Club meeting we had a rare and probably unique 'gathering' of vintage 1960's era Burns guitars, not only on show, but actually being played together by three of our members.
The guys, who played 'The Rise and Fall of Flingel Bunt', are, from the left, John Bell on lead, Hall Smyth on drums, Des McNeill on bass and Simon Corlett on rhythm.
Forgive me if I've got any of the guitar models wrong, I'm certainly not an expert.
John has owned his Artiste probably from around 1960. It was refinished last year but unfortunately at sometime in the past John lost/removed the wiring so it is now wired as a Strat.
Des owns the other two guitars. The one Simon is using is a Vista Artiste from 1961-2 and is original complete with the bizarre wiring and controls, three volumes and three tones plus the selector switches. As Des says, the problem is that the controls “cascaded” so you could easily lose your settings, – usually on stage.
The bass is again a Vista Artiste from 61-62 and has been refinished at some point. Des has just installed a Fender style bridge as the original was fatigued and could not take the strain of the strings.
And here they are lined up along with Des' Burns Marvin:
The guys, who played 'The Rise and Fall of Flingel Bunt', are, from the left, John Bell on lead, Hall Smyth on drums, Des McNeill on bass and Simon Corlett on rhythm.
Forgive me if I've got any of the guitar models wrong, I'm certainly not an expert.
John has owned his Artiste probably from around 1960. It was refinished last year but unfortunately at sometime in the past John lost/removed the wiring so it is now wired as a Strat.
Des owns the other two guitars. The one Simon is using is a Vista Artiste from 1961-2 and is original complete with the bizarre wiring and controls, three volumes and three tones plus the selector switches. As Des says, the problem is that the controls “cascaded” so you could easily lose your settings, – usually on stage.
The bass is again a Vista Artiste from 61-62 and has been refinished at some point. Des has just installed a Fender style bridge as the original was fatigued and could not take the strain of the strings.
And here they are lined up along with Des' Burns Marvin: