At the foot of Mount Takamine in Sakashita, Japan, Takamine has accumulated more than 40 years of history devoted to the research, innovation and craft of guitar making. The company appeared in the early 1960s, at the height of the guitar boom in Japan.
What began as a small family business has grown steadily to become one of the most significant names in acoustic guitar manufacturing.
Guitarists have had the Takamine brand in mind for a long time, perhaps thanks to the sound marketing of its maker and distributor, or more likely because of the mark of quality it leaves among the players who try them. The fact is that I have had several guitars from this house in my hands, and quite a few musicians I know work with them regularly.
Where's the secret?
Before getting started with our test, we thought about how well the brand has been received in our country, and in broad strokes, players perceive it as offering quality at more accessible prices than other brands (which doesn't mean they're the cheapest on the market).
The cutaway body
The guitar we put on the test bench is rather compact: 48 cm (body length) x 37 cm (body width) x 10 cm (depth). The tonewoods listed on its spec sheet "speak" well of its raw materials (mahogany, rosewood and cedar).
The finish is bold, since we all seem to associate the natural tones of wood with this type of instrument. Still, they say there's no accounting for taste, and the transparent wine-red tone that shows off this model's grain may well find its market among guitarists (that's up to you).
The guitar is comfortable and easy to handle thanks to its dimensions. At first the volume (I mean physical space, not dB) makes you think the guitar will have little body, but once you play it, you savor its richness. On the other hand, tone types and prices also vary when choosing an acoustic, steering our attention toward Jumbo, Dreadnought models and so on...
The sound
Honestly, my first impression on opening the case was lukewarm. I was surprised by the color, which I had expected to be natural, and it looked small to me (these are just first impressions). Color seems to be a matter of taste, and size may be tied to price.
To my pleasant surprise, I got hooked on the instrument as I played it, because it sounds good, really good. I did the first tests unplugged, and the guitar is solid and well built, with enough volume and body for its size, and it blends beautifully. Compared with other models I have around from other brands (higher-end models), I honestly have to say it sounds surprisingly good. It has a fairly bright, incisive sound that works well for pop/rock strumming (for example). I later made several recordings and the instrument kept surprising me in a good way. The flat recording is super balanced, and with a few touches of EQ afterward, we get an excellent result.
I also like the consistency between the bass, treble and midrange. All the notes are balanced, giving a completely neutral overall balance in chords. That gives rhythm parts body, keeps anything from sticking out of the mix, and also gives us an especially pleasant acoustic sparkle (thanks to the highs I mentioned in the previous paragraph).
Headstock
In this section I always talk about the headstock (in today's case, matching the color of the body) and the precision of the tuners. This model has Gotoh tuning machines installed, and it offers good accuracy when tuning.
The preamp: CT4B
Another detail that helped change my impression so radically after I opened the case. We get a three-band EQ (bass, mid and treble), plus a master volume slider. Sound capture is faithful, balanced and responsive.
But the tastiest part of this preamp is the built-in tuner. I like this, I like it a lot. Even though the guitar is completely stable, having a built-in tuner, without having to plug the cable in anywhere, is especially convenient. Many of us get a little "hysterical" about tuning. They say the guitar is an instrument with imprecise tuning (in general), though personally I think that if the instrument is good and well made, it's a pleasure to find that we play and play while our tuning stays spotless. In short: the tuner is very practical, intuitive and fast. It comes with a power switch on the preamp itself, which, like all of them, runs on a 9V battery.
Conclusions
895 € (as of the date of this article) is not what you'd call radically cheap, but I think the guitar may well deserve it. To underline what I've already said, this is a good instrument: accurate, balanced, with good sound and a good preamp, and in short, well made. I have few complaints about this Takamine, other than that I wish the price were somewhat lower, that the bass were more consistent and that, personally, I prefer acoustic guitars in natural wood finishes, a totally subjective nuance.