Taylor Guitars Limited 326ce Baritone 8

Description

Enter the Baritone Zone
If you’ve never played a baritone acoustic guitar, you are missing out on a whole world of rich, chocolatey guitar goodness. Thankfully, our friends at Taylor have brought back the 326ce Baritone 8, which is one of the most inspiring examples of a baritone guitar ever to grace Wildwood’s shelves. This instrument (which is tuned from B to B) feels familiar enough that it’s easy to play, but it sounds fresh and exciting enough to get your creative juices flowing at warp speed. Let’s get low and explore the myriad sonic delights that the 326ce Baritone 8-String has to offer!
The Body of a Baritone
The shape of an acoustic guitar’s body is the factor that shapes its voice the most, and our friends at Taylor picked the perfect shape for a baritone: the Grand Symphony, a relatively new shape first unveiled by Bob Taylor in 2006. It has a wider waist and a meatier lower bout than a Grand Auditorium, but it’s still smaller than a dreadnought.
This body style works marvelously for a baritone, because it brings plenty of rib-rattling power while maintaining a sculpted frequency response profile. It’s really easy for a baritone acoustic guitar to fall into the mud and sound flubby because it’s tuned so low. But, the narrower waist and upper bout on the Grand Symphony allow the 326ce Baritone to sidestep that pitfall. As a result, it sounds big and open enough to fill the room with its resonance without sacrificing clarity or articulation.
A Splash of Sparkle
As its name implies, the 326ce Baritone 8 has two more strings than normal. The two middle strings—the A and the D—have an additional octave course next to them just like a twelve-string. When you play full chords, they add in a splash of high-end sparkle that really creates a lush sense of three-dimensional atmosphere. And, if you’re unsure of how you’d utilize those extra strings, have no fear. To quote an esteemed poet and philosopher, “Don’t worry—be happy!” Once you get accustomed to them, you feel the octave strings more than you hear them, and they become an extra dose of flavor when you strum full chords. They also add width to single-note lines. Frankly, you can just play the eight-string as you would a normal guitar, and the two strings will just add a little extra color and flavor.
The ‘Hog and the Tasmanian Devil
Taylor builds these beautiful baritones out of mahogany and blackwood, a slight tweak to a classic tonewood formula that gives the 326ce Baritone 8 a fresh, exciting voice. All-mahogany guitars have been around for at least a century, and for good reason. Mahogany’s exceptional warmth, midrange punching power, and natural musical compression have the power to captivate players looking for earthy-sounding acoustic tone. The 326ce Baritone has a mahogany top, and it certainly exhibits all of these characteristics in spades. However, instead of building the whole guitar out of mahogany, our friends at Taylor elected to make the back and sides out of Tasmanian blackwood.
Tasmanian blackwood is a hardwood that shares sonic characteristics with koa and mahogany. Like mahogany, it produces natural compression and has a warm, midrange-forward sound. But it is exceptionally transparent, and it produces a rich, sweet, singing top-end. So, above all that woody warmth, that classic Taylor sparkle still blooms in the trebles. All in all, it makes for full yet balanced tonality that will work in just about any musical context.
A Match Made in Heaven
Mahogany and blackwood both play to the strengths of the Grand Symphony body shape and the baritone tuning. Their tendency towards roundness and compression keeps the attack sounding even and consistent, and it helps heavy-handed hitters avoid producing any spiky, ugly frequencies when they get enthusiastic and dig in. Also, the Grand Symphony tends to have a midrange-forward voice, which matches up nicely with mahogany’s inherent midrange muscle. Finally, the trebles get an extra dose of richness from the blackwood back and sides, which add a touch more sparkle and a little extra mass to the clear, sunny high-end. So, the 326ce Baritone sounds robust, warm, and clear, and it has just the right amount of overtone presence.
A Bold, Beefy Baritone Beauty
We’re proud to showcase the Taylor 326ce Baritone 8, a guitar that serves up a tremendously inspiring, endlessly enticing flavor of acoustic tone. It’s the sort of instrument that gets your creative juices flowing, and it will excel equally well in the studio, on the stage, or just on the porch or couch! We’re sure that its low-end power will compel you to embark upon all sorts of exciting fretboard adventures!
Specifications:
Brand:
Taylor Guitars
Model
: Limited Edition 326ce 8-String Baritone
Type
: Grand Symphony
Top Wood
: Solid Tropical Mahogany
Top Finish
: Satin Shaded Edgeburst
Bracing
: Baritone
Back & Sides Wood
: Solid Tasmanian Blackwood
Back & Sides Finish
: Satin
Neck Wood
: Tropical Mahogany
Neck Dimensions
: .830 1st - .880 9th
Fingerboard
: West African Crelicam Ebony
Fingerboard Inlays
: Italian Acrylic Gemstones
Scale Length
: 27”
Width at Nut
: 1 3/4”
Nut Material
: Tusq
Binding
: Black
Electronics
: Taylor Expression System 2
Tuners
: Taylor Nickel
Bridge
: West African Crelicam Ebony
Saddle
: Micarta
Case
: Taylor Brown Hardshell Case
UPC
: 00887766104896