Harmony H55 Sovereign

So... I also have one of these sovereigns. it is gloss finished, and, though crafted with solid woods... the workmanship is deplorable.
The reason I say that, is very apparent to somone who has a fair amount of understanding of acoustic construction. It has NO TOP BRACING... no X bracing, no fan bracing... no nothing... with the exception of a single silly bar of wood going in between the sides. As a result, the soundhole, as you can imagine is caving in.
It is acoustic electric, and like the previous fellow said, it has a pickup in the back of the neck, which, though often touted as rosewood, is simply a solid mahogany neck fashioned into a fretboard and "binded". No fretboard on a guitar? The tuners had already been replaced, but Im sure they were just as ridiculous.

I'll give it a five because it almost pulls off amplifying the strings. Sound is thin and lacking notable sustain. Trebly and quiet.

Innotation is pretty bad... trussrod is hard to adjust... looks like an improper installation to me. Action is surprisingly decent though because the saddle is so low.

Heh... Lets not bother the public with it's shortcomings

Ermmm...

Played for nine years... This guitar sounded like a fun project and, since all of these sovereign reviews seem to be "stellar" for the price, I figured I'd give it a try. However, after a close inspection.... I'd like to tell everyone out there to save their money for a real instrument. The Sovereign guitars, regardless of what you may hear elsewhere, are not real instruments; they're toys.

The sovereign Line was introduced as a higher quality alternative to their other line of flat top acoustics; the "Stella" models. They featured solid wood construction (Solid spruce top, mahogany back and sides). A Pinless Bridge, comprised of Brazillian Rosewood, which features a string through bridge construction much like that of a Fender Jaguars tailpiece;No tremelo or pesky floating bridge though :-P. Also includes attractive binding, along with a laminated headstock displaying a very ornate Gibson esque Harmony Logo.
</P>My guitar seems to be rather rare in comparison to the other models which went from Dreadnaughts, to Grand Concert 000 Sized guitars. The "H55" Is equipped with one particularly odd feature: A pickup mounted in the FRET BOARD. I?ve never seen anything like it, and it still surprises me to see the six magnetic screws poking out of the area succeeding the 20th fret. Obviously that means it also has a volume and tone knob and a 1/4 mono jack in the lower underside of the guitar for amplification purposes.
</P> The construction of the actual guitar body and neck seem quality, though there is always a somewhat sloppy looking excess amount of glue left inside the sound chamber of these guitars which screams poor craftsmanship. However despite this little blemish, these guitars hold up, and are indeed constructed quite well. But at an original price of 150.00 in the early sixties when they began production on these particular guitars the Harmony Company obviously had to skip on some of the higher quality hardware and features that the another company?s (say Martin or Gibson for example) would have used. Here are my observations pertaining to this fact. When the guitar arrived at my door step the fret board was a dry white sickly mess. The people I had purchased it from on eBay advertised it as a rosewood fret board... However after re-hydrating the wood with some good wood restorer I found the color and grain to be more consistent with mahogany which is the same wood the neck, back and sides are fashioned from. This is not necessarily a negative thing, as many quality guitars made today come with mahogany as the standard for the board... But it would explain the slightly brighter sound which I will elaborate on later.
</P> Moving on, The tuners are an absolute mess. I never trust guitars with open backed tuners that do not predate the 1930's because of the mass production boom in the field of instruments that pretty much took flight in the mid 30?s as folk and jazz became popular, and the depression era called for cheaper parts for cheaper guitars for people with not a lot of money to throw away on a recreational device. Frankly, old, badly constructed open line tuners, even when lubricated NEED to be replaced. Upon arrival I found the tuners to be for the most part entirely unusable and... well what can be worse than an out of tune guitar that can?t be tuned without either super strength or some darn good pliers? The guitar came into my possession on a Friday, and had replaced the tuners with new Grover?s before the start of the next week day. If you are considering buying any Harmony Sovereign, or any vintage guitar with open backed tuners for that matter?PLAN on replacing them immediately. The Grover?s I installed have worked flawlessly, though I had to widen the headstock holes substantially in order to install them. I highly recommend Grover?s as they keep tune, and compliment the headstock design very well. The only problem is the old screw holes are not recyclable and they will remain there scarring the back unless the screw holes are filled. I did not mind this that much considering the fact that these guitars are meant for playing, and are not prized for their value or status as a collectable or sizeable investment. I am entirely unafraid to leave a few marks on these guitars in order to allow for better playability.
</P> Next we have the use of plastic. P

This guitar has a unique and beautiful sound. It is very bright and booming in comparison to the standard acoustic, and will get compliments when played. If you read the features section, I mentioned all the upgrades I had to do to bring it to potential, and I couldnt be happier. I spent 250.00 in total including my upgrades to get it in perfect playing order, and I must say it beats many higher end accoustics I have played. When I got it it sound very rough and dry, but after re-hydrating the fretboard, changing the tuners, and most importantly the saddle and nut, this guitar sustains endlessly, and has beautiful tone that can rarely be matched. Diamond in the rough indeed. Only beaten by the best of the best in both strumming and picking styles. 9 in sound department.
</P> Woops! and Thats just unplugged! This thing is afterall an acoustic electric... Due to the placement of the pickup it has a very low end/ midrangy tone, which completely contrasts its punchy high end tone while left acoustic. This is brilliant, because if you ever want midrange, amplify it, and mic the soundhole to get a harmonic medium between bass and treble. Very Cool!

The action when purchased was decent. Unfortunately I havent devised a way to adjust the truss rod yet, however I lowered the bridge saddle hight on my ivory version, and that did a lot to make the guitar VERY playable. I give it an 6 simply because it has potential to be entirely quality, but again, plan on doing a little luthier work.

I love the thing, dearly, its constructed like a tank, and I would never worry about gigging it alone, though I tend to play electric more so Im not sure about the integrity of that statement. These guitars are worth every red cent. I reccomend them to anyone except for a person looking for a deep bassy guitar... If you want one of those however, go buy a drednaught..

I had to give it some low scores because of the state it was in when I recieved it initially, however in its current state, I wouldnt give it anything less than a very solid 9. 1500.00 Martin? No way sir! I dont want to pay that much for an equal. Give me this 250.00 Sovereign any day! I wish it had some real abalone/mother od perl inlay.. That will soon be remedied however ;-P