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REVIEW: The Tanglewood TSR-2 Acoustic Guitar
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Tanglewood Guitars was established in 1991 and has primarily served Great Britain and Ireland. Promoted as “the best selling brand of acoustic guitars in the UK”, they have broadened their reach to the United States and Canada. The TSR-2 represents one of a number of models in their Master Design series, designed by Swedish luthier, Michael Sanden.
The Tanglewood TSR-2 Grand Auditorium acoustic guitar is part of their Master Design series.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS
The guitar came in a heavy duty case built by SKB specifically for Tanglewood and clearly custom to the guitar as it fits like a glove. A TSA lock built into one of the latches suggests its fly-worthiness. Upon swinging open the top I was faced with a gorgeously curvaceous Grand Auditorium.
The grain of the solid spruce top and rosewood back and sides is fully revealed through a natural gloss finish. Mahogany binding surrounds the body along its top and back including a thin strip of lighter wood on either side of the binding and vertically along the middle of the back. This adds real beauty to the instrument. Running my finger along the body edges I noticed a few rough spots but you’d have to be looking for this to notice.
A lustrous abalone rosette decorates the soundhole with a clear pickguard protecting the treble side. An ebony bridge, reminiscent of an inverted Nike swoosh, secures the strings which run over a bone saddle and are held in place by ebony bridge pins, also adorned with abalone. The neck is made of twin-piece mahogany and supports an ebony fingerboard.
A minimalist approach is used for fret markers. Abalone is used for dots along the fingerboard edge as well as a “T” logo embedded into the 12th and 13th frets. A bone nut handles string spacing and a zero fret (you don’t see these too often) takes care of string height. A graceful wave shapes the top of the headstock which sports a rosewood veneer front and rear.
The TSR-2 features an ebony bridge, does it remind you of an inverted Nike swoosh?
The tuning machines are gold finished Grovers and the buttons are ebony. This guitar is a wood lover’s dream and a lot of thought was put into its design and appearance. I nearly forgot to mention the B-Band A1 electronics because they’re so well hidden. The bottom strap button doubles as the input jack. Inside the sound hole, a 9V battery hides inside a snap-buttoned sheath under the upper frets of the fingerboard, and a single easily accessible control for volume rests under the bass side.
RING OUT SOME CHORDS!
The guitar felt comfortable on my lap. The lower bout is fairly wide but the narrow waist provides a snug fit and drops the body low enough to compensate. The neck is fairly shallow and curves gently along the back which widens as it approaches the sides. All notes rang out clear and true throughout. The fingerboard is smooth and while I enjoyed strumming, I found myself drawn more to flat picking away at lead lines and finger picking. Tonally, the sound is bright, full, and notes ring out and sustain nicely. This review took me twice as long to write as usual because I kept going back to the guitar to play just a little more.
Testing the electric output, I plugged into an AER acoustiCube 3. As mentioned previously, controls include a single dial for volume – no tone as might be expected. I like options to help in shaping my sound but this didn’t bother me as the sound was faithfully reproduced without it. The majority of my adjustments happen after the output anyway and there’s something elegant about this limited approach.
THE FINAL WRAP
The Tanglewood TSR-2 is a real beauty sonically and visually. Its celebration of wood and minimalist, yet elegant, design gets to the core of what a great guitar should be. The cost will keep it out of reach for the average player, but this is not an average guitar. Given the qualities, it’s priced properly. The case is custom fit, heavy duty, and TSA-compliant, but the locking snaps are chunky and stick out like blocks. Thumbs up for durability, but a guitar like this deserves an equally appealing case.
PROS: Beautiful wood-centric design. Heavy duty custom fit TSA-approved case. Smooth, easy to travel fingerboard. Notes ring like a bell.
CONS: Deserves a nicer looking case.
MSRP – US $2349 / UK £1499 / Euro €1531
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Dan Coplan is senior staff writer at SMG. Dan is a Los Angeles based cinematographer and self-admitting guitar junkie. Email: dancoplan@sharemyguitar.com
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