Takamine

News flash: guitars in the modern era are made of many different kinds of wood, and the choice of wood — especially in and acoustic or acoustic-electric guitars — has a huge impact on the tone and responsiveness of the instrument. While most musicians tend to think of just two wood types for use in acoustic guitar bodies — namely, rosewood and mahogany — there are many other terrific wood varieties that each present their own advantages. Today, we’ll be taking a closer look — and listen — to black walnut.

Just the Facts
Black walnut is a wood species called Juglans nigra, a deciduous tree in the walnut family that’s native to central and eastern North America. You’ll find it growing across wide swaths of the USA and Canada, from southern Ontario all the way down to northern Florida and southwest to central Texas. Takamine sources its black walnut supplies from trees grown in the USA.

Why Black Walnut?
At Takamine, we originally ramped up our use of black walnut out of necessity. In the 2010s, enforcement of CITES — the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora — made it exceedingly difficult to make and sell guitars using rosewood bodies. And of course, we are 100% in support of all efforts to ensure the sustainability of the woods we use to build guitars.

Takamine G Series GD51CE Natural

Takamine G Series GN71CE Brown Sunburst

In the process, we found that black walnut offers its own superb tonal characteristics and a beautiful look that’s made it perfect for a number of our G Series guitars. Black walnut also offers the advantage of being less expensive to source compared to some other tonewoods, which is one factor that allows us to deliver G Series guitars with such excellent value.

That being said, black walnut has also been in use by high-end guitar manufacturers for decades due to its great combination of great looks and distinctively present sound.

How Does It Sound?
Black walnut is a dense wood, producing tones that give you the characteristics of both rosewood and mahogany. You get some more pronounced midrange from black walnut than you’d expect from rosewood, but you also more glossy and articulate high frequencies and a more resonant low end than most mahogany-bodied guitars can offer.

You’ll note that nearly all of Takamine’s black walnut-bodied guitars are paired with a solid spruce top. This combination delivers excellent projection with clean, crisp highs and in-your-face attack with clarity that’s great for strummers and flatpickers.

One other fact about black walnut’s tone: it keeps getting better. As time goes by, your Takamine guitar with a black walnut back will offer an even richer low end. Below are a couple of great examples of G Series guitar demos with instruments that feature black walnut back and sides.

How Does It Look?
There’s a reason it’s called “black walnut.” This wood has a naturally dark chocolatey brown hue with a similar color value as rosewood, but with a more pronounced tight grain pattern. With a gloss finish, this wood looks classy and elegant, and provides a gorgeous contrast to the spruce tops we generally use as a pairing.

What Takamine Guitars Use Black Walnut?
Many of the highest-quality guitars in our G Series range make use of black walnut. These include GD93CE, GY93E, and GN93CE. The GD71CE and GN71CE are also black walnut-bodied guitars, as are the GD51CE and GN51CE. Several of our nylon-string G Series guitars, such as the GC5, GC5CE, and GC6CE are take advantage of the lovely, well-rounded tone of black walnut for their bodies.