eldegas.com

Back in early 80's I sold a Degas electric hollow body guitar. The unique thing was it had slider controls for volume and tone controls. It was sunburst and had a big chip out of the bottom front face edge. My mother colored it in with black marker to hide it. If i dont find the guitar, well no problem but does anyone have info or pics of this unique style of Degas guitar? It looked like a jazz guitar.

I forgot to add that i sold it in Peterborough Ontario canada. Maybe someone from there knows about this guitar.

Thanks for posting - I hope someone can point you in the right direction but it's a real needle in a haystack situation. I wish you the best of luck.

I at. first thought it may have been one that I am in the process of restoring/modifying because mine has a knot like area on the front top right side when your facing the body but I do not belive it is your old guitar

Hi Michael.
While I understand your urge to find your old guitar, you're making it very difficult to help you.
You have not given us any specific information or description aside from being a jazz style guitar with slider switches. A picture would be a huge help here, eh?

You say you "sold" it in 1980, but when did you BUY it, and was it new or used when you got it? That would help a little bit to narrow down the year of construction. My assumption is that it would be a late 60's or early 70's.

Are you you positive that both the volume and tone were slider switches? It was very common for 60's vintage hollow body guitars to employ sliders for pickup switching, coil cutting and preset tone selection (like the more modern Varitone circuit). As you say though, a slider on the volume control would have been unusual.

One more thing to be aware of. The "el Degas" brand was simply a white label. That is, Japanese (and later Korean) guitar builders would accept orders for custom label production from many middle-man businesses who did not make anything themselves but simply marketed and distributed stock designs under their own label. As a result you'll commonly see virtually the same instrument with different brand names on the head stock. In other words, there was no such thing as an el Degas "factory".

I say this because it's highly unlikely that your your guitar is unique or "rare" since it was based on an existing catalogue of available models of the time. If you are still actively looking may I suggest you start looking at old guitar catalogues from Japanese manufacturers, there are many of them available online. See if you can recognize your old instrument in one of them.

For example, a very common model similar to what I think you're describing was made for the Aria brand by Matsumoku Japan.
Here are a few links to get you started:
http://www.oldguitar.jp/catalog/aria.htm
http://garakutaguitar.com/
http://brochures.yokochou.com/

Good luck with your search!

Did Aria sell those guitars in the west?

Geez, Justus, it's taken you 7 months to respond to my post?! (And a "thank you" would have been nice before asking more questions.)
And you're still not giving us any more information!

I have no idea what guitar you are referring to this time.
Yes, Aria did (and still does) sell in the "west". Back in the 80's most of their models were made in Japan by Matsumoku under a variety of brands. Some common labels in Canada included Pan and Granada.