1975 Hand Made Murphy Shaw Guitar

[gravy]

I just joined and I must say I really like this board a lot!I tried asking about this on the other board,but nobody seems to know there so I thought I'd try my luck here.

I just scored this '75 Murphy/Shaw & I can only find very limited info on the net .Basically that they quit Gibson started Murphy Shaw. Their factory burns down & that's it.????I figured somebody around here could help.
It sounds absolutely amazing!!!!HUGE neck,which I like but damn this is bigger than my '59 special which also has a pretty chunky neck.The one piece/neck through thing bums me out a little,but I'm sure I'll get used to it.All Gibson Parts minus the Grovers.Epoxy filled Pickups.
Any info will help.:hmm

[LoKi]

THat looks like a rare one there my friend! Wish I had some more info. I know what those 2 started doing at the end of the 70's and right on through up to today.... but I have never seen one of these fine guitars before!

[gravy]

hey Loki- Thanks for checking it out.It is really nice,but needs a litle TLC.I just wish I find out more about it.

[gravy]

OK-So I still can't find out anything about these fine guitars.
Does anyone have any ideas how I could go about getting a hold of Tom Murphy or Tim Shaw to get some info?

[Travisbone]

hi there. I actually own a 1975 custom murphy shaw. It was a gift from my mothers boyfriend who got it made for him when he was youngger. I was wondering if you know how much these guitars are appraised at. I'm looking to sell mine and can't find anything on how much they are worth. They are very rare though

[Mike Marois]

I have one but I don't know where Pat Murphy and Tim Shaw are now.

[bfisher]

Hi Guys
I also own a Murphy- Shaw. I bought mine around 1975 from a music store in Canton Ohio. Mine is a silver metal flake finish and I actually visited the place right before it was finished.They actually shaved down the neck a little to suit my hand size and where the neck joins the body on the top side they made a perfect curved fit for my thumb. I also remeber those guys were working on this guitar for Billy Gibbons and it was the shape of Texas - I remember handling it. As I recall the two of those guys were nice but a little strange - real craftsmen though. Out of all the guitars I owned ( I had many) I still have this one - I had a chance some years back to buy a used second one and should have done it. I knew the guy that owned it and we both came from Canton and bought them at the same store. I am unsure of exactly how many of these guitars they made and sold before the fire happened but I am betting less than 100. I was told mine was really unique due to the finish and that it was so diffucult for them to do that htye would never do another metal flake finish. Mine is still in the case and hasn't been really played for 20+ years - the neck is still staight as an arrow and feels just as good as. I am unsure of the value and it will never be worth big bucks due to the obscurity of the brand. I believe I paid roughly $1000.00 for mine in 1975 - a lot of money back then but it was a custom made guitar - and I loved playing it and did so every night for the next 4years until I got off the road and tucked it my closet. I would love to know what happened to those guys and if they are still in the "Business" or not. I hope I hear from a few of you guys about this - I'll have to try and get some pics and post them up if anyone is interested

Thanks
Bob

[Jason]

Originally Posted by bfisher

Hi Guys
I also own a Murphy- Shaw. I bought mine around 1975 from a music store in Canton Ohio. Mine is a silver metal flake finish and I actually visited the place right before it was finished.They actually shaved down the neck a little to suit my hand size and where the neck joins the body on the top side they made a perfect curved fit for my thumb. I also remeber those guys were working on this guitar for Billy Gibbons and it was the shape of Texas - I remember handling it. As I recall the two of those guys were nice but a little strange - real craftsmen though. Out of all the guitars I owned ( I had many) I still have this one - I had a chance some years back to buy a used second one and should have done it. I knew the guy that owned it and we both came from Canton and bought them at the same store. I am unsure of exactly how many of these guitars they made and sold before the fire happened but I am betting less than 100. I was told mine was really unique due to the finish and that it was so diffucult for them to do that htye would never do another metal flake finish. Mine is still in the case and hasn't been really played for 20+ years - the neck is still staight as an arrow and feels just as good as. I am unsure of the value and it will never be worth big bucks due to the obscurity of the brand. I believe I paid roughly $1000.00 for mine in 1975 - a lot of money back then but it was a custom made guitar - and I loved playing it and did so every night for the next 4years until I got off the road and tucked it my closet. I would love to know what happened to those guys and if they are still in the "Business" or not. I hope I hear from a few of you guys about this - I'll have to try and get some pics and post them up if anyone is interested

Thanks
Bob

Cool story. I don't have any info for you, but I do know firsthand how hard it is to spray metal flake. Stuff really likes to clog up in the nozzle... and cleanup is a nightmare!

[Copakid]

Hey guys,

I am in the market for a Murphy Shaw guitar. Let me know if you want to part with one.

[voices]

Tim Shaw currently works for Fender in Nashville

[gravy]

Originally Posted by Copakid

Hey guys,

I am in the market for a Murphy Shaw guitar. Let me know if you want to part with one.

Hey if anyone's interested. I'm actually thinking of parting with my Murphy Shaw. I'm seriously considering buying back my old '59 Special and need to raise some funds.Shoot me a fair price and we'll go from there.

[jdwright6@gmail.com]

I bought this guitar. Good seller honest guy. +1 for him.

Anyone know anything about it yet?

[jdwright6@gmail.com]

Description: Serial number 23. We have been provided the following information: “Beautiful Mahogany and Maple neck through body construction.All Gibson parts,very unique epoxy filled Tim Shaw pickups. Guitar has a plaque on the back in the guitar, says handmade by Shaw and Murphy, Kalamazoo MI 1975. #23…. The tuners have been changed to grovers sometime in the 70's. I bought this guitar from the original owner who got it directly from Shaw and Murphy but never knew anything about it other than the previous story or what its worth. There is also not the original case. However there is what appears to be a 70's style SG bridge and a lightweight aluminum tailpiece with long studs. The sound rivals Shaw's from the 80's when compared side by side to my early 80's standard. Other than that I don't know much about it. Guitar condition is 7.5/10 some minor worming not through the finish on the back, oxidization on the tailpiece and some finish flaked off the back of the neck. 5 way switch which is strange with dual coil taps. Tone and volume.” Based on the photos provided, the owner’s description appears to be correct.

Tim Shaw, one of the makers of this guitar, has provided the following information: “There were about 107 of these made in total, from about 1973 to late ’76 or early ’77. The original partners were Patrick Murphy and me; by 1975, we’d added Chuck Burge, who later worked with me in R&D at Gibson, and a guy named Loring Janes. Our shop was over a music store in Kalamazoo called The Sound Factory, which later became Pro-Co Sound. The last plaque was put in the back of guitar #26, I think; after that, they were called Sunrise guitars. This is one of the earliest guitars with the maple peghead overlay and that particular peghead shape, which was taken from a circa 1860’s Bruno that Murphy owned.

“The earlier guitars, like this one, used Gibson components, but I rewound the pickups. Later on, we made the pickups entirely ourselves. The controls are master volume, master tone, a 5-way rotary (series, fingerboard pickup, parallel, bridge pickup, and series out-of-phase,) and two series/parallel switches. Bill Lawrence had been a consultant at Gibson in the early 1970’s, and I learned a lot about pickups and controls from him. The original tuners were Gotohs.

“This guitar is probably cherry, not mahogany, but it’s hard to tell from the photos. By and large, we used Michigan maple, walnut, and cherry for the body woods. There was no big fire that drove us out of business; we weren’t very fast or very profitable, and it quietly sputtered out in 1977. I left and moved to California in January of that year.

“I don’t remember the original retail price, but it certainly wasn’t $1000. Most of these were sold direct; others were sold through a small network of music stores in the Midwest.”

Tim Shaw later gained some degree of notoriety for his work on Gibson pickups, and consequently this instrument would be of historical interest to collectors.

[jdwright6@gmail.com]

Open to trade offers for boutique, vintage, or les paul/fender guitars.

Not interested in amps, pedals.

[jdwright6@gmail.com]

please email me directly at my username if interested, thanks very much

[thumper]

Testing before I write and find out that something doesn't work. Sorry, If this does come up, on the forum, shortly you see the complete story on the Murphy-Shaw guitars.

[thumper]

Murphy-Shaw guitars

Hi guys,
I do have the complete low down on these, I was there and I was the guy who built them.
It was Pat Murphy, Tim Shaw, Loring Janes, and Chuck Burge (me).
It starts off with Pat Murphy in the 60's, in Germany, he meets classical guitar maker Rhyner Krempel. Pat Murphy introduces Krempel to the classic Martin and the X bracing and they developed the first Krempel steel string guitars. In fact they developed the reverse Martin Xbrace pattern which Martin later adopted for Martin guitars!
Pat moves back to the states and opens "Instrument Repair Service". In the Sound Factory Building in Kalamazoo, Michigan. He hires Tim Shaw. It is 1973, a player came into the shop who wanted a custom double neck solidbody built by Gibson and they refused. Pat took on the job and built the guitar. Players came in the shop and saw it under construction and started placing orders. At that point they desided to call them Murphy-Shaw guitars.
A couple of months later and when Pat and Tim were working on #2 and #3, I came in as another member. With my tallents on board and Murphy busy with guitar repair, I started taking over one after another guitar building details. It was not long before I had done a redesign of the guitar, made a complete set of blue prints, and took over all of the construction. I think by #4 or #5.(while Pat and Tim did a lot of repair keeping us alive)
From that point on, I built the guitars from design and lumberyard to final sanding. Pat did the sanding, lacquer work, buffing, fret work, and final set-up. Tim built pickups, guitar assembly, and all the wiring. Loring helped with assembly, etc. By the time we built #23, Pat desided that in view of my doing redesign and all the wood work that we should not any longer call them Murphy-Shaw guitars. We changed the name to Sunrise Guitars.
We built guitars from 1973 untill late 1976. 100+ guitars. There was no fire. We ended up with 37 dealers, coast to coast. Many, if not most of the dealers (music stores), would never pay us or delay payment for so long that we went broke. To make a long story short, Pat moved to Nashville and managed Bill Lawrence's pickup factory, Tim moved to California and went to work for Guitar Player Mag. I went to Gibson. I was hired as guitar designer/model maker, Gibson Kalamazoo.
10 months after joining Gibson, I ended up on Bruce Bolen's budget at Chicago, CMI. Bruce moved to Kalamazoo and we started Gibsons first R&D department. We had an opening for a pickup and passive wiring guy. I suggested that Tim was the perfect choise. Tim came into town and Bruce hired him for the position. Now it was Bruce Bolen, Tim Shaw, Chuck Burge(me), and Abe Wechter who formed Gibsons first R&D department and a few months later, the four of us were also the first Gibson Custom Shop. Bruce was the boss, Tim did pickups and wiring, I did the design work and the actual building of all the solid body prototypes, show models, and customs. Abe handled all of the acoustic building. Sometimes I helped Abe with the building, sometimes he helped me with the building. When it came to new inlay, I did the design and Tim and I shared the actual inly work.
When Gibson Kalamazoo disolved in '82, Bruce moved to Nashville to start R&D there. Tim followed. I stayed and Abe stayed. We each started our own personal shops in Kalamazoo.
Later, Bruce moved to Fender and Tim became head of R&D Nashville and even became a Gibson V.P. Later he joined Bruce at Fender, where they are today.
Pat Murphy now lives on the west coast and is retired but still active. I am in Kalamazoo and work in my 2,000+ sq ft personal shop, I design and build custom guitars, acoustics, and pickups. I am personal friends with Les Paul since the mid 70's and have done some guitar work and a lot of pickups for his 'players' for the last few years. These are all LPR's.(low impedance pickups) We talk quite often. So I have ended up doing a lot of work on LPR's for people all over. I also specialize in surgical repairs like Les Pauls with broken off heads, does not even matter if the head is missing!!
That is the story of Murphy-Shaw guitars and the people involved from the 60's untill the present.
Other info:
NO Murphy-Shaw or Sunrise guitar ever had any mahogany in it. All were maple and black walnut except two. They were cherry.
NO Murphy-Shaw or Sunrise guitar ever had a neck-through (someone saw my neck/body jointery design and misstook it for neck-through)
Yes, we did build a "Texas" guitar for Billy Gibbons. Later, I built a second one for him, a Gibson.
All but about 35 of these guitars went to dealers for $550 dealers price, likely $1,000- retail. The rest were built as customs for individual players and went generally for $700 and up (do not forget this was the 70's)
Yes, the famous 'Sunrise Flattop Pickups' came from us.
- chuck

[voices]

Chuck! welcome to the forum! you have the best stories and i cant wait to hear more from you now you are on here.

ron-that "Moderne" guy.

ps-when you are ready for an apprentice, let me know!

[bfisher]

Originally Posted by bfisher

Hi Guys
I also own a Murphy- Shaw. I bought mine around 1975 from a music store in Canton Ohio. Mine is a silver metal flake finish and I actually visited the place right before it was finished.They actually shaved down the neck a little to suit my hand size and where the neck joins the body on the top side they made a perfect curved fit for my thumb. I also remeber those guys were working on this guitar for Billy Gibbons and it was the shape of Texas - I remember handling it. As I recall the two of those guys were nice but a little strange - real craftsmen though. Out of all the guitars I owned ( I had many) I still have this one - I had a chance some years back to buy a used second one and should have done it. I knew the guy that owned it and we both came from Canton and bought them at the same store. I am unsure of exactly how many of these guitars they made and sold before the fire happened but I am betting less than 100. I was told mine was really unique due to the finish and that it was so diffucult for them to do that htye would never do another metal flake finish. Mine is still in the case and hasn't been really played for 20+ years - the neck is still staight as an arrow and feels just as good as. I am unsure of the value and it will never be worth big bucks due to the obscurity of the brand. I believe I paid roughly $1000.00 for mine in 1975 - a lot of money back then but it was a custom made guitar - and I loved playing it and did so every night for the next 4years until I got off the road and tucked it my closet. I would love to know what happened to those guys and if they are still in the "Business" or not. I hope I hear from a few of you guys about this - I'll have to try and get some pics and post them up if anyone is interested

Thanks
Bob

After reading the posts at the bottom I got my axe out and looked at the label. Mine is #30 from 1975. Seeing as how I am the only owner I know mine is all original parts and after all these years the neck is still straight as an arrow and sounds like it always did - fat and sweet. I would still like to get the finish repaired on the bacck side and part of the neck but just don't know if it's possible or practical. I am almost positive I paid $900 - $1000 for mine at the music store in Ohio. I know those guys sold 4 or 5 of these guitars becasue I can remember seeing 2 others myself
iu would still like to get my hands on another one just for sentimental reasons and the fact that I still love this instrument

[Mark H]

So realy Mr. Fisher has an "early" Gibson Costom Shop ax?
I wonder if the guy with the music shop in Canton ever paid Mr. Burge?
Very nice story!

[gottman]

It is with a heavy heart that I am here to inform you that Chuck Burge (Thumper) passed away this weekend. His infinite knowledge and crazy sense of humor will be sorely missed. RIP THUMPER

[asher67]

Such sad news about Chuck. I am grateful, however, for the history lesson he left for us in this thread. These were some of the most important people in Gibson's recent history, following Ted McCarty.

Tim Shaw was from my hometown in Michigan. I grew up with his younger brother, who was an excellent bassist and a great guy. My Gibson SG Jr. was in need of new electronics (which was what you did back then if you knew someone who could do it well). Everyone knew Tim, so I made the trek to Sunrise in Kalamazoo. He convinced me to let him set up the electronics like the other Sunrise guitars. My SG still bears the two Gibson/Sunrise humbucking pickups, volume, tone, and 5-way selector switch. Tim went beyond my expectations in the work that he did. It is the only guitar which I had modified in a permanent manner (routing and the like), and I have never regretted it, regardless of any collectibility factor.

[Kirk V.]

I have a Sunrise. What a beautiful piece. Maple construction. Trying to interpret the seriel number. Mine is 108176. Would that be #108 constructed in Jan 1976?

[soundz915]

I am looking for a murphy shaw guitar from 1973 to 1977 if anybody has one for sale please contact me lets see if we can make a deal

Scott Pike

[circusboy28]

Just discovered this thread - amazing! I'd never even heard of Murphy Shaw guitars, and certainly never seen one in this country. What a great story!

[brentrocks]

Thanks for the story Chuck!!! i live in paw paw, used to frequent Abe's shop a lot....got one of his custom acoustics before he moved out of town...glad i did it is awesome!!!

[Tom Baird]

In 1978 I purchased a Sunrise Bass from Tim and Dale in Kalamazoo. I can't believe it's 30 years old. Probably the only one ever made. Paid $1,000. I gigged with it very little as I left the biz within a year. The bass is a single cutaway black walnut with the 5-way tone selector and two cream colored molded epoxy p/u's. Full length bolt-on neck three piece maple, wide walnut stripe, maple - with a rosewood fingerboard. Bridge is BadAss. Head piece / tuners is two and two. Unfortunately the Sunrise logo was a decal, and has long since peeled off. Any one want to send a real good picture of the logo? I contacted Tim years ago in Nashville and he lost track of Dale whom he said would be the only hope of getting it replaced. Bryce Robertson owned a recording studio next door he used the Sunrise Basses straight into the board becuase they were so clean and had flat response that he could use. I'll get a picture inserted.

[J. Prager]

Glad to find this list. This is a somewhat lengthy post, but hopefully worth it to those who care.

Sad news, fellow guitarists. I have learned through the grapevine that my dear friend, Pat Murphy of Sunrise Guitars, was also killed in a car accident about 2 years ago in California.

I had not seen him since about 1989, when he lived in Mtn. Home and worked for Baxter Labs, but we were great long-time friends. I had heard that he had moved back to Kalamazoo around 1990.

I can also vouch for the story told by Chuck . Here's what I know: I met Pat in Harrison, Arkansas around 1980. He had just moved there. A friend named Craig met Pat at a local record shop (remember those?) and was all excited because this "hippie guy" he met had made pickups and this Texas-shaped guitar for Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top, and now lived nearby.

So, Craig and I made the long journey to where Pat & his family lived. They were living (literally) in a converted log-style barn on his parent's place in the deep woods of North Arkansas in Newton County near Jasper. It was way, way off the beaten path, way out in the sticks on a dirt road.

Pat and family were trying to eek out a living there, living off the land and enjoying the back-to-the-earth primitive lifestyle. It was a hard scrabble existence to be sure, but they liked it.

Pat loved to talk about Sunrise Guitars and told us all the Sunrise stories, about his training as a luthier in Germany, about Sunrise guitars, about his stint working with Bill Lawrence in Nashville making pickups, about the Texas-shaped guitar he made for ZZ Top, and the acoustic guitar pickups they made for a while. (Apparently, they sold a lot of the acoustic guitar pickups to famous artists, including Jackson Browne. I recall he also did work for Bob Seger before he was famous and also Chris Squire. There were many others, but I cannot remember them all.)

Craig and I were in rock-n-roll heaven, hearing all these stories and learning all this new stuff. I think we also inspired "Murph", as we called him, because, as he taught us about guitars, so much so that he decided to teach a course at the local college in "Guitar Physics".

At that time, Pat still had a bunch of his Sunrise parts and pieces there with him in the barn-house, including acoustic pickups, a Fender P-bass neck (which I later bought and now own - see pics), a tobacco sunburst single cutaway solid body maple "prototype" electric bass with 2 cream soapbar style pickups, (which I also bought) and an orange metal flake Flying V solid body bass, which a friend named Paul bought (and I should have bought it, but I did not like it because you could not sit the Flying V bass on your lap and play it - a mistake in retrospect).

After the Guitar Physics class ended, I commissioned Pat, with great persuasion, to build a custom Explorer-style bass for me, out there in the woods of N. Arkansas in his log-barn home/workshop. It was loosely based on the Alembic Explorer bass that John Entwhistle had on the cover of his solo album at that time, which was really impressive.

So, I ordered a Koa wood Explorer-style raw bass body from some California guitar parts company and paired it up with the demo P-bass neck that Pat had and a Badass bridge. This P neck was the very same neck that Pat would demo back in the Sunrise Guitars days by placing the neck across two blocks of wood and standing on it - literally. It would flex, but not break.

This neck has/had a special 2-part truss rod design, that the other Sunrise necks also have, that ensured that they could withstand this kind of abuse without breaking. It was a jaw-dropping display I saw on more than one occasion. I know the details of this truss rod design in great detail - it is unparalled.

Alembic would not sell their pickups at that time, so I contacted Bartolini instead, who also made hum-cancelling pickups, so we used those instead along with an active control module that Bartolini also made, and some Raytheon knobs I really liked.

The new design also featured the famous Sunrise Guitars military-spec 5-way pickup selector switch with the first position being the two pickups out of phase with each other for that twoinky Alembic sound. The middle position is both P/Us in parallel and the 5th position is both P/Us in series. I was there with him when he wired it up, and in his usual manner, he explained it all in detail to me.

I designed the bass, spec'd the parts, but Pat did all the work, while I watched apprentice-style. It was a great experience. Pat was a great teacher and a wonderful human being.

I remember that Pat was totally against making an "active" bass at that time - all of his prior designs were passive designs, and the purity of the sound coming out of the pickups was of the highest importance to him. He hated anything that resulted in distortion.

But, he completed this active bass project and did a great job, especially considering that it was made under far-less-than-optimal conditions. He even had to manufacture pickup trim rings out of walnut, since he did not have the right size to fit the Bartonlini Hi-A pickups.

I am not sure, but suspect, it was the last guitar that Pat ever made. It was completed in 1981. I paid him on an installment basis, because I worked as a grocery store clerk at the time.

When the bass was completed, it sounded (and still does) every bit like an Alembic bass, with loads of tone and sustain and harmonics, and an almost infinite possibilities of sounds with the 5 way switch, active bass and treble controls, and another 3-way switch for overall tonal/volume range selection.

I played this custom-designed Explorer-style bass with the Sunrise P neck, along with the Prototype tobacco sunburst Sunrise bass throughout my short professional bassist career until 1985, and still own the Explorer bass (see pics). Jammed on it just last night in fact.

The Prototype bass I sold in 1990 to a friend named Charles who lives in Portland, OR. I did not like the Prototype bass as much because it was way too clean for my style of music. The cream-colored soap bar pickups had zero distortion, so it picked up everything you did, good or bad. I did play it on stage a few times, but primarily used the Explorer. The Prototype Bass was a beautiful instrument though, only more for a clean jazz playing style. This bass was called the "Prototype Bass" because Sunrise Guitars was attempting to get the St. Louis Music Company to buy up the design and mass market it. There was also a matching Prototype Guitar, but oddly, it had a flaw (cavity) in the back of the neck.

Pat once told me a story that the SLMC rep offered him $300 for both of them, so he told him where to stick his money. I would have, too.

*******************

I recall that Murphy had many other stories to tell about other off-the-shelf brands of guitars, which he related to me and to the other students in his guitar class at the local college. He hated Les Pauls, for instance (sorry, folks, but it's true). SGs were complete garbage in his opinion, because of their distortion and because they were very flimsily-made. He once joked that Rickenbackers were "nothing more than furniture". He said that the Rickenbacker company has started out as a furniture company and their guitars were shoddily constructed. I couldn't have agreed more at the time, as I had just sold my black Rickenbacker 4001 bass after the neck warped when I put roundwound strings on it. I had had to ship it back to the Rickenbacker factory for repair, and they fixed it quite well, but advised me to NEVER put roundwounds on a 4001. Only the 4003 could support roundwounds at that time (late 70s, early 80s). I hated flatwounds, so I had no choice but to sell it at a loss.

There's more. Pat and his wife both enrolled in a local electronics/robotics program with the college/votech after we finished the Explorer bass project. They stopped by my work to tell me all about it one day, even suggesting that I should check it out. So, I did, thanks to Pat's inspiration.

And, it has made all the difference in my life ever since. I quit my job as a grocery clerk and enrolled in the intensive 2+ year electronics/robotics program. Pat was there at that time, too, as was his wife, so we often had lunch together, even though they were a year ahead of me in the program.

I graduated in 1985. Pat came to see the band I was with play in Mt. Home on June 1, 1985. It was a big outdoor gig with about 3000 people there. He was in the front row, as he had never heard me play live before, and I played both of the aforementioned guitars that he had made, so I think he enjoyed it, even though he was not into mainstream rock.

Ironically, the demo P-bass neck, upon which my custom-made Explorer bass was built, developed truss rod problems years later in 1989. On a trip back to Mt. Home, Arkansas from Florida, I brought the neck back to Pat and he took it apart and repaired it, which is amazing in itself. So, maybe standing on a bass neck is not such a good thing after all. The neck's truss rod lasted another 20 years.

What's important, though is this: Pat's passionate tutoring led me to become inspired to get an AS degree in electronics, which later led to a high tech career, getting a bachelors in Engineering, meeting my wife and getting married. Thinking back, I realize now that none of that would have happened if I had not met him back in 1980, if we had not made that first trip out to meet this guitar maker guy named Pat Murphy.

In closing, I would like to thank Pat Murphy for sharing his knowledge, his passion for guitars, his love of quality in manufacturing musical instruments, and for all his great stories and for all the good times we shared, but most of all for his friendship. The world, and my life, are better because of him. I will truly miss him.


**********************

P.S. I am attaching some photos of the custom Explorer bass and the P-style Sunrise neck and logo, for those who may be interested, and to prove my story is real. Keep in mind that this was a commissioned guitar, and does not reflect how other Sunrise guitars and basses look, with the exception of the P bass neck itself. My P neck's serial is 400177.

My old E-bass is pretty banged up after several years and two sets of repairs, but it still sounds fantastic. I took it into a local music store and they were simply amazed by it, and wanted to know all about Sunrise Guitars. Pat would have been proud.

[J. Prager]

Most Sunrise guitars and basses likely have 7 coats of clear polyurethane on top, if it was made to Murphy's original specs. He spoke of this often.

This is why the finish is so damned hard and thick and scratch-resistant. Most manufacturers use cheaper paints and varnishes, with thin clear coats. Murphy used a finish like a car on his guitars to protect them. Always the best possible. However, the finish is still prone to chipping, and the chips are difficult to repair because it's polyurethane.

[Mike Marois]

I have a Sunrise that I might sell. The case is a little old looking but the guitar is in excellent shape. I am a little torn about whether to sell it because the guitar is so incredible. It is the most solid guitar I have ever had as well as the most beautiful. Mike Marois