Santa Cruz Guitars

Richard Hoover came to Santa Cruz in 1972 to play guitar, not build one. After his Martin D-28 was stolen, he learned guitar making from two local builders, Bruce McGuire and Jim Patterson, and in 1976 he opened the Santa Cruz Guitar Company with Bruce Ross and William Davis, two repairmen who put money into the shop in exchange for learning to build. Their first model was the D, a dreadnought with tapered bracing, and the H followed in 1978. Hoover bought out Davis that same year and Ross in 1989, and the shop has built more than 20,000 guitars since.

What sets a Santa Cruz apart is how the wood gets voiced. Hoover has described building each part to a frequency, the way master violin makers do, so the finished guitar comes together like a chord on a piano. In the shop that means tapping and shaving a top until it rings where they want it, then checking again once the back and sides are joined and again when the neck goes on. He has favored reclaimed and responsibly harvested wood from the start, and he has trained a long list of builders along the way, including Michael Hornick, Roy McAlister, Jeff Traugott, Marc Maingard and Kevin Ryan.

The Tony Rice model, based on the D-28 Rice played and made a standard Santa Cruz model in 1981, is the one we know best, because John Chapman's own guitar is a 1990 Tony Rice. We've visited with Richard at NAMM more than once, and the videos below are from those conversations.

Here's how the three lines we carry compare. The Founder Collection is a limited run of Santa Cruz's classic models in their standard specs, made for the company's 50th anniversary, and ours have Sitka spruce tops with Indian rosewood back and sides. The 1976 Series comes as a D, an OM and an H13, all with German spruce tops, Indian rosewood back and sides and a Vintage Satin finish. Our Santa Cruz custom guitars are custom-order builds, each with its own woods and trim.

If you're choosing between the two rosewood dreadnoughts, the Founder D and the 1976 Series D share a round neck, a 1-11/16 inch nut, a 25.375 inch scale and mid-tension strings. The Founder D has a Sitka spruce top with tapered bracing, a buffed clear finish, ivoroid binding and Waverly tuners. The 1976 D has a German spruce top on scalloped Sitka braces, a low-sheen Vintage Satin finish, black binding and Gotoh tuners.

Every Santa Cruz we sell gets our 23-Point Professional Inspection by our in-house repair tech before it ships. For other builders, see all of our acoustic guitars.