Up for sale, a 1967 Gretsch 6120 Chet Atkins Nashville in excellent condition and in perfect working order, complete with the original hardshell case. 100% original save for a modern Gretsch bar bridge, this vintage double cutaway iteration of the Chet Atkins 6120 model has a 16" wide fully hollow thinline maple body with painted-on F holes, delivering a clear, barking natural acoustic quality channeled through the pair of original Filter'Tron humbuckers.
The Filter'Trons offer vintage twang and growl, with sparkling trebles and a focused, meaty midrange quality. The bass register is taut and snappy, and flat picking near the bridge delivers a sinewy percussive cut. The slender body depth and lack of F holes results in great feedback rejection for a fully-hollow instrument too. This guitar balances comfortably on a strap at 7lbs 8oz, professionally setup here at Mike and Mike’s Guitar Bar with roundwound 10-46 strings, low action and accurate intonation.
The two-piece neck has a medium C-shaped profile carve with just enough roundness in the shoulders and an easy-playing feel, measuring .850" at the 1st fret and .960" at the 9th. The rosewood fretboard has pearloid thumbnail inlays and original slender frets which have been dressed in the guitar’s lifetime, with good crown in the lower registers and flatter crowns on the fretboard extension where more leveling was needed to ensure optimal playability. The guitar plays cleanly up the 24.6" scale with a straight neck and responsive, optimally adjusted truss rod. The fretboard measures just shy of 1 11/16" in width at the zero fret just forward of the nut. The headstock face features both the Gretsch inlaid logo and Chet Atkins Nashville badge. The original gold Waverly tuning machines are intact and function as intended.
All of the original electronics are intact, with the Filter'Tron pickups mounted to their original transparent pickup risers. The myriad controls include individual pickup Volume knobs, a Master Volume on the treble side body cutaway, three-way pickup selector and tone switches, and a kill switch on the lower bout. The mute engages smoothly and works well with original foam. Hardware includes the G pointer knobs which show uniform surface patina along with the Filter'Tron covers, and the gold bar bridge is a modern genuine Gretsch replacement. The Bigsby B6G vibrato offers great subtlety, with a smooth response for quick dives and warbles.
The Western Orange gloss nitro lacquer finish is framed by original binding which is in remarkable condition overall, all stable and only very lightly ambered. There is some usual checking and targeted aging on the binding on the heel cap, fretboard extension, and inside edge of the cutaways, yet none of the crumbling seen with so many examples of this era. There are just a few small dings and light finish scratches on the body as a whole, and the neck profile retains its smooth nitro gloss, with very light wear on the bass side shoulder from frets 1-9 and a spot of shallow “stand rash” on the carve behind fret 10.
The original hardshell case with silver speckled exterior is included.