Original Vintage 1954 Gibson J-45 - Very Good Condition

This 1954 Gibson J-45 is an absolutely killer slope-shouldered dreadnought. This beautiful guitar is in very good condition and ready to go to its new home. 

Build & Materials

• Top: Spruce
• Back & Sides: Mahogany
• Body: Slope-shouldered dreadnought

Sound Profile
This is the real thing, the vintage tone machine that discerning players are looking for, not a reissue trying to sound like one.

In Good Company
Buddy Holly played a J-45 when he built his iconic sound in the mid-1950s — same slope-shouldered body, same spruce top and mahogany back and sides. This instrument was built just a few years before Elvis, and Scotty Moore put one on screen in Loving You and King Creole. Today, Kacey Musgraves reaches for a '57 J-45 — she calls it Janice — over anything built new. Tom Morello named his Black Spartacus. Slash has taken one on arena tours.

The Details

• Built by Gibson, 1954
• Serial number: X-7112-16
• From the Marvin Rosenberg Collection

The Marvin Rosenberg Collection
This guitar comes from the collection of Marvin Rosenberg — patriarch, attorney, corporate counsel, competitive sports car racer, and lifelong lover of folk and Americana music. For decades, Marvin showed up to jam sessions and bluegrass venues with friends, and that same passion shaped his instrument collection. He sought out player-grade instruments — vintage pieces with real, honest wear from a life of actual use — over pristine collector-shelf pieces, assembling a personal collection of guitars, mandolins and banjos meant to be enjoyed rather than admired behind glass. Each piece was a tool of a passionate musician, chosen with the discerning eye of someone who understood exactly what made it special.

In stock now at Wood & Wire. The real thing, not a reissue.

* The information presented here was collected from the estate of Marvin Rosenberg and independent research. It is accurate to the best of our ability.