I'll give a strong second to Santa Cruz' pre-war series guitars. They sound as good as any Cruz but the minimal appointments make 'em a whole lot cheaper. I have an OM-PW for my principle finger-picking axe and simply love it. It's the benchmark against which I evaluate the sound of other small-bodied guitars when I try them out and have yet to find one that sounds better. And, while it's primarilly a finger-picking box it can be used for flat-picking or rhythm playing, especially in small sessions. If you prefer a large-body guitar, the D-PW dreadnought is the OM-PW's big brother.

The only problem I've had with the guitar is that it really sounds best with Elixir Polyweb strings on it. Every time I try something else I always wind up taking them off and putting Elixirs back on. No big thing except that I'm not rich and I have about 20 other instruments that like new strings too. With the Elixirs costing about three times what my regular brand costs, somebody's going hungry. And I don't buy the "Elixirs last a lot longer" bit. They may sound "fairly good" a lot longer, but they only sound "really good" for about the same length of time as regular strings.

Bruce