Gibson Super 400CES

We take a close look at a stunning collection of Super 400CES electric archtops from Gibson’s golden era and trace the evolution of these superlative guitars with jazzbox expert and author Dr Thomas A Van Hoos

- Rod Brakes

The Super 400CES is often regarded as Gibson’s crowning glory in jazzbox design and, following its release in 1951, it reigned supreme over the electric archtop market. After recently photographing a rare collection of examples from the 50s and early 60s here in the UK, we dropped a call over to archtop historian Dr Thomas A Van Hoose in Texas to take a closer look at the model’s evolution.

A clinical psychologist by profession, Tom is perhaps better known in other more guitar-centric circles as the author of The Gibson Super 400: Art Of The Fine Guitar (Miller Freeman) and is currently writing the definitive biography of celebrated archtop luthier John Monteleone.

“The guitar has been a part of my professional life as far as I can remember,” says Tom. “I always kept a guitar or two in the office, sometimes small-scale ones so kids could play them, but it’s also therapeutic for me. I got involved with the Super 400 during the 60s when I was in college at the University Of Texas. My band had a guitarist who was a very talented blues player and I asked him, ‘Where can I learn this stuff?’ so he took me to a record store to buy two albums, one was called Freddy King Goes Surfin’ and the other was an album by Kenny Burrell. And that’s when I heard something new: that jazzy blues sound. I noticed Kenny played a Super 400C and like any guitar worshipper I said, ‘I want to sound like him; I want to get one of those guitars.’