Froggy Bottom Model K

The custom Froggy Bottom Model K acoustic guitar is a beautiful cutaway small-jumbo built with Indian rosewood and Adirondack spruce.

November 21, 2016

Since founding Vermont’s Froggy Bottom guitars in 1974, luthier Michael Millard has built most types of steel-string flattop guitars, and Froggy Bottom currently offers more than a dozen standard models. For many years, the most popular of these has been the company’s Model K, an instrument with a small-jumbo body that measures 16-inches across the lower bout. We recently had a chance to check out a beautiful 2002 cutaway Model K, courtesy of Peghead Nation instructor Stevie Coyle’s shop, Mighty Fine Guitars.

As custom instruments, no two Froggy Bottom guitars are exactly alike. The Model K in this video was built with Indian rosewood back and sides and an Adirondack spruce top. The guitar has flamed maple binding and an ebony bridge and fingerboard, which has simple abalone dots for position markers, and the top is fitted with a small OM-style pickguard.

Like many Froggy Bottoms, this Model K includes a scrimshaw-style engraving on its heel cap (in this case, a forest scene), which is a very cool and subtle design element that adds to the instrument’s understated elegance.

This Model K has a wide-ranging sound. It offered a great dynamic range with complex tones whether it was played softly or with a bit of force. Played fingerstyle, it had excellent note separation and definition of both chords and single-note lines, as well as impressive volume. In this video, Peghead Nation’s Teja Gerken plays the guitar in DADGAD tuning, while Stevie Coyle gives it a workout in standard tuning.