New guitar help

So I have a parlor size classical guitar, but as I've been wanting to make more covers/songs recently and realized that I'm not getting the sound I want from it with certain songs so I decided to save up for an acoustic. I went to the store and played this one a couple times and liked it, but I don't know much about guitars so I was wondering if anyone could help me out?

Is this a good guitar? I'm looking to buy for the long term. A guitar under $500 that I could use on-stage when I start performing is what I'm looking for right now.

http://www.amazon.com/Seagull-Entourage-Rustic-Mini-Jumbo/dp/B001RIY69A

Monami said:

So I have a parlor size classical guitar, but as I've been wanting to make more covers/songs recently and realized that I'm not getting the sound I want from it with certain songs so I decided to save up for an acoustic. I went to the store and played this one a couple times and liked it, but I don't know much about guitars so I was wondering if anyone could help me out?

Is this a good guitar? I'm looking to buy for the long term. A guitar under $500 that I could use on-stage when I start performing is what I'm looking for right now.

http://www.amazon.com/Seagull-Entourage-Rustic-Mini-Jumbo/dp/B001RIY69A

Click to expand...

Well, for the money its not too bad. At least it has real woods and should sound fine with a cedar top. If you purchase it, get it checked out by a good luthier for the action set up.

Seagull is an excellent budget-minded brand. While they are not super-cheap, they are reasonably priced and keep the price affordable by skimping on the fancy stuff, but making sure the basic quality of the instrument is very high. Seagull is made in Canada by LaSiDo, who makes several well-known brands, including Godin guitars. If you liked the guitar when you played it, you can feel confident that you are buying a well-made instrument from a great company who will stand behind it.

Tone (and even playing/action) is such an individualized and subjective thing. Long time guitar collector, buyer, seller/trader & player of lots 'n lots of guitars of many flavors here (I still have my 1st *real* guitar, which is a '78 Blonde Gibson (Norlin years..) Les Paul Custom -- I don't dump sentiment or anything in possession of tone that I'll perhaps miss forever! )


My personal favorite manufacturer in this price range (believe it or not..) is Yamaha -- in fact, call me nuts, but I feel that my daily beaters, an FG 700-6 & FG720 12-string, compare equally & even favorably to some acoustics costing nearly 5x their respective list prices, imo. A few other manufacturers I find worthy in this price range include Takamine (obvious kudos go to the Japanese, as my two top faves obviously compare to Honda & Toyota when it comes to quality decently priced automobiles!) Breedlove & Blueridge also make some very nice mid-priced acoustics.


I do like Seagull products - their S6 is a very nice model that comes to mind, but I'm not really a mini-jumbo kinda dude. Dreadnoughts are my preferred weapon of guitar scale, acoustic choice, while I do own a very nice Jumbo and one Super Jumbo that is more of an art piece than a player. I suppose if you do a lot of finger picking or play folk music....the mini can have utility -- I've just gotten used to holding/playing dreadnought over so many years, something that rounded feels odd to me..


Anyway, I always say when it comes to ANY instrument purchase....the best way to select something must involve your ears -- get to some shops & play everything of interest. You can buy something online, just be careful on Ebay & Amazon, though I belive Musician's friend supplies most of their "Amazon-origin" (non-marketplace) deals..


Best of luck!


Sean (NKO)

Monami said:

So I have a parlor size classical guitar, but as I've been wanting to make more covers/songs recently and realized that I'm not getting the sound I want from it with certain songs so I decided to save up for an acoustic. I went to the store and played this one a couple times and liked it, but I don't know much about guitars so I was wondering if anyone could help me out?

Is this a good guitar? I'm looking to buy for the long term. A guitar under $500 that I could use on-stage when I start performing is what I'm looking for right now.

http://www.amazon.com/Seagull-Entourage-Rustic-Mini-Jumbo/dp/B001RIY69A

Click to expand...

Thanks for all the feedback/input everyone!

NoKaOi, thanks for the suggestions! I looked up the Yamaha FG 700-6 and I think it might be a contender. Definitely going to try and use my ears and keep looking around at the stores in my area to play guitars so I can see how they are in person (compared to online reviews, etc). For me, being a female, one thing I realized is that certain guitar body shapes really don't work for me as they actually hurt a little to sit with and strum, which is why I liked the mini jumbo body because it didn't seem to irritate me while playing. I'll make sure to be careful online as well

I've been reading this thread with interest because I'm also thinking of buying a guitar in the $300 - $00 range. Two, actually - one for me, so I can take beginnng guitar lessons this summer, and one for a friend who already plays guitar and is looking for an acoustic-electric to complement her solid body electric guitar. We've talked about Seagull as a brand. Thanks to posters for the additonal suggestions. Please keep the suggestions coming! I realize that the guitar forums here, not surprisingly, don't get much traffic. I'm thinking of posting the same question in a guitar forum, and if I do, I'll post a link to that thread in this thread.