A Fine '63 Melody Maker with Factory Maestro Vibrato Tailpiece

This super featherweight guitar weighs just 6.40 lbs. and has a nice fat nut width of just over 1 11/16 inches and a regular scale length of 24 3/4 inches. Assymetrical double cutaway solid mahogany body with rounded horns slightly pointing away from neck. One-piece mahogany neck with a nice medium profile, rosewood fretboard with 22 medium jumbo frets and inlaid pearl dot position markers. Headstock with gold "Gibson" decal. Open-back strip tuners with white plastic oval buttons. Single-layer six-screw black plastic "all-on-one-plate" pickguard with the words "Melody Maker" by the end of the fretboard. Single Melody Maker black plastic-covered single-coil pickup with an output of 7.03k. Two controls (one volume, one tone) plus jack socket, all mounted on pickguard. The pots are stamped "137 6334" and "137 6342" (CTS August and October 1963). Gold plastic bell-shaped knobs with metal tops. Ridged "wrap-over" bridge with factory Maestro vibrato tailpiece. This guitar is in exceptionally fine (9.00) condition, with only a few tiny chips on the edges. Housed in a later padded imitation crocodile soft gig bag (9.00).

The Melody Maker was originally released [in early 1959] as a single pickup model, available with either a regular (24 3/4") or a short (22 1/2") scale neck.

"The single pickup Melody Maker was introduced in early 1959, both in regular and 3/4 size versions, as the newer budget model in the solid body line. A dual pickup version (MM-D) was subsequently listed in late 1959 but was not shipped in quantity until 1960. Between 1959 and 1965 the Melody Maker trio kept the same basic specifications but went through two successive body redesigns…The first variant is characterized by a single cutaway shape identical to the original Les Paul Junior save for a thinner body…In early 1961 both the regular and the 3/4 size versions were modified with a double cutaway shape produced by creating a upper horn symmetrical to the lower one…A further redesign took place in early 1965 when the model took on a double cutaway body with more pointed sculptured horns positioned farther away from the neck…[The] new body shape did not prove very pleasing and in February 1966 the Melody Maker was fitted, both on economic and aesthetic grounds, with the SG body style" (A.R. Duchossoir, Gibson Electrics -- The Classic Years, pp. 215-216).