OulCraft Custom #124 Port Orford Cedar/Quilted Maple Electro Acoustic Tenor Ukulele w/Black Stain

The absolutely unique, pristine and inspiring tenor uke you are looking at right now is an Oulcraft ukulele. Remember the name because OulCraft ukuleles offer something at the high end that really pushes the boundaries of what you can expect from the ukulele.

Using modern production methods these ukuleles compete and learn from all of the hard work many of the very best Japanese and US builders have been producing throughout the last decade. When I hold these instruments I am reminded of Kanile'a, AnueNue and TODA whilst also getting a fair amount of the flavours and sensibilities of the best smaller workshop outfits like Sumi, Barron River and Pete Howlett.

OulCraft comprise of a husband and wife dream team duo builder and designer; Jungtae (the luthier) set up the Oul studio in 2011 having worked previously in Japan building custom acoustic guitars for T's Guitars. He trained under the extremely talented Shinji Takahashi known for Seilen Ukuleles.

The unique design element of the OulCraft Ukuleles is down to Jungtae's wife Seoyoon who has an extensive design history in a wide variety of industries. The synergy that this team create is extremely refreshing, a family approach with a mixing bowl of excellent design ideas, a wealth of craftsmanship experience and modern techniques. We are delighted to be Europe's first OulCraft dealer and to be able to join them on a new voyage of Ukulele design as the company hits it's second decade.

If you were scrolling the website for tenor ukuleles and saw the front of this, I can almost guarantee you stopped what you were doing and clicked - it just has something completely captivating about it. Number #124's dark confidence is a new look on a popular colourful custom we have done before. This is the 5th wrap around custom Jungtae has created for us and is a ukulele that on first looks has all the mojo and flair of a Mike Da Silva - The top is port orford cedar and it's the perfect counterpoint for the quilted maple back and sides and front wrap/rosette. The two woods just set each other off perfectly and the dark stain shows off every detail in the wood. Jungtae very cleverly lines the sides of many of his instruments with Spruce to increase projection... Proof that what is going on out of site can make the things you can see even more sonically impactful.

It sounds fabulous - it's transparent, open, big, clean, clear and utterly beautiful. This custom tenor sounds like a harp at times, and would be absolutely perfect for anyone wanting to hear how subtle changes in string pressure or strumming/picking attack in their playing effect their sound, but it's a joy just to listen to the open notes ring out long and true.

The quilted maple doesn't get enough credit in my book for just how tenderly it shapes the tone of the ukulele... If you like the bubblyness of koa but also want just a little bit of bite and attack to your single picked notes then this ukulele is as good as it gets. A world class instrument by Oulcraft that will no doubt turn heads every time you take it out of the case.

This Ukulele has a MiSi Acoustic Trio fitted making it gig ready!

Specification:
Solid port orford cedar top
Solid quilted maple back and sides, trans-black stain
Spanish cedar/maple 3 ply neck with satin finish
37mm nut width, 28mm G to A string spacing
17" scale length
Bone nut and saddle
Water borne urethane gloss finish
Gotoh stealth tuners
Side soundport
Ebony fretboard and bridge
MOP fretboard dots
Worth CT high G strings
Black quilted maple wraparound soundhole rosette
Subtley radiused fretboard
Supplied in TGI ABS hard case
MiSi Acoustic Trio fitted

Please note - no wax based cleaning products should be used on this finish. Polish which does not contain any wax, like Lizard Spit, will work really well.