SWS SG Cut Away

The list I got from Seagull still shows it being made. First year 2009.

SWS SG = Solid Wood Series Semi Gloss.  I would love to have an SG like the one you're referring to though.

I have played and owned a ton of Seagulls; both full body and cutaways.  I know there's people who like to debate what "camp" they're in as far as does the cutaway actually "take away" any sound or tone etc, etc, blah blah blah.  But for me, I noticed no real diff between Seagull's full body and cutaway models.

The main things that made me trade my Seagulls were stuff like neck issues and dead notes, but as far as the overall sound (volume, sustain, tone etc) being affected by a cutaway or not, I never really noticed any difference that was worth mentioning.  IF there was a diff, it was so negligible that again, it wasn't worth mentioning.

So, in other words, the only reason a cutaway would win over a non-cutaway for me, as far as Seagulls are concerned, is for pure practical ability to play high on the neck.  If that's not important to me, than neither is the cutaway.  Hope that helps. 

Note: that this is specifically with my experience with Seagulls (and to a lesser degree Martin and Taylor).  Other brands may actually have larger differences between their cutaways and non-cutaways, but I don't have enough recent experience with any other brands besides Godin, Martin and Taylor to offer an opinion there.

If there is an effect, it's so minimal that you would really need to concentrate hard to hear it.

If you think about how a guitar is played in a live setup, often with vocals and perhaps with some accompaniment, I don't think the cutaway makes an iota of difference to the audience you are playing to. Unless of course your song requires access to the higher register, in which case it makes a lot of difference if you don't have the cw.

Well I just ordered the 33454 Maritime Dreadnought from Musician's Friend. FYI for all here. I learned too late that Sweetwater will usually discount any guitar you're considering by just calling and asking. So I tried it with Musician's Friend and they do the same thing. They nocked over 100.00 dollars off their Web site price! I would have ordered from Sweetwater but MF is the only dealer I've found that carries this particular model. I'm really hoping I like this guitar and other than getting a dud there's no reason I shouldn't. I owned the regular SWS SG a few years ago and have regretted selling it ever since. The only reason I wanted the 33454 is for the cutaway because I play a couple of Preston Reed songs that require access above the 14th fret. I'm hoping it sounds good with heavy strings tuned really low for those songs also. Overture for Lilly is in open open D tuned down to B#. I play it in open D now but it just wants to be tuned down to where Preston plays it. The Cameo doesn't sound good tuned that low and I don't want to keep either of the two Taylors strung and tuned that way. I'll let y'all now how it goes.

terryd, Congrats on a fantastic guitar acquisition.

The guitar will sound amazing at first, but even better after a couple of years, if played fairly consistently.  The Maritime series was always one of my favorite series from Seagull.  And if you're putting heavy gauge strings on it and tuning it down to D or C, well, I don't know, but I would imagine that would help it open up a bit faster cuz that's some deep resonating going on.