John Birch

product types: 

  • bass guitars
  • electric guitars

Information: 

John Birch (1922 - 2000) was an important figure in the 1970s UK electric guitar industry. He is known for making eye-catching guitars for many famous UK guitarists of the era including Roy Wood, Brian May, Ritchie Blackmore, Tony Iommi, and Barry Devlin. He started out making pickups in the early 1960s while working as a service engineer for Ampex. He founded a business in Birmingham selling his pickups and other guitars parts. He also modified guitars - by adding his own pickups, hardware and refinishing them (these changes were not always an improvement!).

Birch began making guitars as well, but he was more of electronics guy than a wood worker and his guitars had variable build quality - often made quickly and cheaply. John Diggins came to work at the Birch workshop and took a major role in building the guitars: Birch instruments made by Diggins are typically high quality. Birch had several standard models: JB1, JB2, SG, Les Paul, Flying V and Strat style - but his best known ones were custom designs like the Super Yob used by Dave Hill or the glitter star guitar made for Gerry Shephard. Birch guitars had several innovative features including neck though construction, stainless steel hardware and 24 fret necks. Birch's pickups were also unusual in their construction - using large cobalt steel magnets.

John Birch guitars workshop closed in 1977 and John Diggins left to found Jaydee. The company was relaunched in 1993 in Nottingham with the help of John Carling who continued to run the business after John Birch died in 2000.  In 2021 John Birch Guitars relocated back to it's home town of Birmingham under the new ownership of Peter Francis and the direction of its original Luthier John Diggins and his sons Michael and Andrew.

Location

John Birch Guitars UK Birmingham , WMD
United Kingdom
West Midlands GB