{"id":143839,"date":"2024-05-17T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-05-17T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/?p=143839"},"modified":"2024-05-16T08:35:37","modified_gmt":"2024-05-16T15:35:37","slug":"john-leventhal-surprise-birthday-present-johnny-cashs-1940-martin-d-18","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/john-leventhal-surprise-birthday-present-johnny-cashs-1940-martin-d-18\/","title":{"rendered":"John Leventhal Gets a Surprise Birthday Present: Johnny Cash\u2019s 1940 Martin D-18"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Sometime around his 50th birthday, in December 2002, John Leventhal took delivery of a large and unexpected parcel from UPS\u2014an old-school guitar flight case with a shipping label affixed to its lid. Leventhal opened the case to find the platonic ideal of a mahogany dreadnought, a golden era Martin D-18<\/a>, one of only a small handful estimated to have been made in 1940 with a sunburst-finished soundboard out of 377 total. \u201cI remember going, \u2018Wow, what is this?\u2019 I had to dig around in the case to find a little letter from the sender,\u201d Leventhal says.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As it happens, the giver of this generous gift was none other than the legendary country singer-songwriter Johnny Cash, Leventhal\u2019s father-in-law. Cash had used the D-18 in the series of critically acclaimed studio albums he made with producer Rick Rubin, starting with 1994\u2019s American Recordings<\/a><\/em> and culminating in 2002\u2019s American IV: The Man Comes Around<\/a><\/em>.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The guitar was in beautiful condition overall, and Leventhal only recently had the requisite work done to bring it up to optimum playability. With a fresh neck reset and new bridge plate and bridge (the original had been sanded down to lower the action, a rather primitive repair technique), Leventhal finds that this classic mahogany dreadnought is an even better guitar in its current state. \u201cIt feels really good,\u201d he says. \u201cYou\u2019ve got to lean in a bit to maximize the sound, but it yields great results.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leventhal<\/a> has as of late been using the D-18 to write and record demos, and he plans to use it on whatever artist\u2019s album he next produces. But most important, he sees it as a treasured family heirloom. \u201cI\u2019ll give it to my son, Jake, John\u2019s grandson, and hopefully he\u2019ll give it to his child,\u201d he says. \u201cThe thought that this guitar could travel through our family for a while is a beautiful thing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\"Acoustic<\/a>\n

This article originally appeared in the May\/June 2024<\/a> issue of Acoustic Guitar<\/em> magazine.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cash used this guitar in the series of critically acclaimed studio albums he made with producer Rick Rubin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":143840,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"Cash used this guitar in the series of critically acclaimed studio albums he made with producer Rick Rubin.","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1146],"tags":[1947],"ppma_author":[1541],"class_list":["post-143839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-vintage-and-collectible-guitars","tag-may-june-2024"],"blocksy_meta":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/John-Leventhal-Martin-D-18-shade-top-photo-Josh-Wool.jpg?fit=750%2C490&ssl=1","authors":[{"term_id":1541,"user_id":24,"is_guest":0,"slug":"adam-perlmutterstringletter-com","display_name":"Adam Perlmutter","avatar_url":{"url":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Adam-Perlmutter.jpg","url2x":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/11\/Adam-Perlmutter.jpg"},"user_url":"","last_name":"Perlmutter","first_name":"Adam","job_title":"","description":"Adam Perlmutter holds a bachelor of music degree from the University of North Carolina-Greensboro and a master's degree in Contemporary Improvisation from the New England Conservatory. He is the editor of Acoustic Guitar<\/i>."}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=143839"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143839\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":144709,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/143839\/revisions\/144709"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/143840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=143839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=143839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=143839"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acousticguitar.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=143839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}