1926 Bacon Silver Bell No 6 Ne Plus Ultra Resonator Tenor Banjo

Holy shimoli, now that's a banjo, folks. This Bacon has everything. Rhinestones over celluloid in the headstock veneer? Yeah, boss! Engraved, gold-plated hardware everywhere? Yessir. Engraved ivory fretboard inlay? Yep, it has it. An ebony neck with a giant lion carved in the heel with bejewled eyes? Oh, yeah. Like I said, it has everything.

Work on this was fairly simple, too -- I tweaked the setup, corrected a bit of funk at the fret edges, and helped get the lever-activated mute working correctly. This banjo is a screamer with a ton of volume and the usual crisp, up-front, brass-defeating sound you'd expect from a pro-level Bacon of this era.

Did I mention the lion?

It has been replated and the finish on the neck was touched-up at some point, but sheesh -- nothing drags down this stunner. It's completely outrageous.
















Email Post

Comments

daverepair said…
Wow. I love rhinestones! I may have to learn tenor banjo, these things are gorgeous.
September 27, 2024 at 8:28 AM
Tsunami said…
A neighbor gave me a silver bell #6 that her 2nd husband bought in the 20’s for $500 (at the time I thought “sure he did, then he spent the money the remaining $400 on his mistress”). Turns out they did sell for that much back in the day. It was the mid 90’s and a day long internet search only found one reference, which called it ‘the finest banjo ever made.’ I ended up selling it to someone in Sweden a few hours later and used the proceeds to buy a Kurzweil K2500 rack sampler that no longer works. I would have been better off learning tenor banjo and keeping that amazingly beautiful instrument.
August 15, 2025 at 9:07 PM
Post a Comment