I changed to baritone (guitar and tuning) in 2008 when Jasper quit playing bass with Boo Boo Davis and I decided to try to play both the guitar and the bass parts at the same time. Turned out that baritone guitar and throwing away the pick was the perfect solution. I have never been a fan of high and flashy guitarplaying and always liked to lower part of the sound better. Also turns out that my favorite effect pedal (wah wah) sounds a lot better on the lower end.
I started out with a Gretsch and Danelectro but I missed „the bite” of my old strat so I tried to get the best of both worlds and ‚created’ my own guitar. The body is from a Japanese Squier Stratocaster that I bought new in 1984. The neck is replaced with a longer one; custom built by Ellio Martina. The scale of the new neck is 28,75” where the custom stratocaster neck is 25,5”. As you can see the bridge pick up is replaced by a humbucker (DiMarzio)
The strings that I am using is Ernie Balll Slinky Baritone (72 – 56 – 44 – 30 – 18 – 13). On this guitar I mostly use regular tuning but then 7 semi tones down so it becomes A – D – G – C – E – A. Also use the same string set on all my other guitars with a regular neck scale and then tune them down 4 semi tones to C – F – B flat – E flat – G – C.