Guitars are generally portable instruments, but air travel and backpacking-style trips pose unique challenges. Guitars are too delicate to be checked baggage (unless you have a professional case especially designed for that) and too large for the overhead compartment on smaller planes. Likewise, if you’re going on any sort of trip where you need to pack light (backpacking or hosteling, for example), a full size guitar is just too much. If you can’t bear the thought of leaving your instrument at home, there is a huge market for travel guitars! Here’s a quick overview of the sorts of travel guitars out there.
Fractional Guitars
These aren’t designed only with travel in mind. They are also favorites for younger students and students with small hands. A half-size or three-quarter size instrument is often very practical for travel. Nearly all guitar brands manufacture these so-called ‘fractional’ instruments. There are options for most budgets, and you can find them in both steel string and nylon string varieties. In a well-chosen padded soft case, smaller guitars are far more likely to be accepted as carry-on items (though always check airline dimensions to be sure). While most of these guitars will sound quieter due to the smaller body, the sound quality will at least be similar to what you’re accustomed to.
The big drawback is that the smaller body size almost always means a smaller fretboard length and width. If you have big hands, it may take a bit of adjusting to get chords to sound clean. If you have smaller hands and have struggled to develop your reach, you might find it hard to switch back to full-size later.
Collapsible Guitars
These guitars are specially designed so that you detach the neck and fold them up for travel. A guitar case without the awkward neck is barely bigger than a briefcase and can be taken anywhere. It depends on the make and model you choose, but most have a standard fretboard length and are specially designed body for a full sound. Two popular brands of collapsible guitars are Journey and Voyage.
[[{"fid":"28490","view_mode":"teaser","fields":{},"type":"media","field_deltas":{"1":{}},"attributes":{"class":"media-element file-teaser","data-delta":"1"}}]]Collapsible Voyage Guitar
The main drawback of these guitars is that they are very specifically engineered and manufactured for optimal sound and size, and are therefore quite expensive (from around $500 to more than $1000). This is more than many players have spent on their primary instrument, and they may understandably balk at paying more for their travel guitar than for their standard instrument. Another downside from a classical or flamenco player’s perspective is that this design is geared toward steel-string players. This is likely due to the tuning complications that a collapsible neck presents. The nylon-string options are very limited, and I imagine they are tricky to keep in tune.
Small-bodied Guitars
There is a lot of variation in these sorts of guitars! The idea is that they get rid of bulk by altering (or essentially eliminating) the body of the guitar. Some popular makes and models are the Martin Backpacker, Traveler, Yamaha Silent guitars. They come in many varieties (classical, steel-string, electric), have options for all sorts of budgets, and many have a headphone input so that you can hear your playing.
[[{"fid":"28491","view_mode":"teaser","fields":{},"type":"media","field_deltas":{"2":{}},"attributes":{"class":"media-element file-teaser","data-delta":"2"}}]] Martin Backpacker [[{"fid":"28492","view_mode":"teaser","fields":{},"type":"media","field_deltas":{"3":{}},"attributes":{"class":"media-element file-teaser","data-delta":"3"}}]]Traveler [[{"fid":"28493","view_mode":"teaser","fields":{},"type":"media","field_deltas":{"4":{}},"attributes":{"class":"media-element file-teaser","data-delta":"4"}}]]Yamaha Silent
The big downside of these guitars is the sound and the feel. If you’re used to an acoustic or classical guitar that produces sound from the body, it might be hard to accept the idea of a guitar that only works plugged in, as the the Yamaha Silent and some Traveler designs. Plus, while it’s definitely more convenient, not having a body can make the guitar awkward to hold. Classical and acoustic players who are used to resting the right arm over the guitar will have to get used to a new posture.
What is your experience with travel guitars? Do you have any of the guitars I listed above? Have you tried more than one design or brand of travel guitar? What do you like best and why?
Great Topic. So I’m planning to fly and wanted to take my guitar and found that it was $40 per trip which means $80 round-trip. This can add up if you do a lot of flying. I currently have a Martin backpacker and used to take it as a carry-on back in the day. These days it is too big to take on the plane and it would count as my one carry-on item. Additionally I found the backpacker difficult to hold because of the shape. I could never find a comfortable position while playing.
I started researching small travel guitars and I first looked at the foldable guitars. The problem was that although it might be able to be taken on the plane as a carry-on, it would count as your one item.
I finally decided on the Traveler Ultralight Classical guitar. It weighs less than 3 pounds and is small enough to fit in a large suitcase. It can be played with or without headphones. The guitar appears to have a decent sound judging by the videos I’ve watched. It has a full neck and the tuning pegs are inside the body. It uses standard strings so no hard to find items are involved. I will be picking it up next week so I can check back in and let you know of the sound quality and the guitar itself.
There's also the SoloEtte, endorsed by Sharon Isbin, amongst others. I bought one a long time ago when I was traveling a lot and it was ok for a practice guitar. Easy to get on planes, though I did once get held up in Beijing by security at arrivals - they wanted to know what it was and asked me to play. They were not terribly impressed with my rendition of the C Major scale... :-D
Check it out here - https://www.rosscowright.com
I should add the standard disclaimer that I don't anythign to do with Mr. Wright other than beign a customer.
Cheers!
That's great, thanks for sharing, Raaj! I'd seen the SoloEtte before. I just checked out the website -- at first glance, the guitars made me laugh, but the more I think about it, his design is a terrific idea for using space more efficiently.