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Bourgeois

OM Vintage

Tony Rice was polite about the dreadnought. Then he picked up the OM and didn't put it down.

The mid-1980s, Eric Schoenberg's house. Dana Bourgeois has brought two guitars, and Tony Rice stays on the smaller one. Bourgeois has been building that shape ever since. In Maine, since 2000, it's called the OM Vintage.

Introduced
2000
Type
Acoustic
Class
Production
Read the story · 3 min

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The short version

  1. 1929–33

    Martin's OM

    The original orchestra model run, as one review dates it.

  2. 1975

    A dorm-room guitar

    Bourgeois finishes his first, between a Bowdoin dorm and the family tools.

  3. 1977

    A one-man shop

    Brunswick, Maine. When the company itself starts depends who you ask.

  4. 1986–91

    The Soloist

    A cutaway OM with Eric Schoenberg, built at Martin. Other accounts start it in the late 1970s.

  5. 1993–99

    The plain OM

    Engelmann and mahogany, dot inlays. The earlier Bourgeois OM.

  6. 2000

    The Vintage OM

    Adirondack, Indian rosewood, herringbone, squares and diamonds.

  7. 2019

    Touchstone

    A partnership with Eastman brings a second OM Vintage, its tops still voiced in Maine.

  8. 2026

    Professional Series

    Satin with Sitka and Schaller, or gloss with torrefied Sitka and Waverly.

Side A

A1

Polite about the dreadnought

The mid-1980s, at Eric Schoenberg's house. Dana Bourgeois has brought two guitars: a dreadnought and an OM. Tony Rice plays the dreadnought and is polite about it. Then he picks up the OM, and stays there.

Bourgeois tells it with Rice's line at the end:

"This is the sound you should be going for. You just need to put it in a bigger package."

What Rice heard was balance, every string even with the others. Keep the guitars straight, though. Rice's own famous guitar was a Martin D-28. The OM that night was a shop guitar in the other case. None of Rice's records belong on this page.

A2

A book, a supply run, a dorm

Bourgeois started with Irving Sloane's book. In 1974 he made a supply run to Hinsdale, New Hampshire, and in 1975 he finished his first guitar, working between a Bowdoin dorm room and the family tools. In 1977 he had a one-man shop in Brunswick.

When the company started is a different question, and the answers don't agree: 1977, 1978, 1991, or a fiftieth anniversary that points back at 1975. Keep all of them. They aren't one event.

Along the way he worked on the old Martin OMs, the 1929 to 1933 run. He knew the shape from the inside before he ever put his name on one.

A3

A cutaway Martin wouldn't make

Schoenberg wanted a cutaway in that old orchestra-model shape. Martin's custom shop didn't think a cutaway was "appropriate" on a Martin. Bourgeois had already built one to show it worked.

So Martin built them, under Schoenberg's name. In the most detailed telling, the project ran from 1986 to 1991, Bourgeois and later T. J. Thompson voiced the tops, Martin assembled them, and there were about 195. Other accounts put the start in the late 1970s. Dana calls it the first OM with a cutaway and the first production OM since the 1930s.

That's the Soloist. It's a cutaway, it says Martin inside, and it isn't an OM Vintage.

Flip the record · By the numbers

  • 25½"

    The scale. Bourgeois's own 000 is the same body at 25 inches. That's the whole difference.

  • ~195

    Schoenberg Soloists, 1986 to 1991, by one count. The guitars that came before this one.

  • 1¾"

    Nut width on the current sheets.

  • 400–500

    Guitars a year out of the Maine shop, every model together, depending who's counting.

Side B

B1

The long scale

Bourgeois's own non-cutaway OM came after his own company did. The first one, from 1993 to 1999, was Engelmann spruce and mahogany with dot inlays. The Vintage OM followed in 2000: Adirondack spruce, Indian rosewood, herringbone around the top, a zig-zag strip down the back, squares and diamonds in the ebony board. The factory has never printed that year. It just calls the Vintage long-running.

What makes it an OM, at Bourgeois, is one number. His 000 is the same body at 25 inches. The OM is 25½. A longer scale puts more tension on the same strings, and you feel it as snap. Martin's current OM-28 is a slightly different box, at 25.4, with a dovetail neck joint. The Bourgeois neck is bolted on, so it can come off.

B2

Same name, different wood

The name held. The recipe kept moving.

A 2010 build sheet is still Adirondack, with Madagascar rosewood and a pyramid bridge. A 2014 review of an Aged Tone version had X-bracing and a finish from the cyanoacrylate family. The guitar you'd order now is the Professional Series, in two flavors. Satin is Sitka spruce and Schaller tuners. Gloss is torrefied Sitka and Waverlys. Torrefaction is heat cooked into the spruce to age it on purpose. It is not the 2014 finish.

There's a second OM Vintage, too. The Touchstone version comes out of a 2019 partnership with Eastman: tops voiced in Lewiston, bodies built at Eastman. Good guitar. Different guitar.

B3

A bigger package

The shop in Lewiston makes somewhere between 400 and 500 guitars a year, every model counted together. Nobody has published how many are OM Vintages.

Rice asked him for the OM's sound in something bigger. Bourgeois went and built the bigger ones; the dreadnoughts are in the catalog right next to this. He also kept making the small one, the 14-fret orchestra model with the long scale and the old herringbone trim.

Twenty-six years on, it's still there. The shape Rice wouldn't put down.

The cast

The people, and the specific guitars, that made the legend.

  • mid-1980s

    Tony Rice

    The OM in the other case

    Stayed on it all evening at Schoenberg's. His famous guitar is a Martin D-28, not a Bourgeois.

  • 1986

    Eric Schoenberg

    The Soloist, a cutaway OM

    Wanted a cutaway in the old shape. Martin's custom shop didn't think it was appropriate; Bourgeois had already built one.

  • 2000

    Dana Bourgeois

    The OM Vintage

    A repairman inside old Martin OMs first, then the builder of his own.

  • 2023

    Xu Wei

    Custom Bourgeois orchestra models

    Guitars titled OM Vintage Xu Wei shipped in 2023, and a 24-copy limited edition copies one of his customs. The one he says he plays at concerts is a 12-fret.

Liner notes

Specs, construction, rarity, value, and every source we used.

A 14-fret, 25½-inch OM from Lewiston — Bourgeois’s Vintage, bolt-on neck and all, not a Martin OM-28.

Body
14-fret orchestra model; Sitka spruce top (PS-S satin) or torrefied Sitka (PS gloss); East Indian rosewood back and sides; ivoroid binding; vintage herringbone purfling; black/white vintage rosette; zipper backstrip. Body inches on Vintage OM sheets: upper bout 11¼", waist 9⅛", lower bout 15 1/16", body length 19 5/16". Gladesville’s Professional Series sheets also print depth at the neck 3 5/16" and overall length 39 9/16".
Neck
14-fret square, Honduran mahogany; detachable / bolt-on joint; dual-action truss rod; satin. The shared Professional Series block also prints “12 Fret Contour.” That is not this OM.
Fingerboard
Ebony, black bound, abalone slotted squares and diamonds. 20 frets on the Guitar Guitar PSV-OM-S sheet and Reverb’s model field. Radius not printed.
Scale
25½" long (also printed 25.5"). Blue Book also listed a short 25" option on the Vintage OM. Not the same number.
Pickups
None
Hardware
Ebony traditional bridge, 2 5/16" spacing; ivoroid pins with black dots; celluloid tortoise pickguard; Waverly nickel on gloss PS, Schaller on satin PS-S (Coda #11095: Schaller Vintage Bean 18:1). Hardshell case on the dealer sheets that print one.
Electronics
None
Finish
PS-S: thin satin body. PS: high-gloss body. Neck satin on the build sheets that say so.
Nut
1¾" on the PS and 2010 sheets. Bone where a sheet prints the material. Sound Pure’s 2002 #2464 lists 1.80" on that one guitar. Do not average.
Open the full research fileConstruction details, the complete player record, production numbers, dated value estimates, and sources

*Classic living example = current Professional Series OM Vintage, Lewiston, Maine: satin PS-S or gloss PS. Factory inches. No millimetre SKU. Mix flagged. Guitar Village’s Heirloom OM Vintage prints 25.5" (650 mm); Dream Guitars measured a 2002 custom Vintage OM at 25.5000 in / 647.7000 mm. Touchstone listings print 648 mm and 650 mm on other cards. Do not average 647.7 / 648 / 650. Not the Touchstone OM Vintage/TS. Not the Heirloom OM Vintage/HS. Not a 25" 000. Not a 12-fret OMS. Not a Schoenberg Soloist. Not a Martin OM-28. No Gibson SKU.*

Construction

The job was a long-scale orchestra model a Maine shop could voice itself. Martin’s original OM run, in the January 2014 review’s dating, was 1929–33. When the name went away is a fight on the Martin plate, not this one. Dana Bourgeois was inside those guitars as a repairman before the Vintage OM existed.

Guitar World (Janelle Borg, 17 September 2024; a paid partnership, and the dates are Dana talking): Irving Sloane’s book, a supply run to Hinsdale, New Hampshire, in 1974 (the piece prints the shop as Guirian), a first guitar finished in 1975 between a Bowdoin dorm and the family tools. 1977, a one-man shop in Brunswick. Down East (28 April 2026) matches the 1975 dorm guitar and dates Bourgeois Guitars to 1991. Guitar.com (2023) says he founded the company in 1977. That same Guitar World piece has the company marking a 50th “next year,” which points at 1975, not 1991. Blue Book: full-time luthier in 1978. Keep all four. They are not one event.

The guitar that turned him was not this model. Mid-1980s, at Eric Schoenberg’s house, he brought a dreadnought and an OM. Tony Rice was polite about the dread, then stayed on the OM. Bourgeois’s retelling: “This is the sound you should be going for. You just need to put it in a bigger package.” Balance, string to string. Rice’s famous guitar that night was his D-28. Not a Bourgeois.

Schoenberg wanted a cutaway in that old shape, and the start date is a fight. Blue Book: shortly after 1978, a traditional OM cutaway, then a ten-year partnership. Acoustic Guitar (December 2012) puts the Martin work in the late 1970s. Guitar World: mid-1980s; Martin’s Custom Shop called a cutaway not “appropriate” on a Martin; Bourgeois had already built the proof; Martin then built a cutaway OM under Schoenberg’s name, the two of them equal partners. Dana’s line: first OM with a cutaway, and the first production OM since the 1930s. Acoustic Guitar (August 2024) is more specific: collaboration 1986, Bourgeois and later T. J. Thompson voiced the tops, Martin assembled them in nitro under Martin serials, Schoenberg sold them, project over in 1991, about 195 guitars, not replicas. Fretboard Journal (July 2017) calls the Soloist thirty years old. The 2017 30th run was 12 instruments (One Man’s Guitar: cocobolo, bearclaw German spruce, both signatures on the label). Cutaway. Not an OM Vintage.

His own non-cutaway OM comes after the company. Blue Book’s plain OM is Engelmann and mahogany, dot inlays, pyramid bridge, 1993–99. The Vintage OM is the next card: Adirondack, Indian rosewood, herringbone, zig-zag backstrip, squares and diamonds, ebony pyramid, nickel tuners, short 25" or long 25.5", 2000–present. The factory page never prints that year. It only calls the Vintage long-running. This plate starts in 2000, and the credit is Blue Book. A 1994 cedar/mahogany Bourgeois OM on the used market is the earlier model, not this name.

The name held. The recipe moved. Serial 5182 (build 15 March 2010) is still Adirondack, Madagascar, rectangular pyramid, zipper, 14-fret ebony, 1¾", Waverly, standard glue. Acoustic Guitar (Teja Gerken, January 2014) on an Aged Tone OM Vintage: 000-size, 14-fret, Adirondack, Madagascar, X-bracing, bolt-on mahogany, 25.5", 1¾", 2 5/16" at the saddle, Waverly, finish in the cyanoacrylate family, list $6,995. A dealer note on 2006 serial 3500: light Adirondack braces, full bolt-on, no tongue brace, pyramid. That is the period guitar.

The living guitar is the Professional Series in the table. Satin PS-S is Sitka and Schaller. Gloss PS is torrefied Sitka and Waverly. Coda’s #11095 (built 14 July 2025) is the satin card: thin satin, standard glue, Schaller Vintage Bean 18:1, no pickup. Elderly’s sold-out gloss sheet, still up 2 October 2026, is the one that prints Adirondack spruce bracing. Audiofanzine (24 September 2025) pairs aged bracing with the gloss price. Shipped 10907 (October 2025): dual-action truss and the detachable neck. Down East: bolted, so the neck can come off. Torrefaction is heat in the spruce. The 2014 “Aged Tone” coat was cyanoacrylate. Not the same process.

The inches in the table are not Martin’s. The factory splits this outline from Bourgeois’s own 000 by scale alone. Down Home’s Brazilian 000 Vintage limited edition is that same box at 25", and the run was 20. The current Standard OM-28, on that plate, is 15" wide and 25.4", dovetailed. Different scale, different joint, different shop.

Touchstone OM Vintage/TS is the other new guitar: Eastman from 2019 (Fretboard Journal, August 2021; Acoustic Guitar says that fall), tops voiced in Lewiston, bodies built at Eastman, nut 1 23/32" or Denver’s 1.72". Heirloom / HS is Adirondack and animal-protein glue (Gladesville #9289). Country Boy is mahogany. OMS is 12-fret. JOM is the bigger body. The shared series block prints “12 Fret Contour,” and Strings & Things copies it onto gloss OM #11445. Shipped OM Vintage sheets say 14-fret square.

Players

Do not hang a Martin OM-28 on this plate. Do not put Tony Rice’s records here. The OM he played in the mid-1980s was a shop guitar in the other case, and the famous one is the D-28.

Xu Wei — custom OMs, and a 24-guitar Orchestra Model. Factory artist page: mainland Chinese singer and guitarist; a Limited Edition Orchestra Model designed with him, “a replica of one of several custom Bourgeois guitars played by Xu Wei himself,” old-growth Sitka and East Indian rosewood, a mother-of-pearl lotus on the headstock, pictorial inlays, only twenty-four numbered copies. Bourgeois product pages ship guitars titled OM Vintage Xu Wei (10230 and 10228, shipped 29 November 2023): 14-fret square mahogany neck, and 10230’s head veneer is a custom lotus, not the stock logo. His own account, on the factory video: he bought two Bourgeois guitars, then asked Dana for a customized 12-fret orchestra model he plays at concerts. Keep both. The concert guitar he describes is 12-fret. The limited edition is an OM replica of a custom. Neither is the stock Professional Series herringbone card. Which songs sit on which guitar is unpublished here.

Not this guitar. Bryan Sutton bought “one of Bourgeois’s creations” in a Nashville shop; in 1997, when Kentucky Thunder played Maine, he and Ricky Skaggs made an endorsement deal (Down East). The model is not named. Sutton’s Banjo Killer is a dreadnought. Skaggs’s later signature line, and the Country Boy OM dealers call Skaggs-inspired, are mahogany recipes, not this rosewood Vintage. Natalie Maines’s White Lady / Whyte Rabbit is an L-00-sized guitar (Acoustic Guitar, NAMM 2017). Luke Bryan’s line is torrefied spruce and walnut with antler inlays (Down East). Jeff Tweedy’s named Bourgeois at RetroFret is a 2023 OMS-12 Country Boy HS, 12-fret mahogany. Courtney Hartman’s NAMM 2017 guitar was a large-soundhole OM in a Tony Rice tribute, not this table. Doc Watson, Andy Falco, Ray LaMontagne, Steve Earle: brand-level names in Guitar World, Down East, or the 2014 Acoustic Guitar review. No OM Vintage, no serial, no session.

Also known to play stays short. The factory history page adds Sierra Hull, Sean Watson, and Ketch Secor to a Lewiston roster. That is Bourgeois in general. It is not this model.

Rarity

You can order a new Professional Series OM Vintage. Current production is not rare. Satin and gloss are finishes, not limited editions.

Bourgeois has not published OM Vintage unit totals. None invented. Build dates and serials (Coda #11095, 14 July 2025; the 2010 sheet #5182) date a guitar. They don’t count a year. That is why a first-year census is unknown.

Company output is not this model, and the published figures disagree. Acoustic Guitar’s Touchstone review: roughly 500 guitars a year. Guitar World (September 2024): around 500. Down East (April 2026): a team of 32, approximately 500 a year. Guitar Guitar (15 April 2026): twenty artisans, 400 a year. Keep them. All of those numbers are the shop, not the OM Vintage. The Schoenberg about 195, and Xu Wei’s 24, are other guitars.

What is actually thinner: early Adirondack Vintage OMs on the Blue Book recipe, pyramid bridge still on the 2010 sheet, Madagascar and Brazilian sets, animal-protein Heirlooms. A one-off Brazilian Heirloom is one object. It is not a Vintage OM. Touchstone OM Vintage/TS guitars are the other factory path. They do not thin the Lewiston card, and they are not it.

Value

Informal estimate, 2 October 2026. Not an appraisal.

Ask vs sold labeled. Celebrity lots are not-comps. No invented medians. The January 2014 list of $6,995 is an Aged Tone Madagascar OM Vintage, not 2026 street. Dana’s line in the 2023 Guitar.com review — an average Bourgeois street “about $6,500,” beyond most players — is the Maine line before Touchstone, not a cart for this SKU. Down East’s $4,400 Sitka/mahogany and $18,450 cypress are the shop’s ends. The cheap end is mahogany. It is not this rosewood OM.

New street. Factory Professional Series Vintage page: MSRP from $4,139.00 satin (PS-S, Sitka) and from $5,599.00 gloss (PS, torrefied Sitka). Those floors cover the Vintage OM and the Vintage dreadnought. Audiofanzine (24 September 2025) prints the Vintage OM and dreadnought at $4,599 satin and $6,199 gloss. Don’t average the two lists. Strings & Things: gloss OM #11445 at $5,599.00. A Blue Book for-sale scrape shows a PS-S OM at $4,139.00. Elderly, sold out, page still printing 2 October 2026: regular $5,699.00, sale $5,129.10, on the gloss-spec Sitka / Waverly sheet. Guitar Guitar (29 September 2026): satin PSV-OM-S £3,999. Coda: satin #11095 at £3,499.17. Pounds are not the U.S. cart.

Touchstone is a different new guitar. Acoustic Guitar: the OM Vintage/TS streets at just under $3,000. Eddie’s, OM Vintage T/S, SKU T2405049: $2,969.10. A Reverb new listing dropped from $2,969 to $2,767. Not the Lewiston price.

Used modern. Reverb’s Price Guide for “Professional Series Vintage OM” reads $1,941–$3,228 (39 orders, Good to Mint). The same page’s named solds do not describe one guitar: 17 December 2025 Excellent $2,100; 8 October 2025 Very Good $4,160.75; 25 August 2025 Mint $1,750; 22 August 2025 Excellent $3,100; 8 August 2025 Very Good $5,000; 23 April 2025 Excellent $2,095; 8 April 2025 Mint $2,825. A mint at $1,750 beside a very-good at $5,000 means Touchstone, satin PS, and older Adirondack Vintage OMs are sharing a name. Flag: mixed comps. No midpoint.

Vintage / collectible. There is no pre-war tape. A 2002 or 2010 Maine Vintage OM is a used shop guitar, not Nazareth OM money. No clean hammer series isolated here. Eddie’s ask on one Brazilian Adirondack OM Vintage, #9696, is $17,399. One guitar, animal-protein, not a comp for Sitka and Indian rosewood. Xu Wei’s 24, and anyone’s signature custom, sit outside the band. Not a comp.

See also

  • martin-om-28 — Nazareth 14-fret 000/auditorium; current Standard is 15" and 25.4", dovetail, not this bolt-on
  • larrivee-om-03 — another non-Martin OM; Oxnard satin, African Khaya, 25.5", not Lewiston
  • collings-d2h — Austin shop acoustic; a square dreadnought, not an OM

Sources

Guitars this one gets compared to, confused with, or descended from.