Guitaripedia

Every guitar has a story.

Burns

Marvin

Burns built Hank Marvin more than 30 prototypes to keep him in tune. Then somebody checked his jacket.

Late 1963. Hank Marvin and Bruce Welch of the Shadows are fed up with their Strats. The magnets drag on the strings, Hank’s whammy bar knocks everything out of tune, and Welch has walked out of the band over tuning once already. So they go to Burns and ask for something better.

Introduced
1964
Type
Solidbody electric
Class
Production
Read the story · 3 min

All guitarsMore Burns

White Burns Marvin with red tortoiseshell guards, three Rez-O-Matik pickups and a Rezo-Tube vibrato with armrest, full guitar lying on a shop counter
Photo: Bruce Marvin / Wikimedia Commons / Public domainOriginal 1964 Burns Marvin photographed in a London guitar shop; perspective shot from the body end.

The short version

  1. 1963

    Prototypes

    A Marvin without its upper guard turns up in studio photos in early November.

  2. 1964

    On tour

    The finished set is in full use on the Shadows’ spring European tour.

  3. 1964

    Patents

    Burns files for the design and the Rezo-Tube on 14 August, with production already underway.

  4. 1965

    Baldwin

    The American company buys Burns on 30 September. The Marvin carries on under the new owner.

  5. 1966

    Puppet Shadows

    Burns builds Mini Marvins for the Shadows’ puppet cameo in Thunderbirds Are Go.

  6. 1970

    Stolen

    Hank’s Marvins are stolen. Some tellings have him playing them into the early ’70s.

Side A

A1

Out of tune and out of patience

Every signature guitar starts with a complaint. This one had a good one.

Toward the end of 1963, Hank Marvin and Bruce Welch were unhappy with the white Strats they were using. The pickup magnets pulled on the strings (“magnet suck,” players call it), and Hank’s constant work on the whammy bar kept knocking everything out of tune. At one point Welch walked out of the band over tuning, and then came back. That’s a serious tuning problem.

They went to Jim Burns through Ike Isaacs, Hank’s old teacher and now Burns’s technical director. Hank’s brief was easy to say and hard to build: a guitar that stayed perfectly in tune with a wide-range tremolo, and more variety in the tones.

What followed wasn’t a sale. It was an argument, with a workshop on one side and two very particular guitarists on the other.

A2

Thirty guitars later

Hank told the story himself, in a 1964 column:

Those fellows up at Romford must have loved me! Over 30 models were completed before the final job appeared.

He blamed Welch, who would send back whatever Hank didn’t. He also wrote: “The 24 months of waiting was a nuisance.” Twenty-four months would put the first approach back in 1962. Other times Hank remembered starting in mid-1963, which seems more likely. Either way, it was a long wait.

Some of the ideas were Hank’s own. The scroll headstock, three tuners a side, was his, and carving it gave the shop a headache. The white finish with red tortoise guards was borrowed from the Strat look he was walking away from. By early November 1963 prototypes were turning up in the studio, one without its upper guard. By the spring tour of Europe, the finished guitars were in full use.

A3

Six tubes and a knife edge

It has a Strat’s layout, but it’s its own animal. The scale is 25½", the first Burns at that length, with one extra fret. Three Rez-o-Matik pickups, a simple three-way lever, a master volume and two tones. After years of Burns chasing clever circuits, this was plain and useful on purpose.

The heart of it is the vibrato, the Rezo-Tube. A long aluminum plate pivots on a knife edge, so there’s very little friction to hang the strings up. Instead of a Strat’s block, the strings pass through six separate tubes set in a recess in the body, kept apart from the wood. Burns’s catalog promised “a new degree of resonance and sostenuto,” which is a catalog’s way of saying it rings. A cage armrest sits over the plate so your picking arm doesn’t foul it. Engraved on the unit: “Designed and handcrafted for Hank B. Marvin by Burns.”

In October 1964 Hank called it “a Burns solid costing £163.” By June 1965 the list was over £173, almost exactly the price of a Strat.

Flip the record · By the numbers

  • 30+

    Models Hank says Burns completed “before the final job appeared.”

  • £163

    What Hank said the guitar cost, in his October 1964 column.

  • 6

    Tubes in the Rezo-Tube, one per string, set into the body.

  • 300–400

    Roughly how many were built. Nobody published a total, and the estimates don’t agree.

Side B

B1

Green guitars and puppet Shadows

Beat Instrumental made Hank its player of the month in June 1964, with “a guitar named after him.” By the early-1964 single “The Rise and Fall of Flingel Bunt” at the latest, the Shadows were recording with the new lineup. No session sheet says more than that.

For the short film Rhythm & Greens, Burns made a special set of Marvins in green sunburst. They showed up on TV and in the film, then only now and then. And in 1966, when the Shadows appeared as puppets in Thunderbirds Are Go, Burns built Mini Marvins for the puppet band. If you want proof a guitar had made it, a scale model in a Gerry Anderson film will do.

B2

The jacket button

Hank got his guitar. He did not stop having opinions about it. Later he said it looked “cluttered,” with “the profusion of plastic,” and the first one was very heavy. And for a while the Rezo-Tube, after thirty-odd prototypes, kept locking out of tune. The culprit was the button on his jacket, catching in the string-feed slot on the back.

Baldwin bought Burns in September 1965, and in mid-1966 factory manager Jack Golder flattened the carved scroll into a lump that wasted less wood. Baldwin halted the line by 1970. Nobody published a total. The guesses run from 300 to about 400.

Hank played his until 1970, when they were stolen, or into the early ’70s, depending who you ask. Either way, somewhere there are guitars with his name engraved on the vibrato, built after thirty rounds of send-it-back by a shop that kept saying yes. And the last thing standing between Hank Marvin and a guitar that stayed in tune was a button on his own jacket.

Put this on

You’ve read about it. Now hear it. Here’s what this guitar sounds like, and what to listen for.

  1. The Shadows · 1964

    Rhythm & Greens

    Burns made a special set of green-sunburst Marvins to promote this short film. Look for them on screen.

    Watch it on YouTube

The cast

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

  • 1964

    Hank Marvin

    The Marvin

    The guitar is his name. He wanted a wide-range tremolo that stayed in tune and more variety in the tones.

  • 1964

    Bruce Welch

    The Marvin

    The other half of the signature set. If Hank didn’t send a prototype back, Welch would.

  • 1963

    Ike Isaacs

    The introduction

    Hank’s old teacher and Burns’s technical director. He brought the Shadows to Jim Burns.

  • 1966

    Jack Golder

    The flattened scroll

    Burns’s factory manager, who turned Hank’s carved scroll into a lump that wasted less wood.

  • The American Breed

    A Marvin

    A Marvin shows up with them on their first LP. Proof it made it across the Atlantic.

Liner notes

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

A carved scroll, three Rez-o-Matiks, and a Rezo-Tube — Burns’ Marvin, the Shadows guitar after Hank’s Fiesta Red Strat, not a Bison.

Body
Offset double-cut, curvier upper horn than a Strat. RetroFret’s 1967: African mahogany. Mix flagged.
Neck
Bolt-on, natural finish. Vintage Guitar: usually unbound rosewood board on the 1964. RetroFret 1967: maple with bound rosewood. Mix flagged.
Fingerboard
Rosewood; one extra fret vs a period Strat (Vintage Guitar). Bound on Baldwin-era examples
Scale
25½" (648 mm) on RetroFret’s 1967. Mix flagged. First Burns at this length (Vintage Guitar)
Pickups
Three Rez-o-Matik (RetroFret; Vintage Guitar also writes Rez-O-Matic) single-coils, Strat-influenced, often slanted
Hardware
Rezo-Tube vibrato, knife-edge plate, six tubes in the body; cage armrest. Van Gent tuners on RetroFret’s 1967
Electronics
Master volume, two tones, 3-way lever (Vintage Guitar). Later reissues add a 5-way
Finish
Brilliant white with red tortoise guards typical (Vintage Guitar). Green-sunburst exists as a short Shadows run
Nut
1⅝" (41 mm) RetroFret 1967. Mix flagged.
Open the full research fileConstruction details, the complete player record, production numbers, dated value estimates, and sources

Classic living example = 1964–65 Burns-logo Marvin (Romford). No current factory Marvin SKU this pass (burnsguitars.com did not serve a live Marvin page, 3 September 2026). Baldwin Model 524 is the September 1965 continuation — flattened scroll from mid-1966, not the carved 1964 head. 2004 40th Anniversary is a closed run of 2004. Shadows bass, Bison, and Double Six stay off this slug. Hank’s Fiesta Red Strat lives on fender-stratocaster. No Gibson SKU. Mixed inch/mm flagged on RetroFret’s 1967 (overall 40" (101.6 cm), lower bout 13½" (34.3 cm), depth 1½" (3.8 cm), scale 25½" (648 mm), nut 1⅝" (41 mm)).

Construction

The job was a guitar that stayed in tune when Hank Marvin leaned on the arm. The Shadows had been a Fender-and-Vox band. Toward the end of 1963, Vintage Guitar (Peter Stuart Kohman) has Marvin and Bruce Welch unhappy with the white tortoiseshell Strats they were then using — “magnet suck,” constant whammy, Welch leaving the band over tuning and then coming back. They went to Jim Burns through Ike Isaacs, Hank’s old teacher and Burns’ technical director. Tony Bacon (Reverb News, 26 April 2018): Hank wanted a guitar that remained perfectly in tune with a wide-range tremolo, and more variation in the tones.

What they built is a Strat-layout Burns, not a Strat. Offset cuts, bolt-on, rosewood board, 25½" scale — the first Burns at that length, with one extra fret (Kohman). The three-and-three scroll head was Hank’s idea; Kohman says it gave the shop a carving headache. Brilliant white with red tortoise was the last Fender look, borrowed. Three Rez-o-Matik coils, Strat-influenced, with a simple 3-way, master volume, two tones — a move away from Burns’ earlier Split Sound and low-impedance experiments. The Marvin was the first Burns with the fancier “Handcrafted by Burns London” guard markings.

The sound is the Rezo-Tube. Patents filed 14 August 1964 for the overall design and the tailpiece; production was already underway (Kohman). A long aluminum plate pivots on a knife-edge. The whole assembly raises and lowers, sprung from beneath. In place of a Strat inertia block, the strings pass through six individual tubes in a body recess, isolated from the wood. Burns’ catalog: “a new degree of resonance and sostenuto.” A cage armrest sits over the plate so the picking arm does not foul it. The unit is engraved “Designed and handcrafted for Hank B. Marvin by Burns.” Ads sometimes called the vibrato Rez-O-Matic; Kohman notes that marking actually belongs to the pickups.

It is not a Bison. The Bison was the flagship until this one arrived; Kohman has the Bison restyled to match the Marvin, not the other way around. It is not the Shadows bass. It is not Hank’s 1959 Fiesta Red Stratocaster, serial 34346, ordered by Cliff Richard — that object lives on the Strat plate.

Hank, quoted by Bacon and by Kohman from a 1964 column: “Those fellows up at Romford must have loved me! Over 30 models were completed before the final job appeared.” He blamed Welch for sending them back. “The 24 months of waiting was a nuisance.” Kohman: that timetable would put the first approach in 1962, around the second-generation Bisons; other Hank reminiscences start mid-1963, “which seems more likely.” Prototypes were in use by late 1963 — a Marvin without the upper guard in studio pictures from early November. The first complete signature set was in full use by early 1964, seen on that spring’s European tour. Beat Instrumental, June 1964: player of the month, “a guitar named after him.” The guitar appears in Burns literature by July 1964. Hank in his October column: “a Burns solid costing £163.” Bacon’s 1964 line lists Marvin at £162.50. Kohman: June 1965 list over £173, almost exactly a Strat.

Baldwin bought Burns on 30 September 1965 (Kohman, Volume 9). Bacon: £250,000, after Baldwin had failed to buy Fender. The U.K. company became Baldwin-Burns Ltd. Marvin became Baldwin Model 524. Collectors’ trap: logo plates swapped, “cut-in” Baldwin plaques, later Burns re-badges on Baldwin guitars sold as “True Burns.” Kohman: very few production instruments were double-logo’d Baldwin-Burns. Mid-1966, factory manager Jack Golder flattened the carved scroll into a lump that wasted less wood. RetroFret’s 1967 is that later neck, bound rosewood, metal-button Van Gent tuners, white polyester. A few late Marvins got bar-magnet pickups. Baldwin halted the line by 1970 (Bacon).

Classic vs current: 1964–65 Burns-logo Marvin — carved scroll, Rez-o-Matiks, Rezo-Tube — against no new factory Marvin you can order in 2026. Barry Gibson’s Burns London, from 1992, made Legend / Marquee descendants and a 2004 40th Anniversary limited to 2004 (Sonicstate, 4 April 2004). Those are later objects.

Players

Do not hang Hank’s Fiesta Red Strat on this plate. Do not recruit Bison, Shadows bass, or Double Six players as if they were this guitar. Do not flatten every Shadows record before 1964 onto a Marvin.

Hank Marvin. The guitar is his name. Kohman: at latest the early-1964 single “The Rise and Fall of Flingel Bunt” was cut with the new lineup. He kept using them through the early 1970s after the Shadows’ first split (Kohman). Sonicstate, 4 April 2004: he played them from 1964 until 1970, when the guitars were stolen. Keep both. Later interviews, still Kohman: he thought they looked “cluttered” with “the profusion of plastic”; the first one was very heavy; the Rezo-Tube would lock out of tune until they found his jacket button catching in the string-feed slot on the back.

Bruce Welch. Same signature set. Kohman: over 30 prototypes because if Hank didn’t send one back, Welch would.

Green-sunburst Marvins. Kohman: a special set used to promote Rhythm & Greens, on TV and in the short film, then sparingly. Beat Instrumental #21 (December 1964) mentions the Shadows’ service arrangement and special green Marvins. Premier Guitars Australia lists a 1964 Greenburst as one of three, the example Jim Burns kept; the two Shadows green ones stolen in 1970. One dealer object. Not a census.

Thunderbirds Are Go (1966). Kohman: Mini Marvins built for the puppet Shadows; Burns provided the minis, Vox the amps.

Also known to play stays short. Kohman, Volume 9: The American Breed on their first LP with a Marvin. Album-to-guitar credits beyond those named interviews are unpublished here. None invented. Rostill’s Shadows bass is the matching four-string, not this slug.

Rarity

You cannot buy a new factory Marvin. The 1964–late-60s run ended with Baldwin. Burns London’s 40th Anniversary was 2004 instruments, a closed numbered edition, not a 2026 cart. Legend, Marquee, and Apache are descendants, not this table.

Burns did not publish Marvin totals. None invented. Kohman: informed estimates put the number built at around 300 to 350. Guitar Buyer (review hosted on burnsguitars.com): around 400. Keep both. Neither is a factory ledger. Kohman: between early ’64 and late ’65 Burns ran through something like 6,000 serial numbers; the Marvin is a very small percentage of that output. Serials date a guitar. They don’t count a year.

What is actually thinner: 1964–65 Burns-logo carved-scroll examples (RetroFret: VERY scarce); complete green-sunburst Shadows pieces; un-rebadged Baldwin 524s vs Burns-logo swaps. Hank’s stolen 1970 pair, if they surface, are unique objects. They are not a vintage Marvin.

Value

Informal estimate, 3 September 2026. Not an appraisal.

Ask vs sold labeled. Celebrity lots are not-comps. No invented medians or factory counts. Period list £162.50 (Bacon) / Hank’s £163 / June 1965 over £173 (Kohman; RetroFret) is 1964–65 money, not 2026 street.

New street. None under Marvin this pass. The 2004 40th Anniversary was £749 at announcement (Sonicstate) — 2004 money, a closed run.

Used modern. 40th Anniversary and later Legend / “The Marvin” reissues. Named asks, not a Price Guide band this pass: Riviera Music, 40th Anniversary #1426, $4,100 (listed about three months before this pass). Foulds, Reverb UK, 40th Anniversary sold at £1,800. 2014 “The Marvin” 1964-style reissue, Reverb ask $2,410.73 this pass. Do not average those with a 1964 original.

Vintage / collectible. Reverb Price Guide on Burns Marvin did not print a clean Good-to-Mint band this pass. Don’t invent a midpoint. Named asks: RetroFret 1967 Baldwin Marvin, ended at $2,950 (sold listing, not a 2026 hammer). Current Reverb asks on 1965 white Marvins $7,407.55 and $8,889.34. Denmark Street’s old 1964 white asks (£6,999 / $11,277.98 ended, listed years ago) are not 2026 comps. Premier Guitars Australia’s Jim Burns Greenburst $17,912 is one object. Do not average those asks.

See also

  • fender-stratocaster — Hank’s 1959 Fiesta Red, serial 34346; the guitar he put down for this one
  • mosrite-ventures — the Ventures’ 1963 Fender-to-Mosrite switch, the U.S. rhyme Kohman draws
  • vox-phantom — UK-built competitor; Kohman has the Phantom at £84 when the Marvin listed over £173

Sources

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