Baby Taylor Travel Guitar
August 13, 2009 by Best Travel Guitars
Filed under Acoustic Travel Guitar Reviews
The Baby Taylor travel guitar is exactly what it says. This small three quarter dreadnought size acoustic guitar is made for the road. Its light weight and sturdy build make it ultra portable, and it comes with a gig bag instead of a hard case, so it fits easily in airplane carry-on, or the back seat of a car. As is true to the Taylor name this guitar is well built, with back and sides of sapele mahogany laminate, and choice of a solid sitka spruce or mahogany front. The spruce lends itself to a quite, simple eloquence, while the mahogany flaunts a darker, richer beauty. With their satin finish both guitars are nice looking little instruments.
The Baby Taylor, like the full size Taylor guitar is quality made. It has 6 Elixir® light gauge string with NANOWEB® coating, an ebony fret board with inlayed pearloid dots, and an ebony bridge. The neck of the guitar is tropical American mahogany. The tuning machines are enclosed, die-cast and chrome plated, and the sound hole rosette is laser etched. It is easy to see that Taylor used the same fine attention to detail when designing this baby guitar as they do with their full scale models.
This baby guitar has remarkable volume, tone, and versatility for its size. Naturally some of the sound is sacrificed to the smaller dimensions, however; of the baby guitars on the market, the Taylor definitely takes the cake. It can be difficult to get a travel guitar that compares to the sound of a full size, especially in the base end, but the Baby Taylor performs well. The mahogany is especially proficient at producing richer bass tones. This guitar is also versatile; it can be played high strung, with a capo or a slide and in alternate tunings. However, keep in mind that because of its smaller fret size capo use can be limited, and finger picking past the third fret can be more of a challenge for adults.
The Baby Taylor travel guitar is not just for adults, but also makes a wonderful starter guitar for children. Its small size lends itself to smaller hands, and is not as intimidating as a dreadnought. It also holds its value and can be used as a trade in on a larger guitar. It sounds much better than a cheaper $75 guitar, yet is still affordable at $275-$300. So, with this guitar a child can gain true appreciation for finer music, but on an instrument that’s just right for them.
Though the Baby Taylor travel guitar is not considered a specialty instrument for recording or performing, it is completely appropriate for more informal settings. It’s a wonderful instrument to take on those weekend family getaways, or as a child’s first guitar. It holds up well, has a lasting value, and best of all, because it’s a Taylor it comes with great customer service.
Taylor Baby Taylor Mahogany Top Dreadnought Acoustic Guitar Features:
- Solid mahogany top
- 3/4 scale
- Sapele arched back and sides
- Ebony fretboard and bridge
- Lexan headstock veneer
- Laser-etched rosette
- Enclosed die-cast tuners
- 22-3/4″ scale
- 1-11/16″ nut width
- Taylor gig bag
Whats your opinion? Cast your User Star Rating **
ChrisC on Mon, 2nd Nov 2009 1:13 pm
I practically drool whenever I see pics of that guitar, which is something I’ve never been able to say about the Martin Backpacker. And reviews I’ve read just make me want it even more.
Best Travel Guitars on Mon, 11th Jan 2010 9:36 am
Hi Chris, I know what you mean, its a beautiful guitar but you really can’t compare it to the Martin Backpacker. I mean, the backpacker is a totally different animal meant for traveling. When I say traveling, for me, I think backpacking which is when I often bring my backpacker.
The Baby Taylor is a 3/4 size guitar, its small but not like the martin backpacker. I couldn’t imagine hiking with it anywhere. I think if we want to compare the Baby Taylor with a guitar then we would have to compare it to the Little Martin.
BuddyGtr on Sat, 3rd Apr 2010 1:48 pm
I don’t know who wrote this review on the Baby Taylor, but all in all it is quite good… except for one point, and I quote: “because of its smaller fret size capo use can be limited, and finger picking past the third fret can be more of a challenge for adults.”
All I can say about this is that I’ve recently finished a tour of the US using my Baby Taylor as my main (and often only) instrument on stage… for nearly 11 months! That’s a lot of solo finger-style performing…
I play all over the fretboard with great ease because of the smaller size (and I have big hands/fingers). So This statement doesn’t hold water IMO. Granted everyone’s hands are different though.
Now, if all you do is play 1st position chords i.e. rhythm playing. Than it won’t matter either way, other than having significantly less tension on the fretting hand. But for lead players, or finger-stylists the Baby Taylor is a super easy guitar to play. Not significantly different from a full sized Taylor, but with a greater reach so you don’t have to stretch as much. Again, this can be debated, but I personally disagree with the above statement. Everything else in the review… 5 stars, right on!
Hope this helps clarify the use of the Baby Taylor.
A note about my setup… I set it up to utilize GHS Nylon strings (ball end), and I installed an L.R. Baggs dual-source pickup system to play live, and it works beautifully. It seemingly turns into a whole new guitar when plugged in. I wouldn’t dream of playing regular venues w/o a pickup installed. Not that hard to do, or just pay a local tech to do the job
Best Travel Guitars on Mon, 5th Apr 2010 8:17 am
thanks for your sound input BuddyGtr, I encourage more people to voice second, third, and even fourth opinions. This is what the review process is all about
Suzanne on Tue, 27th Jul 2010 3:10 pm
I bought my Baby Taylor in the spring, and it’s been a great addition to my collection, however I do find that it goes out of tune quite frequently…