BMG Arielle - Antique Cherry
BMG Arielle - Antique Cherry
BMG Arielle - Antique Cherry
BMG Arielle - Antique Cherry

BMG Arielle - Antique Cherry

List Price £945.00
UK Price  £845.00 Inc. 20% VAT
WORLDWIDE PRICE £704.17
(3 Reviews)
In Stock
Product Details

Building on the success of the widely acclaimed 2021 BMG 'Two Tone' Arielle model, styled after American virtuoso Arielle Schwartz's distinctive, eponymous custom build and engineered in collaboration with Brian May himself, the House Music team is thrilled to drop the first in a series of fresh new alternative seasonal colourways for this unique instrument.

"The Red Special in a parallel universe" — Sir Brian May

Now available in traditional translucent Antique Cherry flavour, "the Red Special in a parallel universe" continues to rock a sleek, retro-futuristic look infused with choice elements from Dr. May's storied homespun creation and of course delivers everything one should expect from a Brian May Guitar — impeccable design, superior quality, pro-spec construction, exceptional playability, and devastating tonal dexterity.

Striking Body Design

The flamboyant, asymmetric angles of the Arielle's Indonesian Mahogany body clearly pay homage to radical American automotive and electric guitar designs of the 1950s and '60s, with a distinctive raised centre strip increasing the body mass for enhanced sustain and resonance, and a split, 3-ply parchment pickguard and classic gloss finish completing the cool, vintage look.

24" Scale Mahogany Neck

Employing the short 24" scale favoured by Brian May on the original Red Special, the one piece mahogany neck, in perfect balance with the lightweight body, has been engineered with a decidedly contemporary feel, featuring a generous 45mm nut width, comfortably spacious profile, and wonderfully smooth 24 fret ebony fingerboard with Arielle's choice of abalone diamond snowflake inlays in the traditional BM pattern.

BMG Tri-Sonic Style Pickups

Like the best-selling BMG Special, the Arielle features three BM branded 'Tri-Sonic' style single coil pickups, modern replicas of the vintage '60s units so fundamental to the Red Special's powerful and distinctive sonic character with the same series wiring, retro-styling and magnet alignment as the originals.

BM Switching System

The unique Brian May designed electronics system is provided by six black DPDT switches featuring high quality contacts mounted on a contrasting 3-ply black control plate. Engaging each pickup individually as well as providing dedicated phase reversal, this familiar configuration gives the BMG Arielle the same astonishing tonal agility as the original Red Special itself.

Volume and tone are controlled by 250k pots with a Sprague 0.033μF 'Orange Drop' film capacitor delivering exceptional sonic purity, a nuanced tonal roll-off sweep and, with individual pickups or selected pairings, a pleasingly warm response, without getting too muddy or bright.

Wilkinson WVP Tremolo Bridge

Continuing BMG's long association with veteran British engineer Trevor Wilkinson, the Arielle is fitted with his acclaimed WVP 2-point tremolo, a vintage-flavoured variant of the unit used on the BMG Special. With a modern, friction-free design offering one of the smoothest actions of any fulcrum vibrato currently available coupled with a sleek, low-profile surround to eliminate lateral saddle movement, the WVP offers superior comfort, stability and performance.

Additional features include a stamped steel, heat hardened top plate, solid stainless steel saddles, and a "stagger-drilled" solid steel sustain block that provides unrivalled tuning stability, ensures easy and accurate intonation adjustment and improves overall sustain, brightness and top end, resulting in a more expansive, sharper tone.

Thumbwheel Locking Tuners

The distinctive BM style headstock sports 3-a-side locking chrome tuners with an 18:1 gear ratio for precise tuning and a thumbwheel locking mechanism that clamps the string securely. These superb quality machine heads allow for quick and easy string change with fewer string wraps and will maintain rock-solid tuning stability and more accurate return-to-pitch, even with lots of vibrato and string bends.

Padded Gig Bag Included

A premium quality, padded gig-bag, made from durable showerproof material, with twin rucksack-style shoulder straps, side and front grab handles, dual front pockets and stitched BMG logo, is supplied as standard.

Playability & Sounds

Versatile and bold, the heart of the sound is round, wide, warm and rich, with clean, clear highs and crisp note articulation, even when overdriven. Eminently capable of authentically delivering the hardest of rock or the most intimate dream pop shimmer, the Arielle has clearly been engineered to be a brilliant, one-stop stage and studio workhorse. 

For blues and roots styles, there is a pleasing presence and a tight, focused bass response whilst jazz players and country pickers will love the chiming clarity, especially on out-of-phase settings, and the smooth, hollow twang of the neck pickup. Cranking up the gain, combining two or more pickups in phase, the broad Tri-Sonic response and resonant body give crunch chords ample room to breathe and allow lead licks and solos to project clearly and powerfully. In all positions — single coil or humbucking — the Arielle retains a natural brightness with a tight, balanced, low end courtesy of its shorter scale length. 

With a fast, modern radius neck, inviting 24" scale, a body shape that balances comfortably whether sitting or standing, and a responsive, diverse tonal palette, this is an instrument designed to an endlessly rewarding joy to perform with.

Specifications
Body Indonesian mahogany
FINISH Gloss polyurethane
Binding Cream binding, front
Neck 1-piece Indonesian mahogany
NECK JOIN Set neck construction
Truss Rod Dual action / 440mm
Fingerboard Coromandel ebony
Frets 24 x medium jumbo frets
Fret Wire Crown Height: 2.7mm (0.106") / Radius: 250mm (9.8")
Inlays Abalone 'Diamond Snowflake' facing inlays with white side dots
NUT PPS / 45mm x 6mm
Pickups 3 x BM brand Tri-Sonic style series wired single coil pickups with chrome covers
Switch System Switchcraft DPDT black switches / 3 x pickup on/off / 3 x pickup phase in/out 
Controls Volume: Alpha B250k / Tone: A250k with Sprague 'Orange Drop' 0.033μF capacitor
Control Knobs Chrome UFO style
Bridge Chrome Wilkinson WVP 2-point, knife edge tremolo with 41.2mm block
Tremolo Arm 6" arm with parchment tip
Machineheads 3-a-side locking tuners
PICKGUARDS 2 piece, 3-ply parchment pickguard and 3-ply black switch plate
Overall Length 1054mm (41.5")
Body Length 432mm (17")
Body Width 304.8mm (12")
Body Depth 45mm (1.78") with 5mm (0.2") raised centre strip
WEIGHT Approx. 3.4kg (7.5lb)
SCALE 610mm (24")
Fingerboard Radius 304.8mm (12")
Headstock Angle
Neck Width AT Nut 45mm (1.77")
Neck Width AT 12th Fret 52mm (2.05")
Neck Width At 24th Fret 57mm (2.25")
Neck Depth AT 1st Fret 20.84mm (0.820")
Neck Depth AT 12th Fret 22.48mm (0.885")
Neck Depth At 12th Fret 22.37mm (0.920")
String Spacing at Nut 36mm (1.42")
String Spacing at Bridge 53mm (2.09")
Strings D'Addario EXL120 Nickel Wound Super Light – Plain Steel .009 - .011 - .016 / Wound .024 - .032 - .042
Included EXTRAS Premium quality BMG gig bag with twin shoulder straps, side/front grab handles, dual zipped front pockets and stitched logo
Country Of Origin World Musical Instruments Co. Ltd., South Korea
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Customer Reviews
Write a Review and share your opinions!
3 Reviews:

Just got her yesterday, cleaned strings, playing for two days straight, very minor adjustments ! Love her
Rating:
12 April 2024  | 

Got it! She works and came undamaged. Love that the volume is closer to my pinky. She is beautiful, just wiped the strings and barely any tuning, intonation seems almost perfect, I will give it a few weeks, see if needs super minor adjustments. I do have Brian’s Special from Burns, which I have treasured for so many years. I’m so curious, your choices were great, it stays in tune, so maybe the zero fret not so necessary 🤘🎸💕. But the zero fret does work so well in the Special, never broke a string on that one 🤣🤞

1 of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Nice guitar
Rating:
10 January 2023  | 

Guitar is well built, short scale with 24 frets is great as I have a hand injury and it has become difficult for me to stretch to 5 frets. I love the out of phase sounds possible.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful.
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Still in tune
Rating:
31 December 2022  | 

My husband is blown away by the quality of the guitar and that, although there was a long journey to the west coast of the USA, it was still in tune right out of the box. Thanks for making such a high quality product that my guitarist loves!

2 of 2 people found this review helpful.
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