Ebony fingerboards are one of the best materials to use for your guitar. They’re strong, very dense and the natural dark colour of the wood makes for an amazing fingerboard. All the ebony I sell in the shop is African Ebony. It is often difficult to get nowadays in such a dark colour, but fortunately I manage to!
The tree
Diospyros mespiliformis or the Jackalberry tree is an evergreen tree found in the African Savanna, which grows cream coloured flowers and red / yellow berries, often eaten by a Jackal. The tree can live for over 250 years.
These trees aren’t very big, and can take a long time to grow to a suitable size. However that does make the wood more dense, and with high strength, perfect for fingerboards. All of this means that the wood is in high demand which makes the price of ebony relatively high compared to other commercial woods.
A bit of History
The most common use of ebony has been for making musical instruments. Ebony has the ability to create high-quality tones and clear tonality when instruments and musical instrument parts are carved from it. Mandolins, violas, violins, fingerboard for cellos and guitars, and black piano keys have all been commonly made from ebony’s black wood.
Ebony also has other uses and is often used for expensive black chess board pieces. Ebony is frequently used to make items that need to be both practical and decorative, such as sword and knife handles. This is a popular material for artisan crafters in all fields.
For centuries, especially the past 500 years, ebony wood has been the most prized possession at royal courts. It has been used as decoration pieces by kings, princes and dukes throughout Europe and Asia. Ebony has often been used as drinking cups in Asia, as they are often seen to have neutralise poisons.
What’s in the shop
You can buy the Ebony fingerboards pre-slotted to certain scale lengths in my online shop. The fingerboards are thicknessed to approximately 7mm, so they allow for any radius you want to put into the board. They are also oversized, so you can cut them to the exact measurement to suit your guitar. I use the exact same stock for all of my fingerboards!
There are also other items available in the shop, so please check them out!
