Custom Builds

Syracuse Custom

The Syracuse Custom was designed and produced by Lou Siragusa with design specifications provided by Leigh Siragusa. Leigh is now the proud owner of this guitar!

The Syracuse Custom features:

• Mahogany body with a Spalted Maple top
• Maple neck, bolt-on
• Bocote fingerboard
• Mother-of-pearl inlays
• Lollar Special S Series pickups
• Wilkinson/Gotoh VS-100N Tremolo system
• 5-way switch and Volume control
• Schaller 4-2 Locking Tuners

The body shape is loosely based on the discontinued Starfield Richie Kotzen model guitar (Kotzen is a huge influence on Leigh). The neck is a similar shape to a modern Fender Stratocaster. The headstock/tuners arrangement is similar to the Music Man 4/2 tuner arrangement.

The wood was specifically selected for this custom model. The spalted maple, which is attached to the top of the mahogany body, was carefully selected and cut to match the body shape. The neck is made from maple and the fingerboard is a distinctly grained bocote wood to make an interesting compliment to the spalted maple.

The body was sealed with coats of blond shellac to retain the colour of the spalted maple. The neck was sealed with amber shellac to darken the wood tone. The body and neck had protective finishing coats of nitrocellulose lacquer applied, and then final finish with carnauba wax. Lemon oil was applied to the fingerboard.

The Lollar Special S pickups provides this guitar with a high output which has a warm Fender “spanky” tone when played clean. It also has a heavy Gibson-style attack and sustain when driving a valve amp. Leigh did not want a tone control as he always has the tone turned up full, which is the same as having no tone control – having a tone control present also runs the risk of slight tone-bleed. The simplicity of the controls on this guitar helps to show off its interesting wood characteristics.