Greg Fryer’s guitar making history 1980-1997:

In 1980 I began making and repairing guitars under the tutelage of the master Romney Godden at Brookvale on the northern beaches of Sydney Australia.

In December 1982 Romney unfortunately closed his Brookvale business and soon after moved to the country at Kempsey, 350 kilometres north of Sydney.

In May 1983 I was given the opportunity to set up my own guitar making/repairing business at the rear of the Farrells/Orbital Music complex at Brookvale which at the time was Sydney’s best music store, with the 505 Pittwater Road building attracting a host of other music industry businesses ranging from recording studios to amp repairers to music teachers and more.

The early guitars that I made were based on what I loved playing live: Gibson Les Paul Juniors and Fender Stratocasters, with several attempts at designing my own guitar hybrid based around Les Paul Juniors and also based on Brian May’s Red Special which I had been fascinated by since I first heard it on record in late 1974 and began reading about its uniqueness of design in the music press articles of the day.

The last guitars which I made were my 3 Red Special replicas ‘John’, ‘Paul’ and ‘George Burns’, built for Brian May in 1996-97.