While options are limited compared to right-handed guitars (even the legendary Paul McCartney had to buy a right handed acoustic guitar and modify it to suit his playing style), lefties should be thankful that they have decent options today. Doesn’t matter what style of music you like play, you should be able to do it your way using a left handed guitar designed specifically for you. Checkout these left-handed guitars from Fender, Gibson, Schecter, ESP, Dean, and more. We have also listed several options for left-handed beginners.
Introduction
We all would love to find a good-quality guitar also looks good and is also reasonably priced.
A little bit of research and you would know that the left-handed ones not only cost more, but are also much harder to find. There are some challenges of buying a left-handed bass guitar (compared to a right-handed one).
- You will have much fewer options available!
- Go to any shop and you can see that the choices for lefties are much lesser
- They will cost comparatively more
- Your local music store may have a pathetic selection of left handed guitars or the better ones could be perpetually out of stock.
- You have to interpret chord and scale diagrams mirror-image style.
Besides, you may get the feeling that it will be more difficult to play, since it is not your natural side.
However, the fact is that irrespective of what you choose, in the beginning anyways you are going to feel that playing the guitar or the bass is tough, so it really doesn’t matter what you start one.
So it is more of a personal choice.
Some go with their instincts and choose the natural one; if they’re left handed they’ll go for the ones meant for lefties. Remember, one of the most popular musicians – Paul McCartney also played a left-handed bass guitar; so it can’t really be a bad choice.
Best Left Handed Guitars
Doesn’t matter if you need strings or a complete left handed bass guitar package, you’ll find it here. We constantly look for the best online deals, from the best merchants & brands, and list it here so don’t forget to check them out.
Best Left Handed Acoustic Guitars
Here are reviews of some great Left Handed Acoustic Guitars (and acoustic-electric guitars)
Most of these are steel-string guitars, we have mentioned (wherever applicable) if the guitar has nylon strings.
Oscar Schmidt Schmidt OG2NLH-A-U Left-Handed Dreadnought Acoustic Guitar
Reasonable but good quality. This dreadnought guitar has high gloss finish, select spruce top, catalpa on the sides & back. It has a standard X bracing, rosewood fingerboard & bridge, a mahogany neck, and a fully adjustable truss rod. It comes with Chrome die cast tuners.
Full acoustic resonance. Available in a wide variety of colors. Dimensions: 41 x 7.8 x 15.5 inches, Item Weight: 5 pounds.
Fender Dreadnought Acoustic Guitar, Left Handed CD-100
The fender left-handed CD-100 dreadnought delivers great sound, looks, feel and value, with a natural-finish spruce top, and mahogany back and sides. It comes with a black pickguard and mother-of-pearl acrylic rosette design, new compensated rosewood bridge design, white bridge pins with black dots and smaller (3mm) dot fingerboard inlays. Other features include X bracing, 20-fret rosewood fingerboard, a dual-action truss rod and die-cast tuners.
Perfect for beginners who want to learn from scratch without spending a lot of money on their first guitar.
Yamaha FG720SL Acoustic Guitar
The FG720SL acoustic is an affordable and a great looking guitar. It has a solid Sitka Spruce Top, eastern Mahogany Back/Sides, Nato Neck, Rosewood Fingerboard/Bridge, Natural Finish.
Sounds great and looks expensive. The FG series is Yamaha’s most popular series for acoustic guitars.
Best Left Handed Electric Guitars
Reviews of some popular Left-Handed electric guitars.
Fender Squier Affinity Telecaster Electric Guitar
The Fender Squier Affinity Telecaster (left-handed) has a solid-body electric guitar design. Features two single-coil pickups (offer a great range of tones). The 3-way pickup selector switch allows you to easily select your favorite tones. It comes with a comfortable neck, quality hardware, and offers top quality construction.
Overall, a quality construction guitar that is easy to play and has a great tone, also offers great value. See PRICE on Amazon.
RST BK Full Size Electric Guitar Package
This SX RST package provides you everything you need to get started: an excellent SX RST full-size guitar; a portable amp that delivers big sound; an instructional DVD (note that DVD shows a right handed player); a bag to protect your guitar when you are not playing; a strap to help you hold your instrument; a 10′ cable to connect your guitar to the amp; and a guitar tuner to keep you in tune! This guitar is perfect for playing in any musical style.
An inexpensive (entry-level) Left Handed Guitar Package that includes a decent amp and several useful accessories. .
Best Left Handed Bass Guitars
Best Left Handed Bass Guitars: For a long time, left-handed bass guitar players only had a limited selection from which they could choose an instrument. However, things are comparatively better today. Here, we will take a look at the various left-handed basses (classic Fender designs like the Precision and Jazz Bass to modern metal and funk bass guitars from Warwick, Spector and others).
Here we take a look at the best left handed bass guitars.
Dean E09 Bass Guitar, Left Handed
The Dean E09 Left Handed Bass Guitar is a popular musical instrument and offers the best value for money among electric basses. It sounds cool and a great buy for the beginner bass player.
Buy on zZounds
Schecter Omen Extreme-4 Bass Guitar
The Schecter Omen Extreme is a 4 Bass Guitar with nice tonal quality and craftsmanship. It features Diamond Active Pickups, Schecter Tuners, Diamond Bass Bridge, 24 Jumbo Frets.
Buy on zZounds
Squier by Fender Vintage Modified Jazz Bass
This Squier bass delivers superior sound and feel and delivers great traditional Jazz Bass style and performance, it comes with dual Fender designed pickups and a slim “C”-shaped maple neck with a vintage-tint gloss finish.
Ibanez GSR205BKL Left-Handed 5-String Electric Bass Guitar
The Ibanez GSR205BKL are more suited to serious beginners & intermediate level players. Sounds great and looks sleek. Overall, an affordable 5-string bass.
Rogue VB100LH Left-Handed Violin Bass Guitar
Rogue VB100LH Left-Handed Violin Bass Guitar. This is a great beginners bass, in a classic design that sounds sweeter (beatles fans, fans of sir paul mcCartney will love it).
- Pros: Looks Beautiful. Good build and sound Quality. Its Lightweight
- Cons: Slight fret buzz
- Uses: Use it for jamming, learning, practicing, school bands, small venues
Flamed maple arched top and back, European-style hollowbody produces deep, resonant bass tones. Its also lightweight and features the traditional 31″ scale.
With a little bit of sprucing up, such as tightening the truss rod, setting the bridge to avoid buzzing, you actually get a beautiful bass guitar.
Key features:
Violin style hollowbody, Arched flamed maple top, Flamed maple body, Set-in neck joint, Hard rock maple neck, 22 frets, Rosewood bridge with custom trapeze-style tailpiece, Mini humbucker bridge and neck pickups, Die-cast tuners, Chrome hardware, Pearloid pickguard, Front and back body binding, Custom trapeze
Controls: dual volume; bass, mid, and treble switches
Traditional 31″ scale length
Weight: 7.6 pounds
Vintage sunburst finish
Overall, a great lefty bass that’s reasonably priced, although the electronics used are quite basic. But it sounds good and feels good in the hands. If you’re a lefty and a Beatles fan, do consider buying this instrument.
- [easyazon_link identifier=”B004I95JUA” locale=”US” tag=”keytarhq04-20″]Buy on Amazon[/easyazon_link] | Buy on Musiciansfriend
Left Handed Guitars: Buying Guide
Introduction
Not everybody is right-handed; there are many musicians who are left-handed as well. So if you are one of them, what should you learn on – a left-handed bass guitar or a right-handed one?
Though it might seem common sense for lefties to use left-handed ones, it is actually not that straightforward. There are two factors that make it a difficult choice, and those are “Available Choices”, and “Price”.
Whether you are looking for a left handed acoustic guitar, electric guitar, or bass, usually lefties have comparatively fewer choices. That is why we decided to list the bestselling left-handed guitars/basses here.
Dilemma for Lefties
Most left handed persons learn to do several things with their right hands (using a toothbrush, scissors, etc.) because of not being able to find the right equipment. But then do you have to do that with musical instruments?
If you are left-handed and intend to learn to play bass guitar, what are your possible choices?
Here are a few!
- Buy a left-handed guitar
- Buy a normal guitar and try to play it the way the right handed guitarists play?
- Reverse the strings on a right handed guitar (Is this really an option?)
You do get left-handed guitars / basses but then not every retail shop will carry these models. For most small shops, its not worth the trouble to get them as there won’t be much demand for them.
Can You Reverse the Strings?
Right handed people hold the guitar with their left hand and strum with their right. Left handed people feel more comfortable doing the opposite. However, if you hold a regular guitar with your right hand, the strings will be in the wrong order (if you’re a lefty), and for some guitars (depending on its shape/design), the whole thing will be quite uncomfortable in your hands.
Now, theoretically you can do anything! But then this would mean completely re-engineering your guitar, and reversing the strings is easier said than done.
It is actually a much more complicated process, which should ideally be done by an experienced technician. It would simply add to the costs, and also put all the knobs in weird spots.
If the nut is not placed in the right order, it could rub against the strings and wear/tear them out much faster. Changing the design also doesn’t suit the more irregular shaped guitars, as the cutaway could be positioned wrong, and the knobs could come in the way making it more difficult to strum.
Why do Left-handed Guitars Cost More?
There is no doubt that the left handed guitar is rare and quality ones are even rarer. Choices are slimmer when it comes to picking the right left handed classical guitar.
Most of the local music shops stock very few left-handed ones, and the smaller ones don’t even stock them; you have to place a special request with them. One of the main reasons for this is that Guitar manufacturers find it cost-effective to make things in bulk; which they cannot do with the left-handed ones.
This is more of a business thing; because there is more demand for right-handed ones! Most big companies however try to price them same, although some disparity may remain.
For instance, most companies have a pretty elaborate process for making various types of guitar so that they can mass produce it, and if they have to change that process, it will mean lesser numbers produced.
So, it is more a matter of supply and demand.
A guitar is a complex piece of woodwork and it is not that you just have to simply attach the strings in the reverse order, to a right handed guitar. It takes much more than that to make a left-handed one. You actually have to turn the various parts of the body the other way around, sort of make a physical mirror image of it, to get the right tone.
So it does take some searching to find the perfect left handed guitar.
So which one should you buy? Right-handed or Left-handed Guitar?
The right-handed ones have some obvious advantages as discussed. Besides, you may get the feeling that it will be more difficult to play, since it is not your natural side.
However, the fact is that irrespective of what you choose (right-handed or left-handed), in the beginning anyways you are going to feel that playing the guitar or the bass is tough, so it really doesn’t matter what you start one.
So it is more of a personal choice.
Some go with their instincts and choose the natural one; if they’re left handed they’ll go for the ones meant for lefties. Remember, one of the most popular musicians – Paul McCartney also played a left-handed bass guitar; so it can’t really be a bad choice.
In case you decide to get your guitar custom-made (specially made) to suit you as left-handed guitar player, you could be obliged to buy it, even though it may not turn out to be exactly what you wanted in the first place. Its also going to cost you a lot more, and in some cases, you may even have to wait for a much longer time to get your hands on the guitar.
A better option could be to go in for a properly designed, ready-made left-handed guitar with all the components made to be played left-handed.
More Things to Look For
- If you’re a beginner, don’t think to much about Types of woods used, number of frets, types of tuners, etc. Pick up something that looks good to you, and is in your budget
- Stick to the big brands, its difficult to go wrong with them.
- You get 3/4 sized left handed guitars as well, in case you’ve smaller hands or looking for a smaller sized guitar for your child
- Pick something from the top list, preferably a Left-Handed bass guitar starter package that comes with the necessary accessories.
- Bass guitars are available with 4, 5, 6 or even more strings, but if you are a beginner start with a 4-string model.
Final Thoughts
There have been some famous musicians who played the left-handed guitar, but in spite of that the number of options available to righties (in terms of buying a guitar) is more than the one available to lefties. And it seems it’ll always be so, as manufacturers usually tend to cater to the demands of the majority, and they do find it profitable to make things in bulk. So, unless you live in a big city, you’re going to find it difficult to find these versions.
But then you (if you’re a lefty) need to thanks the reach of the internet, which makes it easy for you to order online, in case your local music shop doesn’t stock left handed guitars/basses. The Big companies have also started making more left-handed stringed instruments (compared to earlier years) because of better processes within the company, and also because of more competition.
So if you’re a left-handed player, you need to take advantage of the options available to you (it might turn out to be marginally expensive) but then it’s much better that playing on a “regular” guitar, that has been redesigned to suit you. So go ahead and order that left-handed guitar/bass now.
KeytarHQ editorial team includes musicians who write and review products for pianists, keyboardists, guitarists & other musicians. KeytarHQ is the best online resource for information on keyboards, pianos, synths, keytars, guitars and music gear for musicians of all abilities, ages and interests.
Roy says
An important reason you should not attempt reversing the order of the strings is because the bridge rail at the base of the guitar and the capo rail at the head of the guitar have a set of slots (or grooves) which are designed to hold the common string diameters. Besides, many guitars have a comfort cut out and finger guard, placed at specific locations for right or left handed guitars.
It’s just as hard (or easy) to master the guitar, doesn’t matter if you’re right or left handed. Personally, I feel you should choose a right handed guitar because it makes more sense and you have more options.