Taking Gretsch’s 130th Anniversary Celebration To New Heights

After criss-crossing the United States to attend a series of events celebrating Gretsch’s 130th anniversary this year, Fred and Dinah Gretsch recently took the celebration international. Following an anniversary show at the Sam Ash store in Hollywood on July 20th, they left Los Angeles on the 22nd for a flight to Tokyo, Japan. Because they crossed the International Date Line they arrived on the 23^rd — an auspicious date in itself, since it was Fred Gretsch’s birthday.

The Gretsches were actually in Japan to celebrate two anniversaries. The first is the Gretsch Company’s 130th. The second is the 25th anniversary of Gretsch’s distribution partnership with the Kanda Shokai Company. To make that celebration particularly special, the directors of Kanda Shokai arranged for Fred and Dinah to take part in a unique excursion: a journey to the top of Japan’s iconic Mt. Fuji.

And so it was that on July 26 at 4:30 a.m. Fred Gretsch left his hotel for a car trip to a point nearly 8,000 feet up on the mountain. (Dinah followed in a car a bit later to a station at 6,600 feet.) After spending an hour acclimating to the lower air pressure at that elevation, Fred embarked with a Kanda Shokai team and an experienced mountain guide on a six-hour climb to the summit. There—at an elevation of just over 12,000 feet—Fred proudly displayed Gretsch drum and guitar banners to commemorate his accomplishment and celebrate the double anniversary. Then it was another six-hour descent back to the 7,300-foot point and a welcome car ride back to the hotel.

Kanda Shokai has been the Japanese distributor for Gretsch guitars since 1989.  Says Fred Gretsch, “When we purchased the company back from Baldwin in 1984 it was our goal to begin guitar production again. To do that at a professional level required a world-wide search for our old tooling, designs, and engineering. This effort was led by Duke Kramer, who was nearly seventy at the time. While Dinah and I focused on renewing drum production in Ridgeland, South Carolina, Duke traveled the world for the Gretsch Guitar re-launch initiative.

“As Duke traveled in Japan visiting suppliers and factories,” Fred continues, “he also visited the best distributors. As the number-two market for musical instruments after the US, Japan is served by several top distribution companies with worldwide reputations. Kanda Shokai welcomed Duke with interest and won his allegiance. In turn, he recommended them to the Gretsch family. Dinah and I visited Japan several times in 1988 and 1989, and we agreed that Kanda had the product team and know-how to service the Gretsch market in Japan. They first offered Gretsch guitars for sale at the Tokyo show in the fall of 1989. And we’ve been going strong together ever since.”

photo: Fred at Mt. Fuji's 5th station, before his climb to the top.