High Quality Short Scale Tenor Guitar?

[Mandobar]

I have a Girouard tenor, which is tuned GDAE. Sounds great in that tuning. I also have a Collings tenor tuned CGDA. The Collings is a longer scale, but I have found that you need to play around with the string gauges on these instruments in order to dial in the sound you are looking for. There are no hard and fast rules. There are also some great vintage tenor guitars out there: old Martins, Gibsons, even some really nice old Regals (I have one with a carved mahogany top).

[Lord of the Badgers]

Oh I dunno. For me my 23" mcilroy is always GDAE. If I want CGDA I capo. Hey presto... Short scale CGDA tenor
That's why I like being in GDAE apart from finding I can use alt tunings without 'too soon' string breakages!

[Huck]

I was thinking about having a tenor guitar built by Fletcher, Foster or Girouard...

First, may I say that I applaud your methology trying different strings and picks, etc.

fox builds guitars, so I tend to listen to his advice often. That being said, why not send an email to these three builders expressing exactly what you want and need? I'd imagine their responses will be more reassuring than ours.

Nigel Forester contributes to the tenor guitar forum as well. You might try messaging him.

I think most would agree that off the shelf - mass production guitars can be hit-or-miss as far as tonal qualities. Tinkering with the setup, such as you have, will get most guitars to where we are satisfied. In your case it seems to be the instrument not the player.

I wish you luck in your search.

[crisscross]

Thanks again for your thoughts. Well, first of all, I've got to decide whether a tenor guitar is so important to me, that I will spend the money for a handbuilt tenor guitar. Until now, tenor guitar was just an instrument for a little diversification, that I used once in a while, for me...