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Caparison History | 2 | 3

In the Beginning

Before the founding of Caparison guitars and Caparison DESIGN, Kyowa-Shokai(parent company) was contracted to by Jackson/Charvel in the US to produce Japanese production versions of the American made Jackson line of guitars.

At that time, all American made Jackson guitars were made in the custom shop and with the influx of Japanese import guitars from their competitors(Kramer, Ibanez, ESP), Jackson offered cheaper Japanese production models models made by Chushin-Gakki(the factory contracted by Kyowa-Shokai to manufacture and produce the instruments). The instruments produced by Chushin-Gakki while under the contract of Kyowa-Shokai are the now infamous Jackson Pro/Professional models that are highly sought after by Jackson enthusiasts.

These instruments were of exceptionally high quality rivaling if not exceeding their American made counterparts in terms of fit and finish(with the exception of hardware, as the design of the import models were contracted to use cheaper hardware). As consumers caught on the differences between the American made Jackson’s and the inexpensive Japanese made Jackson Pro series, sales on American made Jackson’s dropped.

In 1994, Kyowa-Shokai’s contract with Jackson had ended. Some say Kyowa-Shokai opted not to renew their contract as Grover Jackson had then sold the company, but I firmly believe that IMC(the company that bought Jackson) terminated the contract and the whole Jackson Professional product line in an attempt to boost sales on American made Jackson’s(in business/marketing terms, it’s called “Protectionism”). It is against standard business logic for a company like Kyowa-Shokai to not renew a contract for a product line that sells so well.

Prior to the contract ending, an employee of Chushin-Gakki/Kyowa-Shokai by the name of Itaru Kanno had developed an innovative new way of finishing guitars to enhance the lower midrange characteristics that many guitar players loved. This finish, now known as the FD finish nn the Caparison guitars, was first introduced on the Jackson Doug Aldrich model which was discontinued once the Kyowa-Shokai/Jackson contract ended.

When the contract ended in 1994, Itaru Kanno with the backing and support from the Kyowa-Shokai trading company started Caparison Guitars in 1995 producing guitars using new innovative designs conceptualized by Mr. Kanno over the years while building guitars for Jackson.

Currently, Chushin-Gakki produces the Japanese import line of guitars for Jackson as well as the Jackson Stars line of guitars for the Japanese domestic market. (The Jackson Stars line of guitars are on par if not better than their American counterparts. The Jackson models currently being exported out of Japan under the Jackson name are not of the same build quality due to contractual agreements).

NOTE: I believe Kyowa-Shokai still contracts Chushin-Gakki to produce the BC Rich line of guitars and I also believe the Chushin-Gakki custom/semi-custom shop is the one producing guitars for Caparison and then shipped over to Caparison DESIGN for finishing and final assembly. The basis for this assumption stems from the fact that Caparison states that they have two locations, namely the “Factory” and the “Office”. If you look at the website for Caparison DESIGN you will read the following when they talk about the office: <READ CORRECTION & NOTE 3>

“This office is in the different place from the factory” -> Signifies that Caparison’s office and Factory are in two different places.
“For example move the body in the middle of the line of the factory to this office once in the case of the model Horus, and graphic work is done.” -> In the website, it shows a picture of two Horus bodies with the Snow Cloud finish. Graphic Work here, refers to the FD Snow Cloud finish.
“… after inspection in the usual factory is finished, all guitars arrive at this office, and it does the work of the final inspection and setting up again by the standard which this office is characteristic of.” -> Translation: ‘After the guitar is completed at the factory and passes the initial factory inspection, all guitars arrive at Caparison Guitars DESIGN for final inspection and setup.

If you consider that Kyowa-Shokai has a good working relationship with Chushin-Gakki and that Chushin-Gakki has proven to be able to produce exceptionally high quality instruments, it would only make sense to leverage existing business contacts and working experience by contracting Chushin-Gakki to build Caparison guitars. It’s likely that Chushin-Gakki only builds the guitars leaving the bodies unfinished so that Caparison Guitars DESIGN can apply the finish on them. Also, this makes more logical business sense as the application of the FD finish that Caparison is known for would be considered Intellectual Property of Mr. Kanno and Caparison Guitars, it would be best to do it themselves. This way, a smaller quantity of guitars with tighter tolerances(read: higher quality build) can be produced by Chushin-Gakki and still provides a small consistent flow of guitars to finish and setup.

Note 2: Although Chushin-Gakki produces Jackson, Jackson Stars, BC Rich and Caparison guitars, their quality levels are different depending on the specifications laid out by the contracting company. While the Jackson Stars are at the same level (if not better) than the original Jackson Professional models and Jackson USA models, I feel that the Caparison Guitars are actually slightly better built than a Jackson Stars J1 or J2 model. I’d have to say that a Custom ordered(not semi-custom) Jackson Stars is on par with what the Caparison’s. This is my opinion after having tried a bunch of Jackson Stars models to compare to Caparisons (part of my research study you could say)


CORRECTION: The Chushin-Gakki factory does not actually produce the Caparison or BC Rich guitars. Our friends over at JCFOnline have kindly pointed out that the Chusin-Gakki factory is located in Nagano and the factory producing the Caparisons is located in Nagoya(completely different place). The factory in Nagoya which produces the Caparison's should be the same factory that produces the japanese BC Riches though. Thanks go out to NC-118 for showing my the thread over at JCFOnline and all the folks at JCFOnline for figuring it out. Here's the thread just in case someone wants to read it: http://www.jcfonline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=78534

Note 3: Seeing that Caparison has disclosed publicly that their factory is located in Nagoya, that narrows down the potential list of factories to three.

1. The Terada (Kanie) factory which have produced guitars for Orville by Gibson, Epiphone Japan, Gretsch as well as Ibanez and several other companies. (It should be noted that Terada was once one of japan's largest OEM guitar manufacturer with a production output of approx 10,000 guitars a month between 3 factories, however only their Kanie factory is still actively producing guitars and their output has been significantly decreased to 12% of their former output)

2. The Ida Gakki (lida) factory which also owns the Peerless Guitar Factory in Korea and have made guitars for Ibanez and Yamaha. (CONFIRMED TO BE THE FACTORY ON CONTRACT TO PRODUCE CAPARISON GUITARS).

3. The Kasuga factory which made Heerby & Ganson Gibson replicas in the 70's and 80's as well as working with Roland to produce the guitar synths in the 70's and producing the lower end acoustics for Yamaha prior to Yamaha's move to Taiwan in the 90's.

Caparison History | 2 | 3

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