“It’s a big ole guitar!” said Charlie. “I flipped out when I first saw it. I didn’t know what to look for. It looks like me. It looks like how I would look on the inside. This is incredible. To look at this thing… And it’s got the scroll around the neck is actually the ‘Star Spangled Banner,’ a little piece of the ‘Star Spangled Banner,’ in authentic notes. If you would unroll it, you could read it. Well I couldn’t, ‘cause I can’t read music, but somebody who could read music, could.”

The GuitarTown project, a public arts affair, debuted the first group of what will eventually be 50 ten-foot tall Les Paul or Chet Atkins guitars on April 1. The guitars will be displayed throughout Nashville through January 2005 and will then be auctioned off to raise money for numerous charitable organizations. “I think it’s great,” commented Charlie. “I think it’s really neat. This is the first guitar I’ve seen, and we’re gonna put it outside the Museum (the CDB Museum in Mt. Juliet). In fact I’m gonna bid on it when they auction these.”

Charlie Daniels has been a Gibson man from the start. “I have a (Les Paul) ‘59 and a (Les Paul) ‘58,” he said. “I think the ‘59 reproduction, to me, is just as good as the original ‘59 was. I’ve got several of them and I’m having some more made. I love them, I absolutely love them. I think they’re great. I absolutely love my Gibson Les Pauls. I play one every night.”

“Gibson has been really, really good to me, good to a lot of people, good to my band,” said Charlie. “We appreciate it, and we appreciate this project here.”