The following list includes some of my favorite pieces of equipment, used both in performance and in producing home studio recordings (such as those available as MP3s on the Performance page).

Zachary Guitars hand-built Z2 hard tail: With a 25" scale, korina Body, walnut neck, ebony fret board (no inlays), and 2 hand built "Zach Attack" pickups by Kent Armstrong, this is the finest instrument I have played. It is light (5.8 lbs), responsive, and sits perfectly in various playing positions. It is strung with D'Addario 10-46s and works beautifully in all musical styles. For more info/pics of this and other Zachary guitars go to www.zacharyguitars.com.

Santa Cruz "D": a great acoustic dreadnought guitar. With a 25.125" scale, it has a beautifully warm but articulate sound. I use this guitar for all acoustic tracks in my recordings. Check out Santa Cruz guitars at www.santacruzguitars.com.

1970 Fender Princeton. I use this for most electric guitar recordings and many live performances as well. This amp has been heavily modified by Soundsmith in Manhattan and is now my favorite. Soundsmith is the best tube amp repair/mod shop I've ever used, a real find. More info on them can be found at www.soundsmith.com. The amp now has a 10" Eminence Delta speaker installed, so you can crank it till the tubes sing with zero speaker overload. Soundsmith also installed a power supply modification for extra low end solidity.

Daking 52270B Mic-Preamplifier/EQ. I use this fine class A transformer-based pre/eq on every recording. It produces an amazingly accurate yet enhanced sound. Daking offers the best customer service I have encountered. The 52270B contains the most "musical" eq I have used. This pre/eq is fantastic for overdubbing, and makes recordings sound expansive and "up front."

Empirical Labs Distressor compressor. This is an industry standard and displays great versatility. I use it to create glossy controlled acoustic sounds as well as subtly altered slide and lower register guitar parts. The two distortion settings are great for "analog type" warming. Since the Distressor is digitally controlled, all of its settings can be perfectly reproduced.

Dynaudio BM6 passive monitors. I use these monitors with a Carver power amp for tracking, mixing, and mastering all my most recent recordings. It projects an ideal balance of frequencies. The monitors are both very accurate and pleasant-sounding. Every detail (including flaws) is audible, even at low volume levels, so the listening fatigue is minimized.