Equipment

1970 - 1979 The beginnings

A 12 years old Jonas picks up the saw, chunks of wood, electronics and a screwdriver and puts together his first bass guitar. "It didn't have a truss rod and it was very ugly, but I was proud of it - I had build it myself!". Sadly, there is not even a photo testimony left to remind of it.

Around the same age, he gets to buy a "real" bass for 50 Swedish Crowns (about 8 USD today) from a pawn shop. It was an Egmond bass guitar.

That guitar doesn't exist anymore either - it was modified and finally "massacred" for parts.

Egmond_bass

Gibson_FenderBassman

Later on, Jonas spends his earnings as a child actor in a popular TV series on a Gibson bass and a Fender Bassman 50 amp system.

He also builds a new mahogany body bass in school, around the age of 16.

'77-'78 Jonas' new touring instrument is a London Burns.

He also played a Fender for a short while.

Then in '79 he bought a Wall bass.

Burns_London

1980 - 1989 First designs

Aria

A first Hellborg signature model was created in collaboration with Japanese guitar company Aria in 1980. It featured a neck thru design with an Ash body and it was used on the Reebop and all our steps recordings.

Hellborg_SoundOfSweden

Sound of Sweden

"Sound of Sweden" was the name of a brand Jonas created with some friends in order to produce the Jonas Hellborg bass in '82-'84.

He also created an amplifier line, in partnership FBT, based in Recanati, Italy. It was the first biamped bass amplifier, in which each cabinet had its own power amp - one for the 15" and one for the 2x12".

Wall

The double-neck Wall was built in '83. A fretted neck on top and a frettless one at the bottom, this monster weighed around 18 kgs and it stayed around Jonas' neck for most of the touring period with

Mahavishnu and John McLaughlin.

1990 - 1999 Electrifying era

Wechter

Abraham Wechter met John McLaughlin when he worked as a designer for Gibson. There he created the multistring wonders that McLaughlin used with his group Shakti.

Later after breaking out on his own he also created a magnitude of fantastic nylon strung instruments for McL.

Around this time he and Jonas met. Talk about an acoustic Bass Guitar led to 5 years of design and building before the Roman Bass was finished.

This extraordinary instrument can be heard on The Silent Life (DEM 026) The Word (Axiom) and the Ginger Baker record Middle Passage amongst other recordings.

Schack
In the 90’s Hellborg also endorsed German luthier Andy Schack. It started out with a 10 string instrument around 1990 then Andy also made him a 6 string acoustic Bass a few years later.

Ovation

Around 94 Jonas ran across Jimmy Page’s double neck ovation guitar in the Trace Elliot HQ in the UK
(trace was the Ovation distributor at the time) and just put in the request to have a double neck bass built on the same body. His call was heeded and 6 months later he was given probably the only double neck Ovation bass in existence.

Status

Hellborg endorsement of Trace Elliot amp in the early 90’s led to a chance meeting with Rob Green and the company Status. Together they developed 2 signature models. The 4 string electric Hellborg model and the 6 string electro acoustic seen here.

Vigier

In the late 90’s Jonas Hellborg decided to support Shawn Lane’s friend and supporter Patrice Vigier and for a while played his basses. Particularly a brass fretboarded “fretless”

In the 90’s Jonas endorsed EBS amps, then Trace Elliot, and after a period of using custom made equipment went back to EBS before developing the Hellborg Signature series with Warwick.

2000 - 2011 The acoustic emerge

Crafter

What Jonas preffered to play beginning of 2000 was an inexpensive acoustic model of Crafter. This instrument was heavily modified with custom pickups and electronics.

It is featured on the Paris DVD, recorded live from a concert with Shawn Lane and the Vinayakram brothers at New Morning in Paris.

An extra version of the instrument was a black 5 string, subsequently modified into a 6 string.

Warwick

In 2004 Hellborg walked into the Warwick booth at the Frankfurt Musik Messe and a deep involvement in instrument design and friendship with Warwick owner Hans Peter Wilfer started.
The first step was Hellborg’s fascination with the acoustic Alien bass guitar. This led to the development of Jonas “dream” Electric Bass, an acoustic size and shaped body with a ultralow impedance pickup that gives a dramatic dynamic range and flat frequency response from 20 Hz to 20 kHz.
Jonas later got involved with the electronics department and started out with developing his own high end series of amplifiers and speaker cabinets.

Solo Concerts in February

Solo Concerts in February

Equipment