Jackson Browne was a guest performer at Michael J. Fox’s charity gala last weekend, and the actor stole the headlines when he joined the folk-rock musician and activist onstage with a very intriguing guitar in tow.
Fox’s performance as time-traveling teenager Marty McFly in Back to the Future single-handedly inspired many to pick up the guitar, including serial Grammy winner John Mayer, Coldplay bandleader Chris Martin, and Gibson director of brand experience Mark Agnesi. His big musical performance in the film proved inspirational, even if the props department got some historical details wrong, including the guitar on which he plays the Chuck Berry hit “Johnny B. Goode.”
That scene saw Fox, who can play guitar just as well off-screen, honor a host of guitar legends. And despite being diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease in 1991, he refuses to hang up his six-string.
In light of his diagnosis, he established the Michael J. Fox Foundation in 2000, and he’s been holding annual charity shindigs to help raise funds for vital research into the degenerative condition. The Foundation has raised more than $2.5 billion to date.
This latest gala, held at the Casa Cipriani in Manhattan, on November 15, included a performance by Browne. Armed with a Sunburst Fender Stratocaster, he played five songs, including “Somebody’s Baby” and “Take it Easy,” with Fox joining for the final song, “Running on Empty.”
The guitar that Fox played, however, is far more unique than Browne's Fender staple. It seemingly takes its cues from both a Gibson Les Paul and the wild curvature of Prince’s Cloud guitar, with “Wolfe” emblazoned on its headstock.
Assuming it’s the same guitar as the one in the Facebook post below, it was built six years ago by Mark Wolfe, chief luthier of Neil Douglas Guitar and Ukulele Shop. The instrument nods to its Les Paul lineage with a stunningly characterful flame maple top, but the position of its tuners is pretty radical. They're gearless, like Steinberger's uncanny design. It also features two humbuckers, a stopbar tailpiece, and plain wooden tone and volume controls.
Sheryl Crow is said to have played it at a previous gala, and it appears to have remained in Fox’s collection since. he also played it at last year’s event.
Posted by neildouglasguitarshop on
“Check out that gorgeous flame maple top!” the shop's Facebook post about the guitar reads.
Wolfe also crafted a custom Telecaster for the 2022 edition of Fox’s gala, which was auctioned off on the night.
Meanwhile, as the search for the Back to the Future Gibson ES-345 goes on, Fox has offered his theory of what happened to it and why it’s unlikely to reappear any time soon.
He has also defended the team behind Back to the Future for their guitar faux pas, and has called out the blues legend who never spoke out about the cultural phenomenon the film created.
