Fretted, congratulations with your 522. Her is how I described my first impression (a 14-fretter by the way).
In May this year I became the owner of a First Edition Taylor 522 (all mahogany Grand Concert). After having played it almost every day since it arrived my conclusion is that the 522 could be a special guitar in my collection. It has a mellow if not intimate warm sound with somewhere sometimes almost a hint of nylon. I play a lot on my beloved 1996 714 (Grand Auditorium) with a cedar top which is also well known for its warmth, but my new 522 beats it in this respect. The 522 has less volume but still has a remarkable sustain. I am a guitar picker and play mainly ‘more subtle’ songs (e.g. Jim Croce, James Taylor, Paul Simon) but even than I feel the back of my smaller new baby vibrating against my chest. I suppose this is also due to Andy Powers’ fresh vision on the all mahogany construction. In fact it was my great small mahogany topped GS Mini travel guitar (what a hit!) which made me decide to look for an all mahogany Grand Concert model – so when I heard about the presentation of the new 500 Series at the Frankfurt Musikmesse I was ‘sold’. The build of this Taylor is flawless and with the off-white ivoroid bindings and extra First Edition inlays simply beautiful. The 522 neck is a delight to play and the guitar stays extremely well in tune. It is in fact the first one I do not have to fine tune when I use a capo. Amplified, plugged into my AER Compact 60, it has a fantastic powerful and balanced acoustic output. I install K&K pure mini transducers in all my guitars and in my 522 they do again a superb job. In fact amplified this way, the 522 shows itself from its most versatile side and handles almost any kind of playing style. Unamplified the all-mahogany is in the first place 'the' instrument for strummers and flat pickers. For them it opens itself to the fullest extent. The search for the right strings took some time. I realize this is a very personal thing and relates a lot to my style of finger picking. With the bronze nanoweb Elixirs (80/20 light gauge) with which it came the 522 did not stand out fully well to my ears. The sound was somewhat ‘muffled’. I changed to Elixir phosphor bronze nanoweb but still wasn’t satisfied (moreover, every G-string of this Elixir wears out – looses its coating? – overnight notwithstanding its high price). The basic (and cheap) bronze D’Addario’s do in my opinion the best job. I recently put on medium gauge strings (D’Addario EJ17) to allow for a slightly lower tuning in Eb which is more convenient to my voice. In short, the 522 is an impeccable new Taylor with a distinctive warm sound. It is less loud than my other Taylors (I admit you have to surrender yourself in a way) but the mahogany offers you some totally different gorgeous tone instead. This Grand Concert is a classic beauty with which you easily fall in love.
If you wish to get an impression how the 522 sounds directly plugged into my DAW (Reason), please check out my short rendition of 'The water is wide':
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYBnUQDzmJ0
