Harley Benton Nashville Nylon NT

This is a beautiful guitar, and with some filing and adjustments it plays great.

Pros: good looking, somewhat unique, electronics seem good, great price point for what it is (little competition in that price range), sounds great but needs external EQ/pre to tame the highs a bit

Cons: workmanship on the sloppy side, heavy, weird balance

After a neck adjustment, some nut filing and filing and crowning a couple of high frets this guitar plays very well. It's a shame that 10 more minutes weren't spent during production to fix those issues though, it would have made this guitar so much more enjoyable. Especially to those who don't have the tools to do it themselves.

Be prepared to take this guitar to a luthier for a setup and final adjustments. Or you might be lucky and get a near perfect one, I suspect quality is all over the place at this price point.

I have been playing guitar now for about 46 yrs. I had a career with my local government education department for a number of years teaching music and music technology to young people from about 12 to 25 yrs of age. Now, because of a serious spinal injury (please, no tap jokes),write and record mainly from home with a view to some wheelchair bound future gigs showcasing my own compositions.
Like a number of guitarist, I have not owned a nylon strung guitar for a great number of years and decided that it was about time that I did. My first ever guitar was a nylon classical and I wanted this sound instead of playing classical and barque pieces on steel strings. Browsing through the Thomann guitars I found this one coming in at just under £200 and gave it a go, I have not been disappointed.
The guitar arrived three days from dispatch to the UK, in Thomann's usual bomb proof, padded and double boxed packaging. The guitar out of the box was in good condition and almost in tune, just a very dry fret board that after a coat or two of lemon oil, was fine.
The guitar has a heavy mahogany body with a well matched solid spruce top, a very well set mahogany neck and Roseacer fret board. The two "sound holes" nice as they are, are for no more than show, being only a few mm deep and offering no real acoustic value at all. This guitar is really a solid bodied instrument, though in the silence of the night, it can be heard slightly unplugged and the aesthetics of the pseudo sound holes give a very classy vibe. It has a nicely cut nut and, for a classical type guitar, a very low action. The bridge is walnut and with a nice cream binding on the body and neck, all this adds up to a great looking, fantastically playable instrument.
Coming to the sound. I have tried this guitar through a number of amps, acoustic simulation F/X and straight in to my desk, so, this is a fairly well rounded review of the sound. I do not know the make or type of Piezo pickup but it works well. The volume sweep is good and smooth with no hint of distortion when flat out and produces a superb representation of all the main aspects of a good professional nylon classical guitar. The bass and treble do what they say and I found the bass at 40 to 50% and the treble at about 50 to 60% seems to work well for me.The sound then over all with just a hint of reverb, is super clean, lush, very well rounded and of a quality that sounds a great, great deal more than just under £200, by and large with this sound, build and ease of playing you feel like you have a five to £600 guitar, in your hands. A bit more reverb and volume and I had Bach swirling and dancing in my ears with a truly amazing tonality and timbre, fantastic. It is an instrument I would be happy and confident to use live in any situation and look forward to the day when I can again.
Once again, I have an absolutely unbeatable guitar for £196 and in terms of price, quality and service all I can say is, many thanks Thomann, you have done it yet again.