Allan Holdsworth was a MASTER of this controller, and used it in concert and on multiple albums.
 
Check out his albums, Sand, and Atavachron for some incredible playing.
 
Bob Bone
 

I believe it was too expensive to make enough of a go on the market, and Allan was reportedly quite leery of his breaking down anytime he took it to a gig.
 
Beautiful and brilliant machine - if I knew where to find one in mint condition, I would consider trying to pool resources of fellow musicians to buy Allan Holdsworth a brand new one.  :)
 
I think Lee Rittenour had one too.
 
Bob Bone
 
 

I never used a SynthAxe but I do remember playing a Strat with a MIDI pickup fitted around 1989/90. It was actually pretty cool once you realized you had to adjust your playing technique. I had great fun going through all the presets on a friend's E-Mu Proteus and I even played a fingerstyle piece into his Atari ST and edited the bum notes out of the score. Seemed pretty far out at the time.  

I like anything that is different in a good way.  I wonder if they'll try making one of these type things again now that the  technology has improved...

Back in the day when Holdsworth was endorsing them, he did a sort of promotional meet and greet before the gig to explain the thing.
 
And what a gig it was.

I have owned a midi guitar since 1982 / 83 ..my first was the Roland ...

 
this is where I first started my midi guitar journey ... I will get to the Synth Axe in another few paragraphs ...
 
When I wound up working for Manny's Music on West 48 th st N.Y.C....some time around late 84 ,
I filled a nice little hole for Manny's Gtr Dept since I was the only Midi Guitarist working at a music store on West 48 th street ....
BTW at the time there was a lot of music stores on W 48 th st nobody else in all the other stores at that time played midi guitar ..
How do I know this ? because all the other stores would try to undercut Manny's prices . I wound up demoing 
Midi guitar interfaces for all their customers too ...When it came time to buy they would buy it off me anyway ...
It's a Small world and news travels fast
For those of you that are interested ..back then midi guitar was a real tough sell ...
The only people that played them were top players that had money ...
Even if you were a regular Joe w the bucks to buy a midi guitar you had to contend with a lot of tough hoops to jump over to get a usable musical squeak out of it ...
Latency , learning Midi , having to totally adjust the way you played guitar in every aspect ...
Even with today's technology  in hardware guitar synths including as much as they have improved since the 80 's
I would love to see and hear a midi guitarist strum chords and finger pick in real time like Tommy Emanuel...
Even on my Midi guitar rig I can't strum chords cleanly or finger pic w out having unwanted glitches ...
 
 
The Synth Axe was an attempt at creating a Midi Guitar that could cross that bridge effectively ...
 
To answer your question Yes , I have played the Synth Axe a number of times ...
 
We had one in an upstairs area of the store that was pretty much appointment only .
This area contained the very cream of the crop / very high end studio gear+ instruments that we didn't want people just beating to hell and back from being on display  ...
 
The Synth Axe we had was brand spanking new and IIRC it cost between 12 and 13 Grand ...
 
Playing the Synth Axe the times I did , I found it to be somewhat interesting ...
You could play legato with your left hand , even softly and it would trigger the notes you were playing cleanly ...
I found it to be somewhat awkward using my right hand for picking because I have spent my whole life working on my right hand techs and I found the way the Synth Axe handled that end of things a little strange ...
The right hand section of The Synth Axe had 2 areas where you could trigger what  your right hand would do when you were playing the guitar ...IIRC,one area was for strumming the other section / area was for single string work ..
Had I been given the opportunity to play it a few times a week I probably could have gotten used to it ...
 
Manny's was a good place for me to work at the time ...the thing is the store was always busy and if it wasn't , there was always something that needed to be done ...Me burning up time playing a $13.000 Axe in an air conditioned private sound proof studio area of the store was not on Henry Goldrich's  agenda
 
I'm going OT here for a moment because I feel like telling a story  ...
 
I do have to say I love Henry Goldrich as tough as he was he had a super kind heart ...
He was a very generous person ...he took the staff out all the time for diner drinks , and when ever there was a big party ...all of us got to go .....case in point,  Les Paul's 70 th Birthday party at The Hard Rock ...
Also while I was there under his employment , he let me take anything I wanted home ..Guitars , amps , rackmount gear, studio equipment , pedals .....
I think he did that for a few reasons ..he trusted me and in many cases it was the only way I could learn the gear on my own time ..
The other thing is when I didn't bring the gear back the next day he would put that stern tough smile on his face to try to scare me ...meanwhile the whole time he was laughing inside because he knew at the end of the week I would be signing over my whole paycheck and then some over to him
I bought every thing at cost plus shipping ...like I said Henry was very generous .....
 
what were we talking about again ? .. Oh The Synth Axe ...
 
BTW I did get to meet and shake hands and talk with Allan Holdsworth  ..
He was interested in talking about micro brews   not the guitar  ...
 
all the best ,
 
Kenny
 

Great stories, I miss Manny's! So much has gone from the area in the last few years. I even miss the Virgin Megastore in Times Square. I'd spend so long in there hunting out CD and DVD bargains.

sharke
... I even miss the Virgin Megastore in Times Square. I'd spend so long in there hunting out CD and DVD bargains.

Sounds like the Tower Records store that was on Clark St. in Chicago. I spent a LOT of money in there. Their classical room was bigger than most other whole record stores at the time, and that was the smallest room. RIP Tower.
 

allan holdsworth.
 
go almost all the way back in his solo catalog,
and you'll find he was one of the first users,
and man, did he use it!
 
no one else ever really mastered it to the level that holdsworth did.