Paul Reed Smith Gives His Custom Built Guitar To Jimmy Herring

Last weekend Widespread Panic concluded the first leg of their Fall Tour with a pair of performances at the St. Augustine Amphitheatre in St. Augustine, Florida. Attentive fans may have noticed either with their eyes or ears that guitarist Jimmy Herring was playing a new instrument – one that happened to have been originally custom built for acclaimed luthier Paul Reed Smith.

As revealed in a message shared by WSP, when Herring showed up to the venue in Florida on Friday night a new axe was waiting for him. Smith had shipped the new instrument overnight to the Panic guitarist after playing the specially designed PRS and decided “it sounded like Jimmy.”

Herring ended up using the gifted guitar for a large portion of the show on Friday night and brought it out for more action again on Saturday. Widespread Panic returns to the road to resume their Fall Tour on October 21 for the the first for three nights at The Riverside Theater in Milwaukee.

Here’s footage of Herring playing his new PRS with Widespread Panic and special guests Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi on “High Time We Went” captured by Fred Ramadan at Friday’s show: