Don Felder Guitars & Gear: The Hotel California Doubleneck, Les Pauls and Documented Rig
Don Felder guitars and gear: the white Gibson EDS-1275 doubleneck, 1959 Les Paul, Strats, amps and pedals, with sources and what is not documented.
Don Felder’s best-known piece of gear exists because of a practical problem. “Hotel California” was built in the studio from layered guitar parts, and when the Eagles took it on the road he needed a way to play the 12-string intro and the six-string solo without swapping instruments mid-song. The answer was a white Gibson EDS-1275 doubleneck, rewired so that its two necks behaved like two separate guitars.
Around that guitar sits a rig made of sunburst Les Pauls, Stratocasters, a Telecaster with a B-Bender, a Martin D-35 and small tweed amps, with very few pedals. This guide covers Don Felder guitars and gear that are documented in interviews, a manufacturer announcement, dealer news posts and museum coverage. Where a detail rests on a single source, or where sources disagree, we say so in the text.
Background: Gainesville, Slide Guitar and the Eagles
Felder was born in Gainesville, Florida, according to Wikipedia, which we use here as a lead and not as proof. In a 2012 Premier Guitar interview by Andy Ellis, he talked about learning slide guitar from Duane Allman at Allman’s mother’s house in Daytona, and about his preference for metal slides over glass. Slide stayed part of his playing, and a Strat set up for slide turns up in his 2025 gear list. Our Duane Allman guitars and gear guide covers the player he credits.
Wikipedia’s account says the Eagles called Felder in early January 1974 to add slide to one song and solos to another, and that he was invited to join shortly afterwards. It also credits him as a co-writer of “Hotel California” with Don Henley and Glenn Frey. We did not confirm either point from a primary source we could open, so treat them as background only.
One Song, Two Jobs: Studio Versus Stage
The studio version of “Hotel California” is not one guitar. American Songwriter, reporting Felder’s recollections from a KSHE 95 radio interview in a February 2025 article, says about fifteen guitars were used in the studio while the band recorded the song. That number is the writer’s paraphrase, so read it as approximate.
Felder spoke about the writing stage in a 2015 Vinyl Dialogues interview with Mike Morsch. He said that when he was writing and arranging the music, “I used a 12-string guitar.” He also said, “I should have said, let’s just do this on a regular six-string guitar,” and that he still plays the 12-string at every show where the song is performed. In a 2026 Ultimate Classic Rock piece by Gary Graff, Felder is reported as saying he played “a bunch of different guitar tracks on the record,” including the 12-string introduction.
Which acoustic 12-string was used on the record is not something we can settle. Search snippets of Guitar World’s 2013 interview with Felder suggest a particular make with a pickup, but the full text would not load for us, and we do not name the instrument on that basis. What the readable accounts agree on is the structure: a 12-string part at the front, a solo at the end, and many layers between them that one player cannot cover with one instrument.
The ending is a two-guitar solo shared with Joe Walsh. Walsh’s side of the duet, including the Telecaster and amp setup our own coverage describes, is in our Joe Walsh guitars and gear guide. This article stays with Felder’s half.
The White Doubleneck
The stage solution was a Gibson EDS-1275: a solid-body doubleneck with a 12-string neck above and a six-string neck below. Felder has told the story of how he got it more than once, and the tellings agree on the main points and differ on small ones.
How He Got It
American Songwriter, citing Felder’s account on KSHE 95, says he asked a guitar tech to find a doubleneck so he could recreate the studio sound live without changing guitars. The tech went to a store and returned with a white EDS-1275 with black pickguards and silver hardware. Felder, as the article relays it, asked why the guitar was white and not black or red, and the answer was that white was all they had.
The other accounts vary slightly. Ultimate Classic Rock’s 2026 report names a roadie as the person who bought it. Open Culture’s 2021 article by Ted Mills, quoting an earlier interview with The Sound, says Felder had his tech buy a 12-string and six-string doubleneck, and that Felder then drilled and wired it so it was really two separate guitars. So the buyer is a tech or a roadie depending on the telling; the store purchase and the wiring work are consistent.
How It Was Modified
Gibson’s August 2010 announcement for its signature replica says the original was modified so the 12-string neck could feed a Leslie rotary speaker cabinet, and that the replica follows that arrangement. American Songwriter describes the same routing from the player’s side: the 12-string neck went to an Echoplex and a Leslie, and a switch sent the six-string neck to a pedalboard and a Fender Deluxe.
Wikipedia’s EDS-1275 entry, citing a 2012 Guitar World article by Fanelli that we did not open, says the modification replaced one tone control with a second output. That is a plausible detail but a single-source one, so we present it as reported and not confirmed.
According to the headline of a Guitar Player article about the doubleneck, Chet Atkins inspired the modification. We could not read the body of the article, so we do not know what Felder said about it beyond that headline. Atkins is a reasonable point of reference regardless; our Chet Atkins guitars and gear guide covers his rig and the Gretsch guitars that carry his name.
Where It Has Been Shown
The original guitar was part of “Play It Loud”, the Metropolitan Museum of Art exhibition that later moved to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. Ultimate Classic Rock’s Matt Wardlaw reported on 4 December 2019 that Felder played “Hotel California” at the Met in April 2019 and gave an encore performance at the Rock Hall, where the exhibition was to run through September 2020. A Wikimedia Commons photograph taken at the Met on 13 May 2019 carries a title that dates the guitar to 1977; we do not know the basis for that date. Wikipedia, again citing the Fanelli article, says the original is on display at the Hall of Fame. As of October 2026 we could not confirm where it is held, since loans end.
The 2010 Gibson Replicas
Gibson Custom announced two Felder tribute guitars in August 2010. Premier Guitar’s report of the doubleneck, dated 18 August 2010 from Nashville, describes a solid mahogany body in custom aged white nitrocellulose, two three-piece maple necks with rosewood fingerboards, Kluson-style tuners, tune-o-matic bridges with custom claw tailpieces, and Burstbucker #1 and #2 pickups on each neck. It had one tone control, two volume controls, a three-way pickup selector and a separate neck selector, with two quarter-inch jacks. The run was limited to 150 guitars, 50 of them signed by Felder, with launch prices of $9,174 and $12,704 for the signed version. Those are 2010 figures and not current prices.
The Music Zoo’s news post of 25 August 2010 covers both guitars. It describes the matching 1959 Les Paul in a “Felder Burst” finish, offered in three tiers: 50 signed and hand-aged, 100 hand-aged, and 150 with Gibson’s VOS treatment, which adds up to 300 by our count. It lists a two-piece figured maple top, a one-piece mahogany neck with a Felder profile and Burstbucker 2 and 1 pickups in the neck and bridge positions. The figures come from a dealer’s post and not from Gibson directly, so we hedge them as the dealer’s reported run.
The Burstbuckers are Gibson’s attempt at a vintage-correct humbucker. Our PAF humbuckers explainer covers the original design that style of pickup is modelled on.
The Rig: Felder’s Guitars, Amps & Effects
Felder’s own interviews are the best guide to the rig, and two are especially useful: Premier Guitar’s October 2012 interview, which includes a gear sidebar, and Vintage Guitar’s interview by Bret Adams, which the magazine says first ran in its July 2025 issue. They come from different points in his career, so we date each claim. Premier Guitar’s June 2016 rig rundown, which we could only partly read, describes the rig in its introduction as a few Gibsons, one do-it-yourself guitar and several everyday pedals, and its body was not available to us.
Guitars
This is the guitar most closely tied to Felder’s recorded lead playing. The Music Zoo post says he used it for the leads on the album. In the 2012 Premier Guitar interview he described playing the ’59 on “Girls in Black” through a prototype 65amps Lil’ Elvis, a 12-watt combo. In Vintage Guitar in 2025, in an interview that covers his album The Vault, he said, “I used sunburst Les Pauls – my ’59 and some reissues.” Our Gibson Les Paul Standard ’50s guide covers the modern Gibson reissue-style model built on the 1950s design.
The live guitar described above. Ultimate Classic Rock says he used it on the tour supporting the 1976 album.
In the 2012 Premier Guitar interview, Felder described the Eagles’ “Victim of Love” as a Strat through a tweed Champ. In the 2025 Vintage Guitar interview he said he has five Strats with different pickups, one fitted with a Sustainiac for long feedback notes, and he also named a Strat set up for slide. The 2012 sidebar lists a Stratocaster and a Telecaster, each with custom-wound Seymour Duncan pickups. For how these designs compare in general, see our Strat vs Tele vs Les Paul vs SG comparison.
In Vintage Guitar, Felder said he has a B-Bender Tele that he had not seen since Hell Freezes Over, more than thirty years earlier. That is the only source we found for it, and we do not attach a recording to it.
Premier Guitar’s 2012 sidebar lists a 1958 Gretsch Chet Atkins. In the interview, Felder described an EBow played on a black Gretsch Tennessean through a Vox AC30 for “I Believe in You.” Our Gretsch G6120 Chet Atkins guide covers the 6120 line; the Tennessean gets only a passing mention there.
The 2012 sidebar lists a 1966 Gibson SG, a Zemaitis 501-DS-BK and a Taylor 614. The “Wash Away” solo in that interview was a 1995 Music Man Luke through a Roland Micro Cube. In 2025 he named a 1965 Martin D-35, which he called the guitar that went on nearly every Eagles record when he joined the band, along with a Zemaitis, a PRS and the slide Strat.
Amps
Premier Guitar’s 2012 sidebar lists a mid-’50s tweed Deluxe first, and American Songwriter’s account of the doubleneck rig ends the six-string chain at a Fender Deluxe. Our Fender ’57 Custom Deluxe guide covers the tweed Deluxe circuit and names Felder among the players associated with it.
All appear in the 2012 sidebar. Felder said in that interview that he records parts through two amps with separate mics, for more separation between them.
Effects
American Songwriter places an Echoplex on the 12-string side of the doubleneck rig, and Premier Guitar’s 2012 sidebar lists a vintage Echoplex.
Gibson’s 2010 announcement and American Songwriter both place the 12-string neck on a Leslie.
These three are in the 2012 sidebar. Our Boss CH-1 Super Chorus guide covers the chorus pedal. Felder said in the interview that he uses few pedals because every connection degrades the signal, and that a comparison of pedals into an amp against plug-ins for chorused echo went in the pedals’ favour.
How He Works in the Studio
The 2012 Premier Guitar interview also describes a process. Felder records demos he calls thumbnails in his home Pro Tools studio, then tracks songs with his band, and he prefers building guitar arrangements part by part over copying and pasting. One of those home recordings, the “Wash Away” solo, was kept for the album. That approach lines up with the structure of “Hotel California” itself: layered parts, each chosen for its own voice, not one guitar doing everything.
In our view, this is the practical lesson for players. The doubleneck solved a live problem that the studio created, and Felder’s own gear lists show a player who picks a different guitar and amp for different parts instead of looking for one tone to cover a song.
What Is Documented and What Is Not
The doubleneck’s purpose, its Leslie and Echoplex routing and the Gibson replica specifications are supported by more than one source we could open. The make of the 12-string on the record, the amp used for the studio solo and the full gear on Felder’s other Eagles-era recordings are not settled by anything we could read in full. Wikipedia says his tweed and Deluxe Reverb amps were modified by Dumble Amplifiers; we found no interview we could open that confirms it, so we leave Dumble out of the rig above.
Frequently Asked Questions
What guitar did Don Felder play on “Hotel California”?
On stage, a white Gibson EDS-1275 doubleneck. In the studio, many guitars were used. The Music Zoo’s 2010 post on the Gibson replicas says he used his 1959 Les Paul for the leads on the album.
Did Don Felder play a Telecaster on the solo?
The sources we could read put the Telecaster side of the duet with Joe Walsh, and our Joe Walsh guide covers it. We found no source we could open that puts a Telecaster in Felder’s hands on that track.
How was the doubleneck modified?
Felder has said it was wired so it was really two separate guitars. According to American Songwriter, the 12-string neck went to an Echoplex and a Leslie, while the six-string neck went to a pedalboard and a Fender Deluxe.
Can you buy a Don Felder doubleneck?
Gibson Custom announced a limited tribute model in 2010, with 150 planned according to Premier Guitar’s report of the announcement. We could not check current availability, so look at used listings for aged or signed examples.
Which guitars has Don Felder named in recent interviews?
As of the July 2025 Vintage Guitar interview, he named sunburst Les Pauls including his ’59, five Strats, a ’65 Martin D-35, a Zemaitis, a PRS and a B-Bender Telecaster. That list reflects that interview and may change.