Premium music shops of Palos Verdes Estates: Our Top-7 selection

This place is amazing! My son took violin lessons from teacher Andrew Goo for more than a year. Andrew was very professional and helped prepare my son for middle school orchestra auditions. He also helped him improve his technique after he was already in orchestra and master the pieces he was being assigned at school. Also, when we had an issue with one of my son’s violin strings, we came here, and one of the young men quickly fixed it for us while only charging a minimal amount just for the new string. We are lucky to have the PV Music House in our community!

What a great experience being here!

Awesome music shop! Great selection of instruments and sheet music. They have a lot of space for music lessons and a talented teaching staff. And they have my favorite Dunlop guitar picks too! Allison at the front desk was super nice. The owner, Jon, is terrific.

A hidden gem – and one of the few music shops in the South Bay that isn’t a big box shop like Guitar Center.

Just got my Fender strat back from Harbor Music, I had a new bone nut, and jumbo frets installed, which included a Complete set up. Scott spent a good amount of time with me explaining everything I needed to know. Both he and Alex were very professional, and friendly. Anyhow, my guitar now plays great!! I’m very satisfied with the work, and the price. IMHO, Scott and Alex try their best to give the customer what they want, and go above and beyond to help to achieve that sound as best as possible. I would Highly recommend Harbor Music to anyone needing professional repairs or music gear.

Greg T.

Fantastic guitar store!

Not easy to run a homey neighborhood shop
in the age of big box stores and the internet,
but these guys are making a go.

I love Harbor Music!
Not too big, not too small.

I have been patronizing them since they opened,
and have enjoyed watching them grow.

Great selection, fabulous service and excellent prices.

They built me a sweet, bulletproof pedal board,
which sounds amazing and is hand-wired with 90 degree jacks
and premium cables and crazy-good velcro.

They built me an amazing Telecaster, with real vintage Fender pickups
and a Super Rare Custom Shop neck, and a special Suhr, noise cancelling curcuit in the pickguard, which works like a dream.

I am going to have them put the same system in my old Strat.

They sold me the brand new Fender Telecaster Baritone at a great price,
right when it first came out. They switched the stock tuners out for Sperzels and set up and intonated the guitar to perfection. They even took my old Dano Bari in on trade, which I bought there several years ago.

They have ordered for me, many unusual and rare parts, they have shipped me all kinds of supplies and gear wherever I happen to be.

Every transaction I have there is easy, relaxing and very fairly priced.

The work they do in-house is meticulous and their outside service vendors
are the best in the business.

I am a professional musician and rely on my gear for my living, and so I drive way out of my way to get to Harbor Music. I so enjoy patronizing a small, local, hometown shop in this day of the Mega Store and web-based nonsense.

All the best to you guys!
You are the best.

DL

Very friendly, very knowledgeable. Answered all my boys questions. Definitely plan to support this store.

Decent selection but used prices are a joke.
For example a used Eric Johnson is $1500 before tax when Sweetwater will you give you a brand new one for 1800 out the door if you have a little bit of a hookup. Shop also seems to have a little but of an unwelcoming attitude-not that I care if you can make a deal but if you’re looking for just that, a deal, this store is probably not for you. Shame, because I usually like to support the small private shops. Even bigger shame, because I buy lots of gear. Lots.

lots of cool pedals. I would have liked to buy a couple and try out some more because there were some interesting brands and reasonable prices but the guy in charge was just incredibly rude to me; like on a whole new level. He insinuated that my 36yr old strat was not vintage and when I said I was looking for a candy apple red 1980s ’57 reissue strat he said that they weren’t special and that they were “just used guitars” which I find hilarious considering how specific my request is, how hard they are to find and how expensive they are when they are found. He then played electric guitar while I tried out an acoustic and talked negatively about me to his associate quite loudly in the backroom. It was extremely uncomfortable. And all of this seemingly because he thought I was a salesperson, which I am not. I was simply talking about my guitar pedal electronics projects (which to be fair, I would like to sell at some point in the future, once it evolves out of being a hobby, but that is likely years off) The employee seemed interested so his manager quickly separated us, sending the employee to the back room making it clear he didn’t want his employee talking to me then he stayed on the phone the rest of the time i was there so I would have no one to talk to… This was probably the worst experience I’ve had in any music store, ever (ok, with the sole exception of guitar center.) There was a time when how you acted only affected one person at a time but now that we have google, everyone gets to hear about it.

They seem like nice enough guys, but their prices are outrageous, and they don’t even come close to matching online competitors prices. That’s a sad fact about the world we live in, these small “mom and pop shops” just can’t compete with the big chains, and the online sellers.

If you live in one of these high dollar beach communities and have disposable income, then pay extra money and patronize these small specialty “mom and pop shops”. But, if you are middle class person that can’t afford to spend extra money (like me), forget this place. You’ll find much better prices searching the internet.

Do not take your instruments here to be repaired. I was overcharged for simple work on a guitar that took nearly a month to complete despite the initial quote of one week. This was entirely due to poor communication and not following instructions. I have been having work done on my guitars for nearly 20 years, so I know how long repairs should take and I have some idea of how long they should take. Be warned – THE WORK IS NOT DONE IN HOUSE HERE and you cannot talk to the guy doing the repairs. I have to take my guitar somewhere else to have the work done correctly – I absolutely do not trust these guys to ever touch my guitar again. I left detailed written instructions requesting easily obtainable industry standard parts to be used and was simply ignored. I felt like making an issue out of it, but it would just take too much time and effort and they would probably want to try to fix it themselves and they are never seeing me or my guitars again. They were embarrassed when I picked the guitar up and they should have been.
As far as the “Mr. Pedal Board” thing goes, go the store’s website and look at the boards displayed here and then type “guitar pedal board” into google and see if you are impressed with this guy’s creations. My friends and I rigged better looking and likely better functioning boards when were teenagers and we were stoned and not particularly bright or technically minded. It’s good enough if you are a weekend warrior or bedroom player, or if you just don’t need a lot of pedals, but I really think you can do better than this no matter how or where you play.
The guys in the store are friendly enough, particularly after they warm up to you and the pedal selection is good as well and it is convenient to demo them in the store, but there are no refunds. Every online store that I know of, and I have shopped at several of them, has a 60 day return policy and a much larger selection and handle the returns with no problems and most of them offer a discount.
I really wanted to form a relationship with a local small business and get away from the big chain and online stores, but this place really let me down.