MusicRadar deals of the week: Just in time for Mother's Day, we've found $700 off an unusual Gibson, $500 off a stunning Ibanez Prestige AZ2204, plus heavy savings on recording and live gear

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Editor's picks
How we choose deals
Why you can trust us
Where to shop
Deals to look for

Welcome to MusicRadar's deals of the week, where we'll share with you the very best offers from around the web on some of our best-rated musical equipment. As the name suggests, we'll bring you a new batch of exciting discounts every week, so be sure to check back regularly to see what we've uncovered and stay ahead of the game.

Mother's Day is this Sunday, making it the perfect time to score great deals for the music-loving mom in your life, or treat yourself to some new gear. This week, we’ve rounded up the hottest savings from Guitar Center, Musician’s Friend, and Sweetwater, with major discounts on everything from guitars to studio essentials.

Hanging on from last week, Guitar Centre is still running its massive Live Sound sale, offering up to 25% off top brands like Yamaha, JBL, Alto, and Shure. Whether you’re after new speakers, mics, or other essential gear, these limited-time deals make it easy to upgrade your setup without breaking the bank.

Now, in an interesting move, Musician’s Friend is now an online outlet for premium gear, offering up to 45% off guitars, drums, recording equipment, and more. “Premium gear gets discounted somewhere – overstock, open-box, discontinued models. Today it's scattered across marketplaces and clearance racks,” said Gabe Dalporto, CEO of Guitar Center. “Musician's Friend pulls it into one place, sourced directly from the brands, at prices that reflect what an outlet should be.”

Meanwhile, Sweetwater’s Recording Month event features up to 50% off studio gear from top brands. There are heavy discounts on everything from interfaces to speakers, mics, software, and so much more. This really is the perfect time to upgrade your home studio.

How we choose our deals of the week

Here at MusicRadar, we are experts in our field, with many years of playing, creating and product testing between us. We live and breathe everything music gear-related, and we draw on this knowledge and experience of using products in live, recording and rehearsal scenarios when selecting the products for our deals.

Our mission is simple - to help you make the best buying decision, find the right gear at the right price, to make the best music you can.

For us to recommend a deal it has to be a product we rate that’s been reduced to a genuinely great price or part of a truly fantastic bundle. It’s also important that we only recommend retailers that we trust.

You can see more of our product recommendations in our buyer's guides and reviews.

Why you can trust our choices

Our editors and writers are all experienced musicians and experts in their fields. They have a deep understanding of the categories that they cover, which means that you can trust their choices when it comes to recommending products.

We pride ourselves on the independence, quality and reliability of our testing processes and the reviews it produces. It’s what has made us the world’s leading music-making publishing company. You can find more details on how we test some specific key product categories, but the principles apply across the board, rigorously assessing build quality, functionality, playability and, of course, sonic performance.

We cover a lot of the big sales events throughout the year, including Memorial Day, Black Friday, 4th of July sales and Amazon Prime Day, and we have a good view of which products are likely to receive the biggest discounts and when, the prices they’ve been in the past and which deals are genuinely worth a look.

Where are the best places to shop?

Online shopping is definitely a lot easier and more secure than it used to be, and we like to recommend a small handful of online retailers who have a sterling reputation and offer fantastic benefits like fuss-free returns, great customer service and, in some cases, full checks and setup of guitars before they are dispatched. So, all the deals we’ll recommend on this page are from retailers that tick these boxes.

What sort of deals should I look for?

Great deals come in all shapes and sizes. There are a few key types to look out for:

Single item - A single product with a great discount
Site-wide discounts - A single discount percentage on a large range of products across a site
Discount codes - Load your basket to a certain value and redeem a discount code for money off your basket contents
Added value deals - These include multi-buy discounts, or additional products or software for free when you buy certain items