Some time ago I have decided to post here guest posts from other fellow guitar bloggers, hoping this will bring something now to the table, different from what I usually write about. So, this being said, today I will post here an article of Anton Emery, the Community Manager of http://www.RhythmStrummer.com. This site offers easy guitar lessons in a fun & patient atmosphere, taught by teachers who care. Students learn songs & technique lessons across a variety of genres, including Folk, Country, and Classic Rock- all with NO advertising.

Anton sent me today an article about an overview of different tonewoods for acoustic guitar and I am happy to post it here today, hoping we would all learn something from it. Enjoy and comment!

To the beginner buying an acoustic guitar can be an over whelming decision. They come in a myriad of body shapes, all with different specifications and woods. How are you supposed to know what makes one better than the other? In this article we will look at some of the various tone woods that acoustic guitars are made of, and how they impact the sound.

First off I want to say that tone is a very subjective. The words and images I use to describe tone may be different than the ones you use. So while these kinds of articles are good as a guide, there is no substitute for your own experiences and using your own ears. Go out and play a bunch of guitars and be your own judge in the end.

Acoustic guitars generally use one type of wood for the top, and another type of wood for the back and sides. Occasionally you may see one type of wood for the back, and another for the sides, but usually they are the same.

Top Woods

Spruce is by far the most common top wood. It comes in many varieties including Sitka, Englemann, and Adirondack, to name a few. It is a sturdy, stable wood with a high strength to weight ratio, well suited for guitar tops.

Sitka spruce is a good all around wood, being to stand up to heavy strumming and picking, but on the right guitar also being responsive enough for a light fingerstyle player. Of course a lot of this is dependent on how the guitar is built and braced. Sitka spruce has a very loud strong tone, with a decent amount of sustain. I feel as a top wood it tends to emphasize the fundamentals more than the overtones, but there is enough there to keep the sound interesting.

Engelmann spruce is lighter in weight and less stiff than sitka. It responds well to a lighter attack, resulting in a more immediate sound, and one more lush with overtones than the other varieties of spruce. Folks say that Engelmann does not hold up as well to heavy strumming. I can’t verify this, I only know I have really enjoyed the Engelmann topped that I have played fingerstyle. I have a pretty light attack, so they seem to suit me quite well.

Appalachian or red spruce was widely used before World War II. A lot of the great pre war Martin guitars are topped with red spruce. Then the wood was over harvested and folks began switching over to sitka. Red spruce is a fairly heavy and stiff wood. It has good volume, a lot of dynamic range, and generally favors the fundamentals though also includes a good amount of overtones in the sound. Red spruce is generally very expensive as guitar top, and usually only available as an upgrade.

Besides spruce, cedar is another fairly common top wood seen on acoustic guitars. It is much softer than spruce, and more prone to nicks and dings. The appealing thing about cedar is it sounds rich and played in from the start. It responds very well to a light attack, and is a popular top wood among fingerstyle guitar players. Cedar top with rosewood back and sides will make for a very rich and deep sounding guitar right from the start. If you want a lot of clarity and note separation this may not be the ideal top wood for you. Some folks say cedar does not hold up that well to vigorous strumming or a harder attack, and that the sound breaks up or gets muddy. I can’t verify this for myself.

Irish guitarist John Doyle plays a cedar topped Lowden and he is quite a rocking player.

Another topwood you will see sometimes is Redwood. It is said to be the best of both worlds, combining the sensitivity and richness of cedar with the durability and volume of spruce. Folks I know who have redwood topped guitars rave about them, so definitely worth checking out.

Back and Side woods

One of the most common side woods is Rosewood. It has a lot of, richness, volume, and sustain that many players find very appealing. Indian rosewood is the most common and available choice these days. Brazillian Rosewood is another option, though it is a very expensive upgrade. It is illegal to import Brazillian Rosewood logs now, so most of the supply that guitar builders have is from before the ban, making it very limited and desirable.

The other common back and side wood is Mahogany. It is lighter and less dense than rosewood. In my opinion mahogany is kind of under valued as a guitar wood, with folks usually opting for the richer sounding rosewood. Obviously this depends on the sound you want and playing style, but mahogany is a very fine back and side wood. It will have a drier, more fundamental sound than rosewood, with good clarity and note separation. Paired with either a spruce or cedar top a guitar with mahogany back and sides will be a good recording instrument, with a clear fundamental sound easily captured by the mics. Often rich sounding rosewood guitars are great sounding to the player and an audience, but can be harder to record.

Maple is another wood you will sometimes see for the back and sides. It has a very bright and penetrating sound, but paired with the right wood can make for a great sounding guitar.

Other woods you will sometimes see for the back and sides are cocobolo, ebony, Honduran rosewood, and zirocote. These are less common, probably more seen on higher end instruments. They all have a very rich sound, with some people comparing them to brazillian rosewood. Ebony in particular is very dense, and will make for a heavy guitar.

Hopefully that sheds some light on the various guitar woods and will give you some ideas of what to look for when shopping around. Depending on what price range you are looking in, you may not run into all these options, but they are good to know about. And above all else, let your ears be the final judge, not what folks say on the internet.

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OK, I know we all have this thing with looking out for new and impressive guitars, it’s like guitar porn as one of you guys said once.

Yesterday a friend of mine sent me this by mail and since I own a Variax guitar, which can be easily considered a chameleon guitar, it got me started!

I personally didn’t know at first where to put it so I put it both in acoustic guitars and modeling guitars categories since it has a bit from both.

Personally I am not a big fan of resonators, but I must admit this guitar would be great in someone’s guitar collection, isn’t it?

I only ask myself wouldn’t be a be difficult to carry it around with all those wood “sound boards”? I mean, hey, guys, wait a minute please, to switch my sound board to something else. Yeah, now we’re talking!

And yes, of course, I said you will also be interested in it, so here it is, the chameleon guitar from MIT:

Well, would you buy one or not?

By the way, here’s the original article(PDF).

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I’m not into cigar box guitars, the fact is that I understand them as a step in the evolution of the guitars, I recognize the historical value, but I can not go beyond this point.

Well, this morning, I stumbled upon this set of pictures on Flick, very interesting guitars made of a cigar box, a lunch box, etc. I don’t know if they actually play, but they sure look interesting.

Well, at that moment I wasn’t decided to post this here, but I guess today the lady with the horoscope must have planed something for me, because from another source, I reached this site here and that was the end of it. I just had to post this here since it seems that cigar box guitars keep on following me this morning.

By the way, does any of you have such guitars at home? What kind of strings do you put on this guitars? Normal ones? Or what?

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Following yesterday’s post about travel guitars, I have started to pay some thinking…would such a guitar be good for me? I mean I am not looking for an electric travel guitar because I don’t think I would ever go hiking and take the electric with me, but an acoustic guitar would be perfect for my way of life.

So, here I go to Amazon to see what I can find. I can tell you I have never thought about buying such a toy, but now, I really consider it. So thanks, Zack for the tip!

To my surprise, there are a few nice acoustic alternatives, one that sounds nice and doesn’t cost much is Washburn Steel String Travel Acoustic Guitar.

Honestly, so far this sounds to me like a good choice for somebody who never had such a guitar before and would want to go play it by the fire. Price is $149.

I immediately looked for a YT video to see what it sounds like…sounds better than I expected!

See here:

Another alternative would be Montana MTG1 Travel Guitar (picture), this one comes at only $96 so it’s even cheaper. The only video I could find for it it’s here, turn the volume a bit louder cause it’s low. Doesn’t sound bad, IMO, but I would have wanted to hear it in more videos.

Another one that I see as a good choice would be Martin Backpacker Steel String Compact Acoustic Travel Guitar, comes at $199. Sounds good and looks…interesting (?) IMO.

Another choice would be Johnson JGTR1 Trailblazer Travel Guitar, I guess, for the price of $104, I couldn’t find any video for it so I don’t know how it sounds.

What do you know, I could also find an acoustic-electric travel guitar, Applecreek Acoustic-Electric Travel Guitar, for the price of $99.95 (the one in the picture on the left)

I stop here for the moment, I can see that the rule of PD with $300 guitar applies everywhere here, seems they all come under $200, at least those that I could find today.

One thing I know for sure, the fact that these little acoustic guitars got my attention and I will keep an eye on them, I will probably end buying one, just for the moments with my friends around the fire.

So, in case you know more about this field, can you recommend me one?

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So far I have tested my recording toy only with the Variax. This is because I really didn’t need anything else, my Variax guitar provides me all the tones I need, including acoustic tones which are pretty realistic.

However, suddenly I started to ask myself how my acoustic guitar would sound recorded through TonePort UX1. So far I didn’t try it because, to my shame, I didn’t have a battery for the EQ, it ran out and because I didn’t have the need of using it on stage lately, I forgot to buy one. So yesterday while buying some groceries I remembered about it and bought a battery also.

I started to record my acoustic and because I didn’t have anything planed, I started to play Tears in heaven, just to see how it sounds. When listening it, I started to improvise over the backing track and…I kept the record and decided to upload it here.

I must admit it has a few bumps and off-tempo notes, because it was recorded in one take, I could have removed them, actually I even recorded 2 other better versions of the solo part but none had the same feeling like this one, so I decided to keep it. Despite the fact that it is not perfect, this version is the most soulful.

So because it made me think of autumn and love, I called it…Autumn love. Not very original, I know, but hey, I didn’t think too much of it, it was an impulse name. I also put up a small video, following Dr J‘s example.

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Today I am in an acoustic mood again, so after browsing YT for a short while, when I found this video I immediately wanted to share it with you.

I really like this kind of music, relaxes me and makes me think of a quiet evening by the fire, with a glass of red wine, playing my acoustic guitar after a long day at the office. Should be also winter or autumn, I think, but not necessarily…

By the way, did you notice that when it comes to playing the acoustic guitar, there is no moment of the day better than…the night?

And now sit back, relax and let the song flow…

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I guess today I am in an acoustic mood, who knows, I have watched a few videos on YT with live performances with just a guitar and a voice and I have decided to post here a video of Avril Lavigne live.

The reason for which I post this video here is that I really liked how the rhythm goes on guitar and how they both managed to transmit energy and freshness with only one guitar, no drums, no bass. I like how the guitar player plays the fast rhythm passages on acoustic guitar. If you would have asked me I would have said that punk needs electric guitars. Well, how about it, works great with only a voice and an acoustic guitar if you have the right artist.

How do you find it?

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Patience was the song that really turned me to rock music and I have always thought the sound there is the most you can get from an acoustic guitar.

The sound is so clean and warm that nothing can beat it and the fact there are no drums there gave me the feeling of being closer to the song, like the song was recorded by a few guys playing the guitar for fun, like we used to do at one party or another…

Now I have discovered on YT this version of Patience played by Velvet Revolver and even if they didn’t change that much to it, the new voice makes it sound different while keeping the rest of it makes it sound the same. New and still the same, does it make any sense to you?

How do you like this version? Did you know it?

PS: Listen closely, did one of the guitar players played a flat note on 1:21 or is it just me?! I love those moments!!

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I am quite excited everytime I read something about fingerstyle guitar players. I don’t play this way, but I enjoy every second watching one of these guys playing. I have posted here a couple of videos of Sungha Jung, a fingerstyle guitar player of only 11 yo, I have posted about Andy McKee also, I have posted about Phil Keaggy, which I consider to be one of the best ever…

Today I have seen this video of Don Ross, a true artist! Here’s a beautiful performance, a beautiful song and a very smooth way of playing the guitar!

Enjoy and comment!

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Thanks to yesterday discussion about locking tuners vs Floyd Rose systems, Jon of GuitarNoize.com pointed me to this video. It is very interesting to watch a custom process of how a guitar can be particularly tuned/prepared for playing, after a solid analyze of the neck, strings, etc.

It’s a process of very fine tuning and I am not speaking here about tuning the strings to a particular note, but tuning the guitar itself. Seems that it doesn’t matter, electric guitars or acoustic guitars, they can all go through this process.

What do you think? Is it useful or is just a fancy thing? Would you do it? I wonder how much such a custom fine tuning process costs?

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