Natural Acoustic Archtop Sound - How to Amplify?

[Paul Hughes]

Hi,

I know it's been asked before on different sites but technology appears to be moving on and I'd be interested if anyone has any experience of getting a good natural acoustic archtop sound from a piezo, floating bridge pick-up, transducer set up etc. I'm looking for an amplified acoustic sound - so magnetic pickups are out.

Here's the issue - I have a Loar LH 700. Sounds great and clearly the most natural amplified sound is to use use my AT - 4033 LDC mic that sounds great live. However when playing solo spots without my band I've started adding percussion via a cajon with pedals. The drum drowns out the guitar on an LDC so I need a plug-in option now and then. The LH 700 is acoustic only and I want to preserve as much acoustic charater as possible. I know it's a compromise but what of the current crop of options have people tried and what gets closest to reproduced a natural archtop acoustic sound?

Transducers at the F-holes?
Piezo under bridge style?
Piezo in floating bridge pick ups?

I'd love to hear any expereinces or recordings.

I'm currently considering the Fishman Archtop floating bridge piezo. The "pick up the world" doesn't look permanent enough for me. Looks a bit fiddly and is visible.

[kris]

What about floating humbucker mounted to the pickguard?

[Paul Hughes]

A magnetic pcikup is not an option for getting an acoustic sound and the LH700 does not have a pickguard.

[fws6]

I have no experience with this pickup Pure Western - K&K Sound but I used their bass version for years with good results getting the very natutral upright sound I was after.

Fishman makes an archtop bridge with piezo installed in it. In my opinion piezo's no matter which brand or how expensive will always sound a bit harsh. And any type of mic will get you into trouble with a drummer.

Mind you, one big drive behind the magnetic pickup was that people started to play with drummers / at louder volumes in the 1930s ! You are facing the same dilemma and re-living a part of guitar history.

For players who alternatively play with / without drummers, I know luthier Frans Elferink here in the Netherlands is installing a floating magnetic pickup on his guitars, with a goose neck mic inside the body, and a mix knob on the guard. That way the player can shape the sound / get a very nice acoustic sound / manage feedback in a variety of settings.

[cmajor9]

Another option is the "Pick Up The World" pickup. I have no personal experience, but its touted as a better (more natural sounding) type of piezo. You could also do what some artists, notably Martin Taylor, do, and blend magnetic and piezo output - IMO he gets a great sound this way, warm but detailed.

[Paul Hughes]

Has anyone tried the Fishman Archtop bridge? Couldn't find any examples of youtube etc.

[kamlapati]

I have some experience...

I have a K&K Archtop PU newly mounted in my Trenier Magnolia, and I'm not happy with it. Of course, it could be that it's not installed correctly, or it's not a match for this guitar, but nevertheless... It seems to amplify some funny resonances, perhaps from the strings behind the bridge or above the nut. It also feeds back at low volume. It's usable in an emergency, but it requires significant EQ, and I'll use a mic whenever I can.





A few years ago I had a PUTW underbridge strip on my Epi Blackstone. The guitar and PU now reside with my daughter, so I can't compare it side by side with the K&K. But I certainly don't remember any problems with it. I plugged it in at numerous open mics without a care and I was always satisfied. Now, I know that my ear changes over the years, I get more sensitive to some things, etc., but, that really was my experience at the time.

I have enough experience with guitars, PUs, and sound systems to know that no anecdote is definitive. Don't read these like that, but still... they are data points.

[rpguitar]

Honestly, this problem was solved decades ago before all of the transducer options were available. Use a condenser microphone. Yes, it can be a pain. But it is the only thing that translates an acoustic instrument's tone into electrons to be amplified.

One of today's premier acoustic archtop players, Julian Lage, has a small condenser mounted to the tailpiece of his 1930s L-5. Other players plant one in front of the guitar on a stand. Yes, it can be clumsy, but it makes the right sound.

[Paul Hughes]

Kamlapati, many thanks. Interesting to hear.

rpguitar, I have an AT 4033 and an AT350. As mentioned at the top, they don't work for this scenario as the cajon bleeds into them too much and wipes out the guitar - hence the need for a non-mic solution.

I'm surprised nobody has tried the Fishman Archtop bridge. I can't seem to find any audio samples or youtube clips of it either. Perhaps that says something. Anyone tried it?

[kamlapati]

I'm surprised nobody has tried the Fishman Archtop bridge. I can't seem to find any audio samples or youtube clips of it either. Perhaps that says something. Anyone tried it?

The bridge is an integral part of the design and sound of an archtop, so replacing the bridge goes against all my principles. Just one man's vote.

[Kojo27]

The bridge is an integral part of the design and sound of an archtop, so replacing the bridge goes against all my principles. Just one man's vote.

I was thinking a similar thing as I checked out the Fishman bridge/pickup. It's ebony, but some guitars just sound better with a rosewood bridge -- so how can one possibly amplify that sound, if it's the one the player likes, when one of the main components of the sound is taken away?

Maybe that's being too finicky.

>>> I'd like to experiment with the types of pickups used by violinists, cellists, etc. Seems that would just about nail it. Also, I'd like to try the "feather pickup" - which looks much like a feather and mounts wherever you like, with a piece of tape.

I agree though - the .mp3 sample is dead on. I have a "The Loar" (stupid name) just like that, and now I know how to mic it, when using a condenser mic is too inconvenient. Thanks for that.

[Synchro]

Just sort of thinking out loud here: IMHO, possibly something like the Baggs Duet system on my Godin classical which combines a piezo with an acoustic mic.

[papaj77]

I used to have miniflex mic in my flattop and it was wonderful it sure will work with archtop.

they are great, there is few videos on youtube so you can check it

[oldane]

The bridge is an integral part of the design and sound of an archtop, so replacing the bridge goes against all my principles. Just one man's vote.

Well, I don't think it's THAT critical. I don't believe that a particular guitar will only play well with the particular bridge delivered with the instrument. The material and shape for archtop bridges is very much a matter of tradition (though Jimmy D'Aquisto tried to revise the design on some of his models). Personally I haven't found any huge difference in sound when replacing one bridge saddle with another one (which I have done because with my setup my guitars intonate better with a compensated bridge saddle than with a slanted straight one, which is commonly supplied). If one changes the material, there will be an audible change in sound - for example when replacing a wood bridge with a metal tunomatic and sometimes also when replacing ebony with rosewood and vice versa. The mass of the bridge also plays a role (more massive bridges tend to dampen the upper frequencies, which may or may not be desirable, depending on how bright one wants the tone). I have more than once experienced a slight change in tone to the better (for my taste) when replacing the bridge saddle for the intonation reasons. In fact, I would encourage people to try various bridge saddles to see what sounds best to their ears. It's easy, non invasive and not expensive. I do believe that one should keep the bridge base, if possible, if one doesn't want to fit a new one to the guitar top. The good fit of the base is very important to the sound. Luckily, many of the available bridges and bridge saddles comes with standard 2 29/32" post spacing, so swapping saddles on an existing base is easy.

All that said, I have never liked the sound of piezo PUs. If using a condensor mic on a stand is not an option - and that does happen - one may be forced to use them, but frankly, I find that peizos sounds like a monkey farting in a tin can.

[Snap]

I've tried the Fishman bridge. Thin, harsh and nasty. I have K&K Western minis and archtop pickups in some of my guitars. They sound nice and were fine for some time. But later i've tried the Schaller Oyster and the B-band AST. Even better and more realistic for my ears than the K&Ks. I'll progressively replace them all.

Magnetic pickups have a sound, but they sound electric even if they are intended for bronze strings. They give that lo-mids hump than no acoustic guitar has. That's the electric guitar world IMO, not a natural sound. Don't get too crazy about mics on-stage. Grab an AST and avoid the hassles forever.

[RayC]

I have an older Kalamazoo kg-31 acoustic archtop and I installed the K&K Pure Archtop transducers inside at the f holes. I think it sounds pretty natural. As stated above it can feedback, but I've been able to deal with this in my amp's eq. Once I get it dialed out it's good. I don't play facing the amp

[fep]

Re: a piezo... have you heard one through a Fishman Aura pedal. If I understand it correctly, it's an eq on steroids in that it has something like a thousand bands of eq. They've got settings to convert the piezo sound back to a natural acoustic sound.

It's really pretty amazing how it sounds like a natural acoustic guitar. I've heard it on a dreadnought and a classical but not on an archtop.

Edit, I found this Fishman Aura, here's an excerpt:

One of the most interesting recent developments in this field, however, sidesteps the limitations of conventional pickup systems altogether, using real-time digital processing to achieve the desired result. The Aura Acoustic Imaging Blender, from US-based acoustic-guitar pickup specialists, Fishman Transducers, uses AST (Acoustic Spectral Transform) technology developed (but never marketed) by Akai, to take a known frequency response, say that of an under-saddle piezo transducer on a particular guitar, and transform it in real time into that of a specific microphone pointed at the same guitar. Effectively it's EQ, but very sophisticated multi-band digital EQ along with some phase manipulation within the very narrow individual bands that make up the whole transform. The Aura divides the spectrum between 20Hz and 20kHz into about 2000 bands, each of which may receive individual amplitude and phase adjustment to get to the desired target response.

Fishman engineers initially establish the sonic 'signature' of the guitar as heard via its pickup system, exciting the guitar's resonances in every way they can think of and averaging the result. They then record the rather different spectrum as detected by an optimally placed microphone when the same stimuli are applied. The result is a frequency/phase transfer characteristic, or Sound Image, capable of transforming one sound into the other. The concept is not entirely new; 'fingerprint EQ' as it is often referred to, has been available for as long as there have been fast enough computers around to do it, with one of the most successful recent implementations being TC Electronic's Assimilator software for their Powercore co-processor card. The Aura, however, does it in real time in a floor box, and it does it affordably!

[Jazz_175]

A magnetic pcikup is not an option for getting an acoustic sound and the LH700 does not have a pickguard.

I once tried an Archtop mounting a Bendetto floating pick up, and, for what I remember, it retains to a large extent, the acoustic quality of the guitar.

I put a Gibson floating mini-humbucker on my archtop. The sound is nice as long as you play at low volumes. It seems just like an acoustic guitar with more volume.
When I go up with volume the sound becomes hotter and the guitar has a lot of feedback. Very unpleasent. I am thinking of changing it with a Benedetto or
with some of the options I am reading from this thread.

[Paul Hughes]

I like the idea of an AST but can't see how you would fit it inside an archtop.

Is the "pick up the world" an AST? I'm confused now.

Still tempted by the K&K for ease of fitting.

Will try the AT 350 as well for a while and see what happens.

What's clear is that there's clearly a market for a natural sounding, easy to fit archtop pick up.

[kamlapati]

The "Pick Up the World" is certainly not the same product as the B-Band AST, but it could be based on the same transducer technology. The form factor and mounting techniques certainly have a lot of overlap.

This topic pops up every couple of months. This version of the thread has some new options, so I'll keep trying to find something I like.

[pingu]

I used to have miniflex mic in my flattop and it was wonderful it sure will work with archtop.
they are great, there is few videos on youtube so you can check it

How you gonna get that into an archtop ?

[papaj77]

How you gonna get that into an archtop ?

There is few models one of them is mounted outside guitar, and you can put the mic into the F-hole.

[Jabberwocky]

What about the Schertler Dyn-G transducer?

[Paul Hughes]

Jabberwocky,

I did look at it but there are a number of things that put me off the Dyn-G

1) The price - It's around £500 ($750, E600). I think it's over priced.
2) I really don't like the idea of sticking a mic with putty to the front of the guitar because it's nitro cellulose (I know it shouldn't affect it) but also because it looks terrible and can fall off easily.
3) Reviews indicate it does feed back at lower levels. Might as well use my Audio Technica 350.

If there was an internal mount version at a lower price I would probably be interested.

[Jabberwocky]

Another expensive solution: the AMT S15G. I'm of no help but I'm just throwing it out there.