The Jazz Guitar Chord Dictionary

View Poll Results: What do you prioritize when selecting string gauge?

Voters
126. You may not vote on this poll
  • I prioritize playability. Tone is secondary.

    26 20.63%
  • I prioritize tone. Playability is secondary.

    27 21.43%
  • I compromise tone and playability to achieve a balance.

    60 47.62%
  • I don't care about your silly poll.

    13 10.32%
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  1. #1

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    The poll pretty much sums it up. I was thinking lately about my own thought process in deciding on strings. I think on some guitars I choose strings weighing on tone too much to the detriment of playability/health.

    I am curious what you all think. Have you considered how you approach this?

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  3. #2

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    I used to have guitars with round wound 9s for bends, and guitars with flat wound 13s (or 14s) for jazz. Now I just have the second kind.

  4. #3

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    imo,...

    Thin strings have a brighter low end, and a brighter low end is a priority to me. I don't like a muddy bottom.

    Thinner strings also feel better to me, .10 or .09.

    So there is no compromise.

    Solid-body guitars and semi-hollow guitars are what I like. And semi-hollow body guitars are really just solid-body guitars that look jazzy.

    Hollow body guitars, I have one, not my thing, should sell it.

  5. #4
    Quote Originally Posted by BigDaddyLoveHandles
    I used to have guitars with round wound 9s for bends, and guitars with flat wound 13s (or 14s) for jazz. Now I just have the second kind.
    Sounds like you go for the style of play/feel and tone is what it is. Would that be an accurate assumption? There are tone shaping techniques but not so much can change the feel aside from action and gauge...

  6. #5
    Quote Originally Posted by fep
    imo,...

    Thin strings have a brighter low end, and a brighter low end is a priority to me. I don't like a muddy bottom.

    Thinner strings also feel better to me, .10 or .09.

    So there is no compromise.

    Solid-body guitars and semi-hollow guitars are what I like. And semi-hollow body guitars are really just solid-body guitars that look jazzy.

    Hollow body guitars, I have one, not my thing, should sell it.

    Very interesting, so both the desired feel and tone coexist at the same point on the graph for you. Cool!

  7. #6

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    Quote Originally Posted by achase4u
    Sounds like you go for the style of play/feel and tone is what it is. Would that be an accurate assumption? There are tone shaping techniques but not so much can change the feel aside from action and gauge...
    I find it hard to separate. I like the higher tension of heavier gauges -- that would be feel. But I also like their tone -- it's hard to describe but I call it more piano-like.

    Lighter gauge strings sound kind of "plinky" to me, but I used them for rock so overdrive/distortion took care of that. Again, lighter gauge was to enable easy bending, so style of play.

  8. #7
    Quote Originally Posted by BigDaddyLoveHandles
    I find it hard to separate. I like the higher tension of heavier gauges -- that would be feel. But I also like their tone -- it's hard to describe but I call it more piano-like.

    Lighter gauge strings sound kind of "plinky" to me, but I used them for rock so overdrive/distortion took care of that. Again, lighter gauge was to enable easy bending, so style of play.
    It's absolutely more piano-like, if you ask me. I enjoy that as well. The string doesn't seem to vary in pitch as much when struck as lighter strings tend to. The latter being something I associate with rock a bit more.

    For me, there is a point at which the tone is desired but the feel may be too stiff. Feel being a spectrum from "ease of play" to "desired stiffness" etc.
    I'm always searching for the sort of nexus where all things are most optimal. I have a hard time going down from 13s on my archtop as they sound very good, however they are a bit more taxing than I would like in order to be relatively comfortable. Part of that is the fact that as gauge goes up, the margin of tension between strings in the set increases. Therefore a low E(or any other string) and wound G on a set of 13s are more lbs apart than a set of 12s etc. Enter Thomastiks and La Bella, Pyramid etc.

  9. #8

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    I don't choose string gauge, my guitar does that; it has a roller nut with rollers above and below each string and I have always fed it the biggest gauge that fits.

  10. #9

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    I am unable to play properly on any gauge, so I am in the lucky position to choose exclusively by tone :-)

  11. #10

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    String gauge is about playabillty.

  12. #11

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    I tried several options to get good tone and playability and it wasn't working for me so eventually I had to face that I had to tune down. I play a whole step down and it solved my issues. I play 10s on rock, general playing guitars and 12s for jazz. The lower tuning makes the notes sound fatter on their own so I ended up not needing overly thick strings, ironically. I learned all the notes in my new tuning.

  13. #12

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    Quote Originally Posted by Clint 55
    I tried several options to get good tone and playability and it wasn't working for me so eventually I had to face that I had to tune down. I play a whole step down and it solved my issues. I play 10s on rock, general playing guitars and 12s for jazz. The lower tuning makes the notes sound fatter on their own so I ended up not needing overly thick strings, ironically. I learned all the notes in my new tuning.
    That's a good point. Tuning down a step or so automatically makes a guitar sound better to my ears. I bet that's why Pat used a baritone guitar (with an unusual tuning) on One Quiet Night.

    The tuning is a "low Nashville" -- take a baritone A tuning A-D-G-C-E-A but have the middle two strings raised an octave.


  14. #13
    Quote Originally Posted by Clint 55
    I tried several options to get good tone and playability and it wasn't working for me so eventually I had to face that I had to tune down. I play a whole step down and it solved my issues. I play 10s on rock, general playing guitars and 12s for jazz. The lower tuning makes the notes sound fatter on their own so I ended up not needing overly thick strings, ironically. I learned all the notes in my new tuning.
    This is part of why I am thinking I will change to an unwound G. The wound G is so tight that it is actually a little choked. I like the stability, but an unwound G is lower tension and really ends up sounding fatter because of it.

  15. #14

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    Yeah, I find that you get diminishing returns with bass as the gauge goes up. Fatter strings are bassier, but higher tension reduces the bass response.

  16. #15

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    Quote Originally Posted by BigDaddyLoveHandles
    Tuning down a step or so automatically makes a guitar sound better to my ears.
    I like it. Been with this tuning for about 5 years now, wow.

  17. #16

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    Hmmm...


  18. #17

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    That's a weird looking guitar. :P

  19. #18

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    Joey Landreth talking about gauges .19 to .64 for open C tuning which is about the same tension as .13 in a standard tuning. See 12:00 of the video.

    Last edited by fep; 08-31-2021 at 07:50 PM.

  20. #19

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    Not for the 1st strings.

  21. #20

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    I have Three very different styles of guitars and each one gets a different type of string One is a Jazz box with two under wound alnico 2 humbuckers and I have pure nickel Flat wound 11 on it. Another is a Thin line tele with vintage single coils alnico 5 and It has Half round nickel plated 10 on it. And the last one is a strat with vintage ceramic single coil and it has pure steel 9 on it. This way I have three different tones from each guitar.

  22. #21

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    For me it's 12s or 13s, usually TI Jazz Swings.
    I replace the top two plain strings with Elixirs though. They last much longer, basically as long as the wound strings do.

    I'm going to try a set of 11s with a wound G on my Les Paul, it currently has TI 13s on it but when I last played it at a rehearsal (not jazz) I didn't really like the feel or tone... it was hard to play and had a dull sound that I wasn't enjoying much.

    I tend to let the guitar pick what gauge... some guitars speak better with lighter strings. Heavy strings can make a guitar sound choked or dull sounding. Likewise, light strings can make some guitars sound really thin and weak.

  23. #22

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    Depends on the guitar, but I use the heaviest strings that give me the tension I need for the style of music I'm playing.

    Usually TI Bebop 13s for jazz, Phosphor Bronze 12s for acoustic and 10-52 for rock.

    Certainly some brands of strings sound better than others, but for me it's mostly about how they feel.

  24. #23

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    I use round wound 9s on my solid bodies for the most part, with flat wound 10's on one tele and my Albatross, and flat 11s on my hollow body. I have a fairly light touch, and will almost immediately put down a guitar that's strung with 12s or higher. Martin bronze 10's on my acoustic.

  25. #24

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    It isn't a matter of prioritizing tone or playability over the other. My archtop is set up for a certain sound and feel (flatwound 12's for a more percussive/staccato tone and resistance to hard picking). My semi and strat are set up for more sustaining sound, legato feel, allow for bending, and to sound better with overdrive (round wound 10's). I don't see these as trade-offs. I just see them as different ways to set up the instrument for different styles of playing. In terms of warm/fat vs bright/thin sounds, I don't find gauge actually makes much difference. I find them all equally easy to play (up to a point, e.g., it's harder to bend 12's, and marginally harder to play fast alternate picking on 10's).

  26. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by John A.
    It isn't a matter of prioritizing tone or playability over the other. My archtop is set up for a certain sound and feel (flatwound 12's for a more percussive/staccato tone and resistance to hard picking). My semi and strat are set up for more sustaining sound, legato feel, allow for bending, and to sound better with overdrive (round wound 10's). I don't see these as trade-offs. I just see them as different ways to set up the instrument for different styles of playing. In terms of warm/fat vs bright/thin sounds, I don't find gauge actually makes much difference. I find them all equally easy to play (up to a point, e.g., it's harder to bend 12's, and marginally harder to play fast alternate picking on 10's).
    So in other words, you find that a given gauge and type of string gives you everything you need and they are simply synonymous or intersect? I like the flatwound percussive/staccato thing as well.

    I remember Jim Campilongo on his forum saying lighter strings were easier on the left hand and harder on the right, while the opposite was true of heavier strings. Of course, it seems like lowering the action negates the left hand issue unless you set the action the same on all instruments. However the right hand point seems to ring true. I used to think there was no way anything was easier on bigger strings. The picking thing makes sense to me now, though after playing 13s. The shredders on 9s get my respect as those things wobble around like crazy.

    Bending aside, it seems most instruments can be set up to feel close to the same despite gauge. As for warm/fat thin/bright, if electrified it does seem to be less gauge oriented. I can set the knobs and amp so they sound quite similar. After I am no longer playing the instrument and it is recorded, it's even harder to tell.
    I find I get a little more sustain and bounce to the sound with 12 flats vs 13. For me, I do have a bit harder time playing the 13s but I do prefer the sound I seem to get. That's why it seems to be a bit more of a compromise to go to 12s, for me.