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Posts: 3532
Joined: Oct. 20 2003
From: Phoenix, AZ
Picking up the Pickup
At noon today, a few hours, I will pick up my guitar, plunk down $200, and go home to plug in. I am having an LR Baggs I-beam classical pickup with preamp installed into my fine Vicente Carillo guitar. The pickup is light and adheres to the bottom of the bridge. The preamp is tiny and there will be a small wheel accessible by poking a finger into the soundhole, that controls the volume. And there will be a hole to stick an XLR cable into, at the endblock. I am sick to death of carrying around heavy micstands, putting on mics, and dealing with feedback and room noise. Now I will just have to plug and play, a la Microsoft. The next step is to get a wireless system to I won't even have to worry about a cord.
I have messed around with the guitar and the new pickup...am not impressed, so far. The trebles sound muddy and the brilliance which is characteristic of this guitar is not apparent. Strumming sounds kind of muddy too. It seems that the bass strings are louder than the mid range strings. In fact, everything has kind of a mid-rangey sound here.
The acoustic qualities of the guitar seem to have been unaffected.
ORIGINAL: Miguel de Maria I have messed around with the guitar and the new pickup...am not impressed, so far. The trebles sound muddy and the brilliance which is characteristic of this guitar is not apparent. Strumming sounds kind of muddy too. It seems that the bass strings are louder than the mid range strings. In fact, everything has kind of a mid-rangey sound here. The acoustic qualities of the guitar seem to have been unaffected.
Yep , been there. Mike, you need to learn how to work with this.
1. First of all, where's your EQ? You HAVE to EQ a piezo pickup to scoop the mid range, it will sound **** otherwise. My Tak has an onboard pre-amp which does this nicely, I also tweak things with my PA.
2. Secondly, string balance can be a real problem. The greater the mass/tension of the string, the more energy is transmitted thru to the piezo via pressure on the saddle and these things are very sensitive.
On one of my guitars, a classical with a Fishman pickup fitted, it sounds great (unplugged) with D'Addario EJ45C composites. However, if I gig with it (plugged in) I have to use different strings to get better balance, as the composite G used to just shout out louder than everything else (denser material).
Apart from trying out different brands/makes of strings, you can get a saddle better suited to balancing strings with a pickup, your current one wasn't designed with this in mind.. Taks come with these fitted, so my string balance is very even. Take a google on 'palathetic' pick ups.
3. Finally, you will improve your sound further still with the subtle use of some effects.
You probably noticed that your getting an ugly, plastic, kind of in-your-face sound, right? You can tame this by using a preamp/fx unit that has mic emulation on it. This creates the feeling of 'space' that you get by micing up guitar.
Secondly, when played unplugged, you guitar will have all sorts of lovely natural resonances and overtones, and a natural 'reverb' all of its own produced by the soundbox. Now the piezo is simply transmitting the energy from the nylon string as it touches the saddle into an electrical signal - in other words, al those lovely natural woody resonances aren't there.
The solution is a little chorus, and a little reverb, it works wonders to lessen the harshness of the piezo sound.
(BTW I use a Zoom 504 for all this except the EQ)
Don't despair Mike, it took me a while to get a sound I could live with. Now however, I am very pleased with it. It will never sound as good as a decent guitar unplugged, but you can certainly make massive improvements.
ORIGINAL: Miguel de Maria Now I will just have to plug and play, a la Microsoft. The next step is to get a wireless system to I won't even have to worry about a cord.
Which reminds me that I must remind ( or nag ) Harold about his pick up and get it out there in the market place, or at least mail order from our website. We've got some great feedback from guitarists (and violinists and celloists) who have tried it out live on stage. Its small, light and especially designed for flamencos and will cost a lot less than others I have seen out there, oh and its wireless.
I'll take a protoype down to Anders in is guitar shop here in Granada so he can give a professional opinion.
You got me really intrigued here, Kate. Any chance you could get Harold to post some details about the pickup?
-how it works (is it essentially a microphone, transducer piezo, something else ??) -what design considerations make it especially useful for flamencos? -how/where it is attached -frequency response range -what spec preamp it uses, what controls are available to the user -details on the wireless transmitter/receiver -how much it is likely to cost
Thanks Jon, my partner Arturo came over here and we put it through my Fishman ProEQ II, and it is sounding better. I have reverb from the PA, too. Maybe I will get something that combines the effects and EQ...
Kate, that sounds great, I would love to hear of it. If it's as good as you say it could make some money.
I was checking out Juan Carlos the King of Guitars' website. He has a "Vicente Amigo" model pickup..for $1000. I'm wondering, is his stuff really good, or it meant for people like Rudy or whatever that have more money than they know what to do with? Anyone heard anything about it?
Ok well first have to fess up that I got it wrong, its not a wireless system, Harold says why bother when the T series by Shure already exists and you can use his system with that. If you are still interested here's the rest of his answers.
It is a piezo transducer and what makes it good for flamenco is that it requires no modification to the guitar, no damage to woodwork. It attached externally and is lightweight and does not alter resonance. Its better than using a mike because you get more volume out of guitar and it reflects all the natural sounds (ie golpe) not just the strings, and of course you dont pick up the compás, cajon or teh cante siner breathing down your neck.
Its attached with blue tack ( ) where you get the best sound, what H calls the sweet spot ( could call it the G spot I suppose - G for guitar that is) > H finds his about an inch behind the bridge towards rear of guitar.
Its removable instantly for when you stand up and walk centre stage for acoustic jam round spontaneous dancing :) And cheap to replace when your dancer stamps on it by mistake. Cost, about €100.
The frequency response is 20Hz - 20,000 Hz.
No spec pre-amp as it depends on individual but H recommends any pre amp with 5 band graphic.
Hope this makes sense. If there is interest I'll nag the old man some more.
Here's something that harold wrote about pick-ups for flamenco. I'll post it just in case its of interest. I'm busy updating our website having finally learned how to do it, from Josh, one of the members of this forum also in Granada. While doing so I've found all sorts of stuff on recording flamenco so look out for the studio page on our website as I'm going to post up a few things up there this weekend given time. Here's H talking about the holy grail and how come he designed a flamenco guitar pick up ....
Searching for a pick-up that can reproduce the 'acoustic' sound of a flamenco or classical guitar is a holy-grail. You'll never find it!
Ask yourself these questions. 1) What is my reference for an 'acoustic' sound? 2) Why would I expect just the strings and bridge-piece to deliver the entire sound of the body (bearing in mind the"Inverse Square Law' with regards to the propagation of any sort of vibration? 3) Why do I need to amplify my guitar? 4) What is my main criteria for an amplified 'acoustic' guitar?
[Answers] 1) A recording, or series of favourite recordings using an external, usually top-range, microphone. 2) (rationally speaking) I would'nt. 3) Because, for 'live' performance my guitar is not loud enough. 4) Lack of feedback at high level.
O.K. The perceived 'reference' 'acoustic' guitar sound is via recordings of externally-mic'd guitarists. So we can forget the 'pick-up' as a substitute for our reference sound, unless someone is prepared to build guitars made of laminated wood and sheets of piezo film. This guitar would be capable of electrically reproducing virtually all parameters of every millimetre of the guitar's vibrations, but talk to any luthier and they will shrink with horror (laminated wood!). A classical or 'flamenco' guitar deives it's sound from the integrity of the guitar's wood and construction. So these strips of metal-clad piezo crystals cobbled into the bridge, end-pins mounted in drillings in the rear-bout and wires flapping about inside the body conform with a luthier's concept of 'integrity'-I fear not.
We need to understand that the only way to achieve this 'reference' sound is to use a microphone. So, if your guitar is not loud enough, you need to agree that the logical trade-off is sound versus volume. Ketama feature 'flamenco' guitars in their live show, but, of course, their guitars are 'off the shelf' electro-acoustic guitars with the usual squeaky-thin, bridge piezo, strings-only, sound that everyone hates, but it's Ketama, it's live and it sounds vaguely like an acoustic guitar!
You cannot externally mic-up an acoustic guitar and put a drum-kit along-side and hope to hear your playing through a 500-watt speaker pumping the mic output straight back to the mic-feeeeeeeeeeeeeeedback city! Do you want a 'reference' sound so badly that you're prepared to wear 'closed' headphones.? Your live sound engineer will have just as futile a time trying to get your guitar to sound louder than the kit in the P.A.
So we need a different 'reference' live acoustic guitar criteria. Priorities:- a) Minimum feedback. b) A sound that captures as much of a balance of the strings/body/neck/finger tapping and hammering as possible. c) No surgery on what is designed as an itegrity of wood in one complete, and unmodified, form. d) Ease of mounting, and de-mounting. e) Speed of plugging-in and unplugging (very important for a 'flamenco' players, where impromptu 'alegrias' dictate that the guitarist gets out of the seat and parades across the stage with the rest of the performers). f) Low-cost. It's possible to kit your instrument out with thousands of dollars-worth of bridge systems/internal mics/pre-amps/equalizers and, for the solution to (e), a radio-belt pack.
Talk to a professional flamenco player from Spain and they will neither have the electronic background of using amplification/pick-ups/radio links nor the money to experiment with every type of system to find their sound.
So a true 'flamenco' pick-up needs to be simple and rapidly removeable, cheap and require NO modifications to their vintage 'Conde'.
Thanks for posting Harolds thoughts, Kate. I completely agree with his point about searching for that 'holy grail' live sound, it aint gonna happen.
I see now that you are talking about a surface-mounted transducer. There are already several products on the market that do exactly what Harold describes eg:
Of course we know about all the other pick-ups. He's used and abused most makes and models over the years. If they were good enough I dont think H would have spent the time and trouble he did trying to get something that worked for flamenco. Still your reaction, reminds me why we cant be bothered to make and sell them. We'll just get a few together for the professionals out here because it makes our jobs easier and the guitarist happier.
ORIGINAL: Kate Still your reaction, reminds me why we cant be bothered to make and sell them.
??
Kate, I'm a bit bemused. You sound irritated by my post, yet I was trying to be helpful.
I have no idea what products Harold has tried out or is aware of, and offering information on similar products is (so I thought) very relevant to this thread.
I am sure Harold's pickup will be a great product.
But yep I guess I was a bit put out at the assumption we did not know of these products. Here we are in Grana happily inventing the wheel What do you mean some-one did it already
Kate, you have to forgive people like Jon who think England is still the center of the universe, although we in the US and Grana'a know better. :)
Btw Andy, I have a ghs soundhole mic and I hate it! I do like Pedro Cortez, though, I took a few lessons from him and he was very encouraging, to the point where he told me I would eventually have to leave Phoenix if I ever wanted to be good. But the GHS is big and ugly, it's a big black box that adheres to the side of your guitar!
I have realized, due to Kate's posts and some introspection, that I do have completely unrealistic hopes. Look at my needs.
1) something that produces a mellow, natural sound for classical and flamenco solo guitar playing. 2) something that gives a nice, clear picado for leads in a duo/trio situation 3) something that sounds decent when strummed aggressively, a la Gipsy Kings
It's hard to imagine anything that could do these things. I am taking my guitar in today, to get the pickup tweaked. There is a distortion in the lower registers, a weird buzzing, and an overall midrangey sound. The tech is going to change the placement of the pickup and fix the buzzing and distortion.
Mike, Well, England actually is pretty much the centre of the Universe, except for Scotland, which is, of course, the true centre. For the last eight years or so, I've spent my family holidays down there and enjoyed every minute of them, from the narrowboats around the Warwick Ring (a la Birmingham), to the beautiful Yorkshire Dales, to Cornwall and Devon (Hey I was even in Plymouth a couple of years ago...didn't see Jon busking though, although I was lookin' for him LOL!) Plymouth's a great place, with lot's of foreign holidaymakers (and young French girls who come up and ask you for cigarretes or money, when you are sitting on the pavement, trying to enjoy your Cornish Pastie from a place that claims to be the best Cornish Pastie house in the World!) We had to waste about four hours getting a connecton to Cornwall, and I remember walking down this one in five gradient that led down to the seafront past a number of very chic cafes and bars. (So I guess this is Jon's hunting ground LOL!) We stopped at one and had some refreshments (beer for me of course!) The situation is wonderful, but I wonder about those Friday and Saturday night drunks on their way home. How do they manage to make their way up that hill to the Bus Station? That's the only drawback of Plymouth IMO. Anyway, a lot better than Arizona, where you've got to drink out of Cactus plants and have big hairy, horrible spiders run up your leg and bite you and lie there in the baking sun and have the buzzards circle your parched and dying body..... At least here we can have a nice cup of tea and talk about the weather in a nice civilized fashion.
As for Harold's pickup, well, anybody who has a love for electronics will tell you that Aerials and Microphones and Pickups are a mixture of Received Science and Black Art. Piezo is just Piezo, Press on it, and you get a voltage. But as with much on the fringes of mathematical electronics, the empirical method is often the best way to go. Why is there such a price variation between mics and between pickups? (Why is there such a price and performance variation between guitars?) I mean, they are only exploiting scientific properties that have been known for more than a hundred years? Is it the crystal shape, thickness etc etc...who knows? I definitely do know that Recording Engineers are truly a breed unto themselves ( I've met a few...and they're nuts, LOL!). They feel as much dedication to their art as many of us do about the guitar. So I'd at least hold fire until you know a bit more about how it actually sounds in use and not jump to preconceived conclusions IMO. Harold might have something here.
True, true Andy. But I'm tired of strapping that thing on. I just want to plug n play. Plus, I undertake the scandalous activity of playing in groups sometimes, where I need some pretty high volumes. Last night we played for about two hundred people, on the other side of the pool at the Four Seasons. Seems Rustoleum's sales team was having a retreat here--in Phoenix. I can't imagine why they would willingly come to the Desert of Death in the summer... we had a monster gig, we played from 2-3 inside, then 6-10 outside. And the Four Seasons is about 45 min. away from civilization, so no going home... it was a long gig!
The ugliness was unsuitable for my uses, that is, high-end functions. The size, clumsiness, necessity for adjustment, need to take on and off for gigs, also compared unfavorably toward a single hole in the guitar for a guitar line. I found the sound to be dull and lacking in the definition I need to play leads and solo guitar, also without sufficient gain. Playing solo, some of these factors are mitigated, but I felt the GHS sound definitely lacks clarity. And playing in a group situation, an as I mentioned yesterday for example we were cranking a 500 watt amp to the max, it just didn't do the job.
By the way, I just got my guitar back from Precision Guitar and the tech made some tweaks with the advice of the LR Baggs people. He said to me, "so it turns out the flamenco guitar is quite different than the classical guitar in tonal qualities!" I had noticed he had kept calling my guitar a classical guitar although I told him it was a flamenco. Now he knows! I played around with the new pickup in my amp for about 15 minutes and it sounds an incredible amount better. Apparently just from some tweaks as to the placement of the pickup. I have to experiment some more and hang out with my friends to see if I really am going to like it or not, but so far, so good! And all you have to do is plug in like an electric! \
Andy, the LR Baggs Ibeam is not a piezo. It adheres to the back of the bridge, that is, the inside of the guitar. It is very natural sounding and has no pop.
Printable Version
) Harold about his pick up and get it out there in the market place, or at least mail order from our website. We've got some great feedback from guitarists (and violinists and celloists) who have tried it out live on stage. Its small, light and especially designed for flamencos and will cost a lot less than others I have seen out there, oh and its wireless. 
) where you get the best sound, what H calls the sweet spot ( could call it the G spot I suppose - G for guitar that is) > H finds his about an inch behind the bridge towards rear of guitar. 
Its the mallafolla de Grana' 
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