|
Hi Bobby,
Thanks for a fascinating story! My Godin is an Encore, and it doesn't have MIDI capability (the logic of putting MIDI on a nylon-string guitar escapes me). I tried the flats b/c the Godin's piezos are super-sensitive and pick up lots and lots of noise, and the flats mitigate that. For just a minute I tried D'A basses with carbon fiber trebles (as recommended to me by Matt Elgart) but the expense and hassle weren't worth it, as I play enough classical guitar to be able to teach beginners and do the occasional low profile gig. These days my other nylon-string guitars are strung with D'A Pro Arte High Tension strings and they work just fine for me.
Cheers,
JV
Juan Vega
-----Original Message-----
From: Bob Hansmann <bobbybmusic@...> To: [email protected] Sent: Mon, Dec 7, 2020 2:51 am Subject: Re: [Jazz-Guitar] What's your preferred guitar strings for a jazz archtop? Hi Juan.
I would imagine flat wounds on a nylon string? Godin to be effective, as so many are using the Godins to drive synth modules and patches, and flats would probably track better. I'm a dinosaur, still using AXON and hex-pickups for that, so I am totally unqualified to contribute anything of experiential value to that conversation. But the catgut strings sound great. If you have the Segovia EMI recordings, you have him on catgut strings. After Segovia got the first nylon strings from Augustine (designed by DuPont and marketed by La Bella), all bets were off for catgut because of the war - the Germans had the gut, and the Japanese had the silk (the basses were silk and steel). Segovia instantly fell in love with the enhanced brightness and longevity of nylon. But the warmth of gut was remembered, and owners of old, very collectable guitars wanted that back. The formulas and records were not published and never kept, and so were lost. It wasn't until a few decades ago that some began to try to reverse engineer the old gut strings. The very nice folks at Aquila Strings were the most successful. I spoke with them at the time, and they hadn't as yet solved the problems of high cost and short string life. Maybe they have by now. I lost interest, though, because Augustine finally cleaned up their act with their basses, and I still love and use D'Addario trebles. While I have my doubts about gut for use on a guitar which drives synth sounds, they may well be worth? a try for you. Or perhaps their Nylgut strings would fit the bill. If you're feeling 'gutsy' (pun intended), you can find them here - Anyway, I hope you're doing great also. I send you & yours all best wishes. -- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. |
