Which amp for an acoustic flat top guitar

[rockabilly69]

I like the Schertler 1st and then the AER 2nd. Im probably in the minority.

Used an AER Compact 60 for quite a while.

 

Not as compact but by far bigger much warmer and fuller sounding is my wifes old Peavey bass head and old 115 PA box.

Last acoustic gigs I did was with that overkill. Never have I had such a good acoustic sound on stage. At least not as cheaply. AER sounded small, boxy and harsh afterwards. I Sold it.

 

Used to Use my Fender Concert. Sounded fine.

The Schertler slays the AER 60 hands down, and that's what led me to my Schertler JAM-400 which is incredibly powerful! I have have at least 60 gigs on the Jam 400 and it is delivering the goods daily. But none of these amps are as good as an Allen and Heath ZED10FX mixer with a Mackie HD1221 or a QSC K12 PA Speaker. Close, but no cigar. The EQ is limited on the Schertler, it would really benefit from a sweepable mid, and the FX are decent at best, they really aren't tweakable. With the ZED10FX I can do a good double, nice slapback, a deep hall reverb, and a nice longer delay, and all are tap tempo!

[bobmeyrick]

I plug my Ovations into an AER Compact 60 and they sound fine to me - I'm not too fussy about getting a "proper" acoustic sound (hey, I'm using Ovations!). However, an old friend of mine, excellent acoustic guitarist Dylan Fowler, is fussy about getting a good sound and he uses a DPA mic attached to the guitar. He owns a studio specialising in acoustic recordings, and he reckons the DPA is an excellent choice for mic-ing an acoustic guitar. Here it is in action -

 

 

The guitar is a Shelley Park, which Dylan loves - his comments can be found at the bottom of this page on Shelley's site.

[peterbright]

Where can you get those?

[Redsand]

You WILL NOT find a better value then a used Fender Acoustisonic Jr...period, end of story.

[bobmeyrick]

Where can you get those?

Do you mean the DPA mics? If so, look here.

[rockabilly69]

I plug my Ovations into an AER Compact 60 and they sound fine to me - I'm not too fussy about getting a "proper" acoustic sound (hey, I'm using Ovations!). However, an old friend of mine, excellent acoustic guitarist Dylan Fowler, is fussy about getting a good sound and he uses a DPA mic attached to the guitar. He owns a studio specialising in acoustic recordings, and he reckons the DPA is an excellent choice for mic-ing an acoustic guitar. Here it is in action -

 

 

The guitar is a Shelley Park, which Dylan loves - his comments can be found at the bottom of this page on Shelley's site.

Those DPAs are the best of the mini condensors, and I know alot of guys that use them in tandem with USTs for a real powerful sound. The mic for the acoustic tone, and the UST for the drive of the top! Highly recommended!

[peterbright]

But $599 is a steep price to pay

[rockabilly69]

http://www.djangobooks.com/Item/audio-technica-pro-70 These are pretty good too! But personally I just use an undersaddle pickup, and I mount an external condensor on my vocal mic stand with a small boom. Here's the down and dirty setup I use with the Schertler, I lean into the mic when I need it...

 

[Keith7940236]

The Schertler slays the AER 60 hands down, and that's what led me to my Schertler JAM-400 which is incredibly powerful! I have have at least 60 gigs on the Jam 400 and it is delivering the goods daily. But none of these amps are as good as an Allen and Heath ZED10FX mixer with a Mackie HD1221 or a QSC K12 PA Speaker. Close, but no cigar. The EQ is limited on the Schertler, it would really benefit from a sweepable mid, and the FX are decent at best, they really aren't tweakable. With the ZED10FX I can do a good double, nice slapback, a deep hall reverb, and a nice longer delay, and all are tap tempo!

I just went through this exercise and ended up with the Zed 10FX and a QSC 10. Really nice set up. The Zed 10FX also had high gain input for your archtop with the humbucker. Beautiful clean tone!!

[Beagle216]

Fishman SA220 is the best amp in my opinion. Affordable and great tone.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[rockabilly69]

The thing that really bothers me is the "gummy" sound of the acoustic pick ups. I very selfishly hear an acoustic pick up that sounds somewhat close to an unplugged guitar. And if you try to overcome that, very often the sound becomes very harsh.

that's because, you don't do it for a living. Look at any pro, and you will find a pickup in their acoustic. Using a mic is not feasible in many cases as you can't get enough gain before feedback. The best way to use a mic is in a dual source setup so that you can pull the mic out when needed. So the best practical situation is a good pickup, and a preamp with effective eq that is designed to tame harsh frequencies and to also remove problem feedback causing frequencies. Just like finding the right electric guitar, pickup, fx, and amp combo, an acoustic setup is just as demanding or more so! Amps like Fender, Marshall's, Carvins, etc are coffee house or small stage amps at best, the bigger AERs and Schertlers are better, with Schertler being the only one being good enough to also handle vocals and percussion as a stand alone PA, or perhaps a Fishman SA220 or one of the Bose rigs, but the real deal requires a lot of power, flexible EQ, and at very least a good reverb as an effect. So unless your playing into a PA, you're going to need a pa like setup, that's why I listed the zed10fx and a powered pa cab. If you are playing into a good PA, I would recommend a good acoustic board, which would include a volume pedal, a good preamp (Dtar, Fishman, Baggs, Sunrise, Radial, etc), a good reverb or multi-fx unit. As for a pickup there are going to be USTs like the Fishman and Baggs, and the more accurate sounding ones Iike highlanders and dtars, magnetics like sunrise, the dimarzio angel, the Baggs m1, and soundboard transducers like the K&K and JBB internal mic systems like the Baggs anthem etc. I personally use a variety of all of the above depending on the guitar. And what type of gig I'm doing with that guitar. But I think amplifying an acoustic is a more demanding task than setting up an electric rig, I've been doing it 5 days a week since 2002 and I'm still learning.

[rockabilly69]

Fishman SA220 is the best amp in my opinion. Affordable and great tone. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Although it is a VERY good amp for what it is, and for a small vocal/guitar thing it's great, but the low end

is just not there compared to a proper cab. It won't hold a candle to what I've suggested. I've owned two

of the SA220's, the original with the overheating preamp problem, and the newer model. I used a SA220

for many smaller gigs and I know it's limitations. I use one here...

[Beagle216]

 

Fishman SA220 is the best amp in my opinion. Affordable and great tone. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

 

Although it is a VERY good amp for what it is, and for a small vocal/guitar thing it's great, but the low end

is just not there compared to a proper cab. It won't hold a candle to what I've suggested. I've owned two

of the SA220's, the original with the overheating preamp problem, and the newer model. I used a SA220

for many smaller gigs and I know it's limitations. I use one here...

 

Very cool video, you seem very at home performing, and I like the song!! I totally agree the SA220 has it's limitations. And that a proper PA would blow it away. But that's also considerably more coin to spend. The low end could be better, but for someone like me who is FAR from professional, and nowhere near your level of talent, it is the perfect amp. =) Very portable, sounds good, and I can sing through it. I was just comparing it to others in its price range based on the previous posts which were mainly of small/ large floor amps from various companies. In my mind, the SA220 stands alone for acoustic amplification in its price range and feature set. But, there is definately way better out there, this was the perfect amp for me and my mainly home use.

 

 

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[rockabilly69]

Very cool video, you seem very at home performing, and I like the song!! I totally agree the SA220 has it's limitations. And that a proper PA would blow it away. But that's also considerably more coin to spend. The low end could be better, but for someone like me who is FAR from professional, and nowhere near your level of talent, it is the perfect amp. =) Very portable, sounds good, and I can sing through it. I was just comparing it to others in its price range based on the previous posts which were mainly of small/ large floor amps from various companies. In my mind, the SA220 stands alone for acoustic amplification in its price range and feature set. But, there is definately way better out there, this was the perfect amp for me and my mainly home use. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I agree with all of your points, and that's why I said it is VERY good for what it is. If you read my earlier post I even stated it was better than all of those acoustic amps (Fender, Marshall, Carvins, etc)! I like the vocal tones that you can get with it, I pushed mine to the limits for sure:)

[tulk1]

that's because, you don't do it for a living. Look at any pro, and you will find a pickup in their acoustic. Using a mic is not feasible in many cases as you can't get enough gain before feedback. The best way to use a mic is in a dual source setup so that you can pull the mic out when needed. <and snip>

Just an interesting anecdote, to me anyway. Tracy's Larrivee OMV-O5E, which I think has the best UST I've ever heard also has a built in mic. A dual pickup system. One gig she's complaining about hearing echoes. During break we start trouble shooting. Sure enough, there are double notes like a short delay. After much mucking with the PA, Monitors, etc we finally start looking at the guitar. Seems somewhere along the line the blend for the mic/piezo has been set to blend both at 100%. And the signal seems to be misaligned time-wise. Put it back on Piezo only and the stir of echoes is gone. Put it on the mic and it sounds good, too. But both .... well, we don't do that anymore.

 

As for acoustic amps, we don't use one on stage. We use an active DI, pipe that to the mixer and feed it back to her thru an EV ZLX12P monitor. Absolutely wonderful acoustic tone right in the face.

[gpuma]

that's because, you don't do it for a living. Look at any pro, and you will find a pickup in their acoustic. Using a mic is not feasible in many cases as you can't get enough gain before feedback. The best way to use a mic is in a dual source setup so that you can pull the mic out when needed. So the best practical situation is a good pickup, and a preamp with effective eq that is designed to tame harsh frequencies and to also remove problem feedback causing frequencies. Just like finding the right electric guitar, pickup, fx, and amp combo, an acoustic setup is just as demanding or more so! Amps like Fender, Marshall's, Carvins, etc are coffee house or small stage amps at best, the bigger AERs and Schertlers are better, with Schertler being the only one being good enough to also handle vocals and percussion as a stand alone PA, or perhaps a Fishman SA220 or one of the Bose rigs, but the real deal requires a lot of power, flexible EQ, and at very least a good reverb as an effect. So unless your playing into a PA, you're going to need a pa like setup, that's why I listed the zed10fx and a powered pa cab. If you are playing into a good PA, I would recommend a good acoustic board, which would include a volume pedal, a good preamp (Dtar, Fishman, Baggs, Sunrise, Radial, etc), a good reverb or multi-fx unit. As for a pickup there are going to be USTs like the Fishman and Baggs, and the more accurate sounding ones Iike highlanders and dtars, magnetics like sunrise, the dimarzio angel, the Baggs m1, and soundboard transducers like the K&K and JBB internal mic systems like the Baggs anthem etc. I personally use a variety of all of the above depending on the guitar. And what type of gig I'm doing with that guitar. But I think amplifying an acoustic is a more demanding task than setting up an electric rig, I've been doing it 5 days a week since 2002 and I'm still learning.

 

 

I totally understand that. My comment was on not on what is practical in a real life scenario. My comment is what the end results are in a live situation and my personal opinion is that the tone that a lot of the pro get is very far from the acoustic tone they are trying to reproduce.

[rockabilly69]

As for acoustic amps, we don't use one on stage. We use an active DI, pipe that to the mixer and feed it back to her thru an EV ZLX12P monitor. Absolutely wonderful acoustic tone right in the face.

 

That's what most pros do that I know, although many subsitutue a small mixer/or pre with a direct out for the DI?

[rockabilly69]

 

 

I totally understand that. My comment was on not on what is practical in a real life scenario. My comment is what the end results are in a live situation and my personal opinion is that the tone that a lot of the pro get is very far from the acoustic tone they are trying to reproduce.

yes G, it's typically a compromised tone! Here's two tracks of mine with similiar playing style to show the differences between the acoustic sound and the pickup sound.

 

This track is all pickup and what a typical live sound is like... <iframe width="100%" height="450" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/93577350&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true"></iframe>

 

 

 

This track is all microphone... <iframe width="100%" height="450" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/91485646&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true"></iframe>

[Genericmusic]

"https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/93577350&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true"></iframe>

 

"https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/91485646&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true"></iframe>

 

Very Nice!

 

I'll go back to my earlier statement, since MG started the threat. Use the Evans!

[Blunote]

Dan, please tell me that first clip was two tracks.

[rockabilly69]

 

Very Nice!

 

I'll go back to my earlier statement, since MG started the threat. Use the Evans!

Although those Evans are VERY VERY nice, I would think they would need to an external pre with a preamp that is

voiced for an acoustic guitar. The midrange control - body control on those doesn't have the necessary cut that you

almost always need to pull back the offending feedback frequencies that plague acoustic guitar pickups. But, with

the proper pre I think the full range of those amps would work just fine.

[rockabilly69]

Dan, please tell me that first clip was two tracks.

 

Yes it was, that song was nothing more than I demo I made up on the spot to show the capability of the

Angel system. It was a first take. Eventually it will probably end up on the DiMarzio website as they sent

me that Angel pickup system as a demo. Since I normally play solo, it was fun to record a rhythm track.

 

On this track, the acoustic rhythm guitar sound is much more like my live sound, and so is the Les Paul sound!!!

This song took me all day to write!

 

<iframe width="100%" height="450" scrolling="no" frameborder="no" src="https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/90974105&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&visual=true"></iframe>

[morg21279]

FWIW, I use a small, external tweeter cabinet that I built (same components as henriksen tweetey). paired with any good guitar amp like the evans, it will do fine. After owning the california blonde, marshall and other "dedicated" acoustic amps, this is a good choice.

 

also, check out the DTAR Mama Bear.