String gauges?

[Tony Done]

I'm wondering what string gauges you jazz guys use these days. The old
archtops worked best with very heavy gauges, and I started wondering
from the Grant Green thread. In the Wikipedia pic it looks like he used
heavy strings on the 330 (was there any choice back then?), but I bet it
comes with light strings these days. This Ib knockoff comes with what
feel like 10-46:

http://www.ibanez.co.jp/products/hb_series13.php?series_id=177&area_id=2&year=2013&cat_id=7

Are modern archtops built for modern ideas in strings, eg 13-56?
--
Tony Done

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=784456

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[Steve Freides]

Tony Done wrote:
> I'm wondering what string gauges you jazz guys use these days. The old
> archtops worked best with very heavy gauges, and I started wondering
> from the Grant Green thread. In the Wikipedia pic it looks like he
> used heavy strings on the 330 (was there any choice back then?), but
> I bet it comes with light strings these days. This Ib knockoff comes
> with what feel like 10-46:
>
> http://www.ibanez.co.jp/products/hb_series13.php?series_id=177&area_id=2&year=2013&cat_id=7
>
> Are modern archtops built for modern ideas in strings, eg 13-56?

I really think this varies by the person. I don't play often and I keep
10's or 12's on my two archtop guitars, just because they're easier to
play that way. Just this morning, I put a set of 10's on my 335 clone
because I wanted fresh strings and it was what I had here - if I'd had
12's and not 10's, I'd have used those. I'm honestly much more
concerned with playing well than with the nuances of sound between 12's
and 13's.

Just my opinion, your mileage may vary.

-S-

[Robby R]

Yeah, I don't think there's any one size fits all answer, or maybe it should be one gauge fits all...

I just started using Thomastik Infeld bebop13s on my newish Epi 375, & like the fact the G,D, & A are relatively light- lighter than those in the set of D'addario jazz 12s i had on it previously!

Tone, ease of playability & feel, & how strings interact with a specific guitar's set-up are all factors.

[Robby R]

One thing I don't see mentioned much is how string gauge realtes to picking feel... I often find it easier/ solider to pick heavier strings, especially on the E, B, & G.

[Robby R]

[rpjazzguitar]

String gauge does change feel, but it's not the only factor.

The length of string that can stretch but not vibrate is also relevant. So, the tailpiece and headstock design are also factors. Scale length too.

So, when a person says I use such and such a gauge, that number doesn't tell you what the feel is like. You also need to know the length of the non-vibrating part of the string and the scale of the guitar.

[Jonathan]

On Friday, June 28, 2013 4:14:50 PM UTC-4, Tony Done wrote:

Here's a quote from archtop.com (http://www.archtop.com/ac_tips.html):

For optimum tone, archtops respond best to medium to heavy gauge strings. Even the oldest archtop guitars are remarkably sturdy for the most part, having been built to accommodate high E strings of .014 or higher. We typically string acoustic archtops with round-wound phosphor bronze strings, gauged at .013-.056 from high to low "E". Strings of .011 or lighter are not recommended for acoustic archtops, as they don't produce sufficient load on the soundboard for optimum tone. Flat wound strings have a smooth feel, but produce a tone that is distinctly more muted, and are not recommended for acoustic instruments either. For electrics, we generally use round wound nickel strings of .013 or .012.

[Tony Done]

On 29/06/2013 6:14 AM, Tony Done wrote:
> I'm wondering what string gauges you jazz guys use these days. The old
> archtops worked best with very heavy gauges, and I started wondering
> from the Grant Green thread. In the Wikipedia pic it looks like he used
> heavy strings on the 330 (was there any choice back then?), but I bet it
> comes with light strings these days. This Ib knockoff comes with what
> feel like 10-46:
>
> http://www.ibanez.co.jp/products/hb_series13.php?series_id=177&area_id=2&year=2013&cat_id=7
>
>
> Are modern archtops built for modern ideas in strings, eg 13-56?

Thanks for the replies.

You jazz players seem very traditionalist to me in terms of gear (you
might feel the same way about my genres), and I was wondering if anyone
goes so far as the use very heavy strings on their archtops, as in the
days of pre-electric big bands.

FWIW I use 13-56 on the acoustics, but after a *lot* of trial and error
involving half a dozen guitars and many more pickups, I've concluded
that light strings (10-46) work better than heavy ones on electrics. Not
only less work, but a fair number of tonal advantages. Have any of you
been through the same process and come to any conclusion, one way or the
other?

I agree entirely with Steve that music should be about notes, not
sounds, but it certainly helps me to play better if I'm happy with what
I hear - more so in the case of electrics than acoustics, about which
I'm not very picky any more.

[John A.]

On Saturday, June 29, 2013 6:46:19 PM UTC-4, Tony Done wrote:
> On 29/06/2013 6:14 AM, Tony Done wrote:
>
> > I'm wondering what string gauges you jazz guys use these days. The old
>
> > archtops worked best with very heavy gauges, and I started wondering
>
> > from the Grant Green thread. In the Wikipedia pic it looks like he used
>
> > heavy strings on the 330 (was there any choice back then?), but I bet it
>
> > comes with light strings these days. This Ib knockoff comes with what
>
> > feel like 10-46:
>
> >

>

> FWIW I use 13-56 on the acoustics, but after a *lot* of trial and error
>
> involving half a dozen guitars and many more pickups, I've concluded
>
> that light strings (10-46) work better than heavy ones on electrics. Not
>
> only less work, but a fair number of tonal advantages. Have any of you
>
> been through the same process and come to any conclusion, one way or the
>
> other?
>
>

I used to play jazz on an archtop strung with 12-52 D'addadario chromes, but would play blues/funk/fusion on solidbodies strung with roundwounds 10-46. A couple of years ago, I picked up a semi-hollow, which has become my jazz and almost everything else guitar. It came strung with 12's, which I kept on for a while, but then I switched it to 10-46, and I find I'm much happier with this. I don't think I would ever play an electric with heavier strings again. After fighting heavier strings for years because that's what you're supposed to do, I finally realized that lighter strings just fit the way I play better. It also simplifies string shopping.

John

[TD]

All personal, as you more than hint at. I have been using 13 thru 56 flats for many years ( I might be using heavier, but my 175 can't handle the tension), along with relatively high action (but not high enough to mess up chord playing and intonation factors) and I love it. Lighter strings (and puff on low action) for me is simply too weak at the knees. I would have to fight that, but as you say, it ain't supposed to be anything. What's supposed to be and what is are more than sometimes miles apart. It's personal is all.

[Docbop]

the guitars themselves and style of music dictate what gauge strings to use. The archtop each one tone and response opens up with certain gauges. Solid bodies do the same but to a lessor extent than the archtops. I tend to use my solid bodies for funk and blues so those I'm usually going down a gauge to make bends and such easier. Last the manufacturer of the strings I mainly use DA strings and part of the reason they are higher tension than most others. I do have TI's on one archtop and that required a gauge just because they are a lower tension string.


So bottom line no one gauge on everything have to find the right gauge for each instrument.

[Tony Done]

I have a good cheap trick for electric strings. I buy a 10-56 7-string
set, and I use the 13-56 subset for the resos, which have magnetic
pickups, and the 10-46 subset for the solidbody electrics. I also use
that set, plus a 0.012 on the 8-string lap steel. It is a bit wasteful,
but it means I only have to buy one kind of electric strings, and the
price difference is small.

Some of the advantages I have found for light strings on electrics, in
addition to lower effort, are 1) less bass boom 2) sweeter high
registers 3) better string to string balance 4) less hot and cold spots
up and down the neck and sometimes 5) better sustain. In fact, the lower
effort bit is moot, because I only play slide on electrics.

[rpjazzguitar]

I used 10-46 on 24 3/4 scale electrics with stud tailpieces. On some, I put an 11 on the E string to overcome a problem with thin sound. That solution was inadequate.

On my D'A EXDC the trapeze tailpiece softens the feel a bit, so I use 11 to something maybe 52. I went to a 12 E string while struggling with the sound of the high E in the upper register, but it didn't make much difference, so I'll go back.

On a Stratocaster, I started with 9's. The feel was too loose. I went to 10's, same problem and ended up with 11's.

So, why would I be okay with same gauge on different scale lengths? Strat headstock design? I don't know.

There are times when I hate all my guitars, but I have no idea what I'd like better.

[rpjazzguitar]

By the way, Jim Hall uses 11-50. Short scale. Trapeze. That's probably a pretty soft feel.

Apparently, that's what he used on his 175 back in the day. Gibson amp. I love his tone.

[Tony Done]

There are also other factors. Action height is an obvious one, and even
in guitars where the strings are fixed at the bridge there are
differences in feel, hard or soft. I have one dread, a Bourgeois that
feels very hard. I don't know what causes this, but neck profile may
have something to do with it, or springiness of the top. Thomas Humphrey
commented on it in his classical guitar many years ago in AG mag, but I
can't remember the details.

[Tony Done]

I can't feel any difference between the long and short scales, after all
it is only equivalent to about 1/4 tone, so I'm not surprised by your
experience.

We all have different ideas about what sounds good, but I've found that
the pickups are more important than the string gauge within reasonable
limits - I like P90 types and SD Jazz, which are bright by humbucker
standards. The guitar also makes a substantial difference, even though I
often refer to it as "just a fancy lump of wood"; it has been difficult
to find pickups I like for my very dark and nasal sounding 335 knockoff.
I'm currently using SD Jazz with series/single/parallel switching to
give a choice between bright hum and stratty.

<g> I've got too many guitars to hate them all a once, and if I do
develop a grudge against one I just swap the pickups and all is well
again. IMO one way to find a guitar you like is to

1) get one you think you like
2) get an amp that really suits it
3) keep swapping pickups until you *really* hit the spot. I've got a
whole drawer full of discarded pickups, coils, magnets and ferromagnetic
mounting plates.

But I'm as much a tinkerer as I am a player.

I'm just blogging because it is a cold damp Sunday arvo, and the film on
TV isn't much chop.

[TD]

Scale lengths make a huge difference concerning tension. It is just difficult to understand that a quarter inch in the outside world uses not the same perspective as the scale length world. In ratio, it's about the length of a city block difference.

[John A.]

On Sunday, June 30, 2013 1:51:37 AM UTC-4, rpjazzguitar wrote:
>

> So, why would I be okay with same gauge on different scale lengths? Strat headstock design? I don't know.

I use the same gauge on my EX DC and my Strat. The two guitars feel different to me, but it's a difference (along with the tone difference) that I enjoy. I used an 11-? set for a while on the Strat in search of a fatter tone, but wound up going back to 10s. I bend a lot, and found 10s to be the sweet spot for that. I'll admit it. My fingers are too wimpy for heavy strings.

> There are times when I hate all my guitars, but I have no idea what I'd like better.

Kazoo? Very tough to find the right strings for one, though.

John

[Greger Hoel]

On Sun, 30 Jun 2013 07:54:57 +0200, Tony Done <tony...@bigpond.com> wrote:

> I have one dread, a Bourgeois that
> feels very hard. I don't know what causes this, but neck profile may
> have something to do with it, or springiness of the top.

My money is on the fretwork


--
Using Opera's revolutionary email client: http://www.opera.com/mail/

[Tony Done]

Try this as an inexact test. Tune down a 1/4 tune (ie half a fret) -
equivalent to the difference in scale length we are talking about - and
report back on how much difference you feel. I would be genuinely
interested to know about this, because you (and many others) just might
be a lot more sensitive to tension than I am. Could be that in my case
everything feels slack compared to the 13-56 gauge/25.5' scale I use for
most of my playing time. I have used 14-62 without problem on the
tricone, but that is a special case, because it has a very soft feel.

[rpjazzguitar]

The Fender style headstock is interesting.

On the EXDC, the length of non-vibrating string is maybe 4-5 inches on the high E. That's because the tuning peg is nearest the nut and the angled tailpiece makes the E string the shortest one (from tailpiece to tuner). Then, the B and G strings are longer, but the D string is the same as the E string on the headstock end, while being angled in the tailpiece. In a way it makes no sense. OTOH, I can't say that I've ever really been bothered by it, or even noticed it when playing.

On the Strat, all the strings are anchored behind the bridge in the same way, so the string length is determined by the tuner location. That's longest for the high E and gradually descreases to the low E. Good or bad, at least it's logical.

Fender's design gives the high E the softest feel, but you have to deflect (bend) it further to get the same rise in pitch. The low E will have the stiffest feel, but small bends will produce relatively larger changes in pitch.

So, comparing the short scale EXDC to the long scale Fender: for the same string gauge on the high E, the Fender has the longer non-vibrating length, making for a softer feel, but the longer scale length making for a tighter string. These offset each other, although I can't get a feel for the magnitudes. For the low E, the Fender's non-vibrating length is shorter, making it feel stiffer, and the long scale makes for a tighter string. So, to get the same feel, the low E on the Fender would have to be a bit larger gauge than the EXDC.

[Tony Done]

In floating trem guitars, there is also the question of trem springiness
to consider.

The whole thing it too complicated to assign any special significance to
any one factor, which was the substance of my argument in an earlier
thread on the subject.

[ic]

"Tony Done" <tony...@bigpond.com> wrote in message
news:kqkqs4$mtd$1...@speranza.aioe.org...

> I'm wondering what string gauges you jazz guys use these days. The old
> archtops worked best with very heavy gauges, and I started wondering from
> the Grant Green thread. In the Wikipedia pic it looks like he used heavy
> strings on the 330 (was there any choice back then?), but I bet it comes
> with light strings these days. This Ib knockoff comes with what feel like
> 10-46:

When I was using a banjo 1st for blues the E, B &G turned out to be 8,10 &
15 custom gauges so before that a 'standard' set must have been 10s. I use
9s now for convenience but for an archtop 'velvet hammer' tone I'd be
tempted to use the heaviest gauge flatwounds I could find, assuming no
string bending, and lighten up to suit the tone, neck, bridge etc. if it
looks fraught.

Even in the blues/rock days when I wasn't bending the D, A & E I put the
heaviest strings I could find on those, still with the 8,10 & 15, on a
no-name 335 copy, without a centre block without problems. It did have the
remains of a copy bigsby to take the strain.
--

icarusi

[rpjazzguitar]

For me the struggle works this way.

I start with light strings. Sooner or later, I get bugged by the thinness of the high E string (sound wise) and I go to a higher gauge. I'm still bugged by it and I may go higher still on the high E string. Meanwhile, I notice that the thicker strings are harder on my left hand and easier on my right. Eventually, my left hand hurts and I go thinner again. This takes maybe 18 months. Then I start over.

The fact is that some players tell you that you can't get a warm sound from a thin string. Other players, having not heard that rule, go right ahead and get a warm sound from a thin string.

[thomas]

I can get a good sound out of almost any guitar/string combination, but it may well take me six months of practice to get my sound out of a new set-up.

[TD]

On Sunday, June 30, 2013 7:32:25 PM UTC-4, rpjazzguitar wrote:

You can get a warm sound out of a thin string. You can get cold sound out of a thick string, but you can't sow a silk purse out of a sow's ear. It's all in the hands, if I'm not permitted to mention ears. All else is compensation.

[van]

Tal used a shorter scale on his Gibson in the 50s to reduce the tension. A sax player I work with, who collects Tal records, asked me the other day why Tal sounded more mellow than other guitarists
For me, tension is crucial.
A few days ago, I was really having problems playing with the MM at 336bpm.
I sounded the A 440 and realized I was a half tone sharp!
As soon as I tuned to A 440, I was cool again.
I've settled on TI Bebop 011s on my B120; if it's good enough for Larry Koonse, it's good enough for me.

[Greger Hoel]

On Sun, 30 Jun 2013 21:37:02 +0200, Tony Done <tony...@bigpond.com> wrote:

> Try this as an inexact test. Tune down a 1/4 tune (ie half a fret) -
> equivalent to the difference in scale length we are talking about - and
> report back on how much difference you feel. I would be genuinely
> interested to know about this, because you (and many others) just might
> be a lot more sensitive to tension than I am.

I usually hear it first, but sometimes I notice the tension loosen first
when my guitar starts to go flat.