Looking to outfit my flatback Dave Shapiro bouzouki with a quality pickup system for an upcoming tour. The bouzouki itself has a cedar top and rosewood back & sides. The soundbox is about 4 inches deep.
I have heard good things about Pickup The World #27 and #54, the L.R. Baggs i-Beam and Element systems, B-Band AST, McIntyre Feather, Headway, and Fishman undersaddle transducers. Then there is the passive Schatten BM1-Pro which perches down by the tailpiece and seems to require their proprietary preamp.
My questions are these:
1. Any clear favorites? Specific models would be helpful & greatly appreciated
2. Stupid question - if I opt for an undersaddle transducer like Fishman or Baggs, where is the wire going to go? I don't want to drill any holes in the top...do you just run the wire into the soundhole and down to the jack internally? For this reason I am leaning toward an AST of some kind...Pickup the World or K&K.
3. What are peoples' thoughts regarding passive vs. active pickups? What are the pro's and con's of each...I would like not to have to worry about battery packs inside my bouzouki. It is my understanding that with passive pickups you really need a short lead to a preamp to ensure strong signal. I have active pickups on all my guitars so I have no experience with passive pickups :/
4. What preamps are people using? I hear good things about the Baggs Para Acoustic DI and the Radial Tonebone PZ. Will my Zoom A2.1u guitar effects unit/DI work with the pickups specified above?
Thanks for any & all advice. I will be playing with a band featuring guitar, fiddle, flute/whistles, bodhran & vocals. My bouzouki has a complex, rich acoustic tone that I want to faithfully reproduce - although it could use some boosting in the low end of the spectrum for this application.
Pickups have come a long way since the '90s, when they all sounded more or less terrible. I think you've got a lot of good choices now. I can say for sure that I've heard the K&K in a lot of instruments, and it's always sounded very good, in the sense that it always sounds very much like the instrument being amplified.
(and not, as often happened with the undersaddle pickups, like some mutant space thing playing the same notes as the instrument being amplfied).
I've heard good things about other pickups as well, though, and I don't know enough to say how the K&K compares to any of them.
For any permanent installation of a pickup, the most common wiring path is out through a pickup in the strap button. This is a completely safe modification, it doesn't affect the sound or the resale value of the instrument. I would advise against anything that leads to wires coming out of the soundhole. They can be dressed down to be mostly out of the way, but I have a nightmare vision of someone tripping on something and tearing the face off your bouzouki. Worst case scenario if you're coming out the tailpiece is maybe - and this is hard to imagine - you damage the jack and have to replace it. More likely, you just pull out the cord.
Active vs. passive - essentially, the question is, where do you want to put your power source. You can mount it in the bouzouki or you can have it close by. If you don't want to mount a battery box in the bouzouki, you're probably talking abouyt passive, which is fine. If you're not jumping around on stage a lot, a short lead to a Baggs box on the floor is not a problem - on most stages, you can't really move around a whole lot anyway. If you want to be a bit more mobile, you can probably find a preamp that'll attach to your strap, and then run as long a wire as you like to the mixing board.
For preamps, I've only ever used the Baggs, and that's because it's always worked. As with the K&K, it may be that there's something else comparable or better, but I've never needed to find out.
I should say that I haven't been playing amplified for a few years now, so if there are current trends to be aware of, I'm not aware of them.
Jon, thank you very much for your informative reply! Having read your comments on similar posts, I was actually hoping you might chime in here.
At this stage in the game I am definitely leaning toward a passive K&K Pure Classic system. Although intended for classical guitars, I imagine 4 transducer elements are better than 3 (or 2) when it comes to really dialing in the right sound. Will the Para DI (or my Zoom A2.1u) provide the juice to the pickup then? I may opt to upgrade the system with a volume slider & pre-phase switch - would this essentially make the sytem active? It would require a battery...not a whole lot of real estate inside my bouzouki however :/
What worries me about the Pickup The Worlds is the relatively larger surface area...will this make them more prone to feedback?
My bouzouki doesn't have a bridgeplate so I do not want to have to worry to much about precise placement of these pickup elements. I plan to position each pickup element on the underside of the soundboard below the corresponding bouzouki course (4 courses). I also wonder what the effect would be of positioning two on the underside of the soundbox and 2 on the interior side of the back?
Right now I'd say it's a tossup between K&K and the Baggs i-Beam (if only to maintain continuity with the Para DI). Again I don't want to have to get crazy with using jigs to install anything.
Worth considering - Microvox system - small mic that sits just over the sound hole and runs to a pre amp clipped to your belt. I haven't used it in anger yet, but it makes a good clean sound, albeit with some of the usual feedback problems (when used in a domestic room at least). The system is used by a number of pro's and isn't too expemsive. The only mod to the instrument is a small strip of velcro to attach the mic to. Good service from the company if you buy direct.
"Worth considering - Microvox system - small mic that sits just over the sound hole and runs to a pre amp clipped to your belt. "
Very much overpriced. You can buy the same mike inserts from placres like Maplin, and the 'pre-amp' is a very simple circuit that can be built for pennies. Even Wiki shows a circuit diagram.
They work quite well, but are very prone to feedback - especially when using a foldback on stage.
I used to build the systems for under a fiver. They performed every bit as well as the Microvox systems, but nowhere as good as using a decent condenser mike (something like an AKG C451B) close up. There are quality small mike systems that use condenser mikes or better quality electret condensers.
AKG make decent ones.
many acoustic guitarists use a magnetic piclup combined with a mic or a piezo element to mix both string and sooundboard vibrations. Not sure if they'd fit a bouzouki soundhole though.
These include LR Baggs M1, Fishman something and Sunrise. I've only seen/heard these on TV/websites. I must admit but they get good reviews on some guitar websites. You can install some of them without mod to the instrument, just have a wire trailing out of the soundhole. So you could take in and out of tow or more isntuments. Could probably even try in your own instrument if you got a real shop.
Justa suggestion froma self-confessed amateur.
DADGADLAD - sorry, I missed your post with the questions.
I'm afraid I don't know what the effect of adding more elements will be. Could be you get more sound, but I'm not sure. Drop me a message by PM and I'll put you in touch with a luthier who's installed a lot of them, he'll be able to answer that one better than I will.
Also, the front-and-back install is one I've never come across, so I don't know what would happen there. The typical installation routine for an AST system, or at least one typical routine, is to place the elements on the face of the instrument with a very non-permanent stickum, and try different placements until you find the combination you like. Directly under the point where the string attaches might not be the best place, and four elements right there might not get you the most natural sound. After all, what you're hearing from the instrument is the air moved by the whole face of the instrument - possibly the back as well, the physics there is beyond my level. It's not just the strings, which is why magnetic pickups always sound more or less like electric guitars - it's because they are - and it's not just the motion of the bridge, which is why undersaddle pickups are also disappointing.
Two or four point sources is not the entire continuous two-dimensional surface, but it's the best alternative I've seen so far. Perhaps the next thing is to embed sensor-detector pairs in front and back, broadcasting their relative distance over wireless or bluetooth or something, and let the massive supercomputer that is your iPod calculate the total movement of the instrument's face, and from that generate a more precise representation of the sound. Someone go build that - in the meantime, the AST will have to do.
I don't really see much point in installing switches and faders on the instrument, but if you do I'd prefer to have them embedded in an onboard pre-amp. But if you run out through a reasonably short lead (15', say) to a Baggs DI, you'll be within stepping distance of a volume switch. Cary Novotny, a guitarist in Portland, modified his Baggs with a foot-operated cutoff switch, which I thought was pretty cool, since your only real volume modification on the stage is going to be cutting out for breaks or tuning.
On the PUTW question, once again I'm not an expert on this, but in my experience on-stage feedback with an acoustic instrument has more to do with your guitar's body acting as the microphone, so I don't think the design of the pickup will affect your feedback much.
Maybe a magnetic soundhole pickup would be less prone to feedback? I haven't had a lot of experience with them, but it seems like it would be less sensitive to microphonic vibration of the soundboard.
Yeah, but they sound terrible. What can you do?
Honestly, though, an acoustic guitar on a live stage will resonate with whatever's going on, and that can drive the strings. Even with a magnetic pickup, that means that if you leave your guitar on its stand for ten minutes while you go outside for a smoke, a low-level hum can build up to feedback. Always hit the mutes when you step off the stage.
But you're right, a magnetic pickup will get less immediate feedback while you're playing. It'll also pick up less of the kick and the snare, if you're playing with a kit drummer.
Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
Looking to outfit my flatback Dave Shapiro bouzouki with a quality pickup system for an upcoming tour. The bouzouki itself has a cedar top and rosewood back & sides. The soundbox is about 4 inches deep.
I have heard good things about Pickup The World #27 and #54, the L.R. Baggs i-Beam and Element systems, B-Band AST, McIntyre Feather, Headway, and Fishman undersaddle transducers. Then there is the passive Schatten BM1-Pro which perches down by the tailpiece and seems to require their proprietary preamp.
My questions are these:
1. Any clear favorites? Specific models would be helpful & greatly appreciated
2. Stupid question - if I opt for an undersaddle transducer like Fishman or Baggs, where is the wire going to go? I don't want to drill any holes in the top...do you just run the wire into the soundhole and down to the jack internally? For this reason I am leaning toward an AST of some kind...Pickup the World or K&K.
3. What are peoples' thoughts regarding passive vs. active pickups? What are the pro's and con's of each...I would like not to have to worry about battery packs inside my bouzouki. It is my understanding that with passive pickups you really need a short lead to a preamp to ensure strong signal. I have active pickups on all my guitars so I have no experience with passive pickups :/
4. What preamps are people using? I hear good things about the Baggs Para Acoustic DI and the Radial Tonebone PZ. Will my Zoom A2.1u guitar effects unit/DI work with the pickups specified above?
Thanks for any & all advice. I will be playing with a band featuring guitar, fiddle, flute/whistles, bodhran & vocals. My bouzouki has a complex, rich acoustic tone that I want to faithfully reproduce - although it could use some boosting in the low end of the spectrum for this application.
Sean
# Posted on April 20th 2011 by DADGADLad
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
I recommend none at all.
Hold it front of a decent condenser mic connected to wotteffah if necc.
# Posted on April 20th 2011 by yhaalhouse
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
Pickups have come a long way since the '90s, when they all sounded more or less terrible. I think you've got a lot of good choices now. I can say for sure that I've heard the K&K in a lot of instruments, and it's always sounded very good, in the sense that it always sounds very much like the instrument being amplified.
(and not, as often happened with the undersaddle pickups, like some mutant space thing playing the same notes as the instrument being amplfied).
I've heard good things about other pickups as well, though, and I don't know enough to say how the K&K compares to any of them.
For any permanent installation of a pickup, the most common wiring path is out through a pickup in the strap button. This is a completely safe modification, it doesn't affect the sound or the resale value of the instrument. I would advise against anything that leads to wires coming out of the soundhole. They can be dressed down to be mostly out of the way, but I have a nightmare vision of someone tripping on something and tearing the face off your bouzouki. Worst case scenario if you're coming out the tailpiece is maybe - and this is hard to imagine - you damage the jack and have to replace it. More likely, you just pull out the cord.
Active vs. passive - essentially, the question is, where do you want to put your power source. You can mount it in the bouzouki or you can have it close by. If you don't want to mount a battery box in the bouzouki, you're probably talking abouyt passive, which is fine. If you're not jumping around on stage a lot, a short lead to a Baggs box on the floor is not a problem - on most stages, you can't really move around a whole lot anyway. If you want to be a bit more mobile, you can probably find a preamp that'll attach to your strap, and then run as long a wire as you like to the mixing board.
For preamps, I've only ever used the Baggs, and that's because it's always worked. As with the K&K, it may be that there's something else comparable or better, but I've never needed to find out.
I should say that I haven't been playing amplified for a few years now, so if there are current trends to be aware of, I'm not aware of them.
# Posted on April 20th 2011 by Jon Kiparsky
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
Jon, thank you very much for your informative reply! Having read your comments on similar posts, I was actually hoping you might chime in here.
At this stage in the game I am definitely leaning toward a passive K&K Pure Classic system. Although intended for classical guitars, I imagine 4 transducer elements are better than 3 (or 2) when it comes to really dialing in the right sound. Will the Para DI (or my Zoom A2.1u) provide the juice to the pickup then? I may opt to upgrade the system with a volume slider & pre-phase switch - would this essentially make the sytem active? It would require a battery...not a whole lot of real estate inside my bouzouki however :/
What worries me about the Pickup The Worlds is the relatively larger surface area...will this make them more prone to feedback?
My bouzouki doesn't have a bridgeplate so I do not want to have to worry to much about precise placement of these pickup elements. I plan to position each pickup element on the underside of the soundboard below the corresponding bouzouki course (4 courses). I also wonder what the effect would be of positioning two on the underside of the soundbox and 2 on the interior side of the back?
Right now I'd say it's a tossup between K&K and the Baggs i-Beam (if only to maintain continuity with the Para DI). Again I don't want to have to get crazy with using jigs to install anything.
# Posted on April 20th 2011 by DADGADLad
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
Worth considering - Microvox system - small mic that sits just over the sound hole and runs to a pre amp clipped to your belt. I haven't used it in anger yet, but it makes a good clean sound, albeit with some of the usual feedback problems (when used in a domestic room at least). The system is used by a number of pro's and isn't too expemsive. The only mod to the instrument is a small strip of velcro to attach the mic to. Good service from the company if you buy direct.
# Posted on April 20th 2011 by ian stock
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
"Worth considering - Microvox system - small mic that sits just over the sound hole and runs to a pre amp clipped to your belt. "
Very much overpriced. You can buy the same mike inserts from placres like Maplin, and the 'pre-amp' is a very simple circuit that can be built for pennies. Even Wiki shows a circuit diagram.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electret_microphone
They work quite well, but are very prone to feedback - especially when using a foldback on stage.
I used to build the systems for under a fiver. They performed every bit as well as the Microvox systems, but nowhere as good as using a decent condenser mike (something like an AKG C451B) close up. There are quality small mike systems that use condenser mikes or better quality electret condensers.
AKG make decent ones.
# Posted on April 20th 2011 by Weejie
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
"places like Maplin"
# Posted on April 20th 2011 by Weejie
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
many acoustic guitarists use a magnetic piclup combined with a mic or a piezo element to mix both string and sooundboard vibrations. Not sure if they'd fit a bouzouki soundhole though.
These include LR Baggs M1, Fishman something and Sunrise. I've only seen/heard these on TV/websites. I must admit but they get good reviews on some guitar websites. You can install some of them without mod to the instrument, just have a wire trailing out of the soundhole. So you could take in and out of tow or more isntuments. Could probably even try in your own instrument if you got a real shop.
Justa suggestion froma self-confessed amateur.
# Posted on April 27th 2011 by harmonic miner
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
and a really bad speller
# Posted on April 27th 2011 by harmonic miner
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
DADGADLAD - sorry, I missed your post with the questions.
I'm afraid I don't know what the effect of adding more elements will be. Could be you get more sound, but I'm not sure. Drop me a message by PM and I'll put you in touch with a luthier who's installed a lot of them, he'll be able to answer that one better than I will.
Also, the front-and-back install is one I've never come across, so I don't know what would happen there. The typical installation routine for an AST system, or at least one typical routine, is to place the elements on the face of the instrument with a very non-permanent stickum, and try different placements until you find the combination you like. Directly under the point where the string attaches might not be the best place, and four elements right there might not get you the most natural sound. After all, what you're hearing from the instrument is the air moved by the whole face of the instrument - possibly the back as well, the physics there is beyond my level. It's not just the strings, which is why magnetic pickups always sound more or less like electric guitars - it's because they are - and it's not just the motion of the bridge, which is why undersaddle pickups are also disappointing.
Two or four point sources is not the entire continuous two-dimensional surface, but it's the best alternative I've seen so far. Perhaps the next thing is to embed sensor-detector pairs in front and back, broadcasting their relative distance over wireless or bluetooth or something, and let the massive supercomputer that is your iPod calculate the total movement of the instrument's face, and from that generate a more precise representation of the sound. Someone go build that - in the meantime, the AST will have to do.
I don't really see much point in installing switches and faders on the instrument, but if you do I'd prefer to have them embedded in an onboard pre-amp. But if you run out through a reasonably short lead (15', say) to a Baggs DI, you'll be within stepping distance of a volume switch. Cary Novotny, a guitarist in Portland, modified his Baggs with a foot-operated cutoff switch, which I thought was pretty cool, since your only real volume modification on the stage is going to be cutting out for breaks or tuning.
On the PUTW question, once again I'm not an expert on this, but in my experience on-stage feedback with an acoustic instrument has more to do with your guitar's body acting as the microphone, so I don't think the design of the pickup will affect your feedback much.
Hope that helps.
# Posted on April 27th 2011 by Jon Kiparsky
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
Maybe a magnetic soundhole pickup would be less prone to feedback? I haven't had a lot of experience with them, but it seems like it would be less sensitive to microphonic vibration of the soundboard.
# Posted on April 27th 2011 by Bob himself
Re: Pickup Reccomendations for Bouzouki?
Yeah, but they sound terrible. What can you do?
Honestly, though, an acoustic guitar on a live stage will resonate with whatever's going on, and that can drive the strings. Even with a magnetic pickup, that means that if you leave your guitar on its stand for ten minutes while you go outside for a smoke, a low-level hum can build up to feedback. Always hit the mutes when you step off the stage.
But you're right, a magnetic pickup will get less immediate feedback while you're playing. It'll also pick up less of the kick and the snare, if you're playing with a kit drummer.
# Posted on April 27th 2011 by Jon Kiparsky