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Synthsizer
Pickups
Q Is it possible to use
my Ovation steel-string guitar with a guitar synthesizer?
Nititorn Yuvachitti
Bangkok, Thailand
A Any of the Roland synth
pickups will work with a steel-string acoustic guitar. They're mounted
on the top of the guitar with double-sided tape and can be removed
later if necessary. There is also a hexaphonic pickup made by RMC
(www.rmcpickup.com)
you could modify and install in your guitar. It's the same pickup
Godin uses in its Multiac model. Whichever pickup you use, you'll
need to feed the signal into a guitar synth, such as the Roland
GR09, or into a guitar interface like the Roland GI-10. It will
then be able to trigger any MIDI sound module.
—Teja Gerken
Orpheum
Guitars
QI'm looking for information
about Orpheum guitars. Where and when were they manufactured? Are
any of the old archtops collectible?
Terry Crane
Englewood, California
A The subject of Orpheum guitars is
one of those obscure corners of guitardom awaiting more research,
and what has been published is vague and at times contradictory.
The Orpheum brand dates back to the late 19th century and is primarily
associated with William L. Lange of New York. In the late 1800s,
James H. Buckbee was one of the top New York banjo makers. He supplied
instruments to other companies, which marketed them under their
own house brands. Buckbee sold his business to Lange and William
P. Rettberg in 1897, and they introduced the well-respected Orpheum-brand
banjos. In around 1921 Lange apparently took over the business and
sold both Orpheum and Paramount banjos. When the guitar overtook
the banjo in the 1930s, Lange added Paramount guitars to his line.
He is reported to have marketed some Orpheum-brand guitars, but
this is not certain and nothing is known of them.
Lange weathered the Great Depression but went out of business in
1941 or '42. In 1944 the Orpheum brand name was picked up by New
York distributor Maurice Lipsky, who applied it to both guitars
and banjos. Most Orpheum guitars I've encountered date from the
Lipsky era. In the 1950s, Lipsky marketed Orpheum electric archtops
and little Les Paul–sized electric hollow-bodies, which look very
much like those made by United (formerly Oscar Schmidt) in Jersey
City, the source of many similar Premier guitars sold by Sorkin,
Lipsky's competitor at the time. In the early 1960s, Lipsky began
to use the Orpheum name on guitars imported from Japan, but the
name doesn't seem to have survived beyond the big crash of 1968.
In any case, be cautious when purchasing an instrument with the
Orpheum brand name.
—Michael Wright
Classical
Fingerboards
Q Can you tell me why
most classical guitars are built with flat fingerboards? I notice
that a lot of the newer models have narrower, more curved fingerboards
similar to those on steel-string guitars.
Tim Beauchamp
Seattle, Washington
A Flat fingerboards are not a big deal
for classical players because they lay under an array of floppy,
low-tension strings. Higher tension, less elastic steel strings
would be far more of a challenge on a flat fingerboard. That's why
steel-string fingerboards aren't flat.
Nonetheless, I remember having a devil of a time trying to barre
accurately when learning to play my old Goya G-13M classic guitar
30 years ago. It seems that I have a naturally pronounced crook
in my barring finger, and I could always get the two basses and
two treble strings stopped just fine, but no matter how hard I squeezed
(even with a death grip), the two middle strings would just sort
of mumble incoherently. I later learned that I could get those middle
strings to sing by rotating my barring finger slightly and contacting
the strings with more of the edge of my finger.
Nowadays, more and more steel-string players are crossing over
to nylon-string guitars and asking luthiers (such as myself) to
build them classical guitars with the look and feel of steel-strings.
It seems to be OK now that the classical guitar world is loosening
up. I recently saw a barefoot concert recitalist directing a master
class at a prestigious university. He was playing a top-of-the-line,
master-grade classical guitar, but it was not made of rosewood
and German spruce. Heavens! What will they allow next? Narrow, curved
fretboards?
—Bill Cumpiano
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