I've finally gotten around to posting these.

There are several different luthiers represented here (including Collings), presented in no particular order. Clips are a slight bit rough but close enough for rock and roll. We were VERY particular about matching mic positioning and record levels throughout. No eq whatsoever. Recorded using a 55-year-old Neumann KM54 microphone - all original - running into a Neve 1272 preamp into ProTools yada yada...

I'll keep adding more guitars to this list as time allows. The model used in each clip will be revealed soon.

Picking 1
Picking 2
Picking 3
Picking 4
Picking 5

Strumming 1
Strumming 2
Strumming 3
Strumming 4
Strumming 5

This message has been edited. Last edited by: elambo,

Sounds great! How do you tell which guitar is being recorded? Sorry if that is answered obviosly somwewhere and I missed it.

JT

canyou make this into a polling type thing where we can vote on our favorite? elections won't happen again for 4 more years... we need to vote, it's our constitutional right.

I'd considered a poll, but I'd really enjoy the feedback. With a poll, people often vote without ever elaborating. A poll is not out of the question in the future. These are all very good guitars and I'm extremely curious to know how they're perceived by the rest of the camp. Certainly there will be varying opinions, and for varying reasons.

FWIW I like Picking #2 and Strumming #5 best. Now which guitars are those?

I like #1 and #5 best in both Picking and Strumming. If nothing else, this little taste test makes me realize that all of the prancing around that we do with respect to this or that builder is more than a bit comical. On a relative basis, I like #2 the least ... but if it's all I had (or if I hadn't heard the others) I'm sure I'd be thrilled with it.

I'll go with #2 picking and #2 and #5 strumming. But I don't think it matters so much, because I think you can hear that they all have the potential to sound excellent with the right recording technique/mic for the particular guitar.

True. Some guitars benefit more from this static mic position than others. Although it sounds very good as-is, #3 in particular would benefit from a mic movement of about 3 inches. #4 would benefit from different strings - I may re-do that one.

I'm considering another set of samples which would allow the mic to be placed in its ideal position for each guitar. As mentioned in the thread on the Acoustic forum, the mic purposely stayed the same for each sample so that my personal subjectivity about what sounds best would be removed from the groupings.

However, if the goal is to hear how good each guitar can be, the mic placement would have to be individually customized. Currently, these are relatively good portraits of the basic sound of each guitar so they're acceptable for the time being.

1, 2, and 5 sound good to me. 5 was great for strumming. Sounds like rosewood to me. 1 or 2 for picking.

4 didn't turn me on much.

Cool exercise. Can't wait to learn what is what.

mattmoo

#1 & #5 seem to have more of the scooped mids sound to me where as the others are stronger in the mids and I would take a stab at #3 being the Collings. But I was pretty wrong on the last sound sample test I participated in here. Anyways, I like that strong sounding bass on #1 and I would take a stab at it being a Merrill although it's pretty hard on such a short sample. This is great fun and I appreciate your efforts Elambo!

1) 2001 Collings D2H (for the most part standard, with FWI saddle)

2) Borges OM-18 GG

3) Borges Barndance

4) Merrill OM-28 (slightly unfair as strings probably should have been replaced with Pearse PB like all others)

5) Guild D-55