After picking up and playing literally several thousand acoustic guitars of different sizes, shapes and tonewoods, we can start to make some generalizations about small versus large guitars. Of course, smaller guitars can be more comfortable to hold while larger instruments can be somewhat unwieldy. Tonally, smaller guitars tend to possess greater brightness or treble response, while bigger guitars (with larger air cavities in the body), at least have a greater potential for bass response.
Large vs. Small
For the purposes of this discussion, let’s define a large acoustic guitar as a dreadnought or jumbo and a smaller acoustic as any instrument with a 000 or OM (orchestra model) body or smaller. People expect big guitars to have a big sound, and expect small guitars to be somehow diminished in tone. The paradox is that smaller instruments can be disproportionately and shockingly powerful in their volume. In addition, smaller guitars can possess a better balance between bass and treble. Without excessive bass overtones or woofiness, smaller guitars can be less prone to feedback onstage, and because it is easier to add bass than subtract it in the studio, smaller guitars are typically capable of producing a cleaner recording.
Guitars can vary in scale length, and scale length has an impact on string tension. I am often asked to explain the differences between the traditional 000 guitars versus the OM. Both guitars look more or less the same, but the 000 is traditionally short scale (24.9") while the OM is long scale (25.4"). So what impact do these different scale lengths have upon each of these sizes?
Most guitar players know that the scale length of a stringed instrument is basically the distance between the nut and the saddle. Say that you’re playing a 25.4" or 25.5" (long) scale guitar. Even with light gauge strings, the strings are tight and the tonal response has a lot of punch. Now, if you take a capo and put it across the first fret, you are in effect shortening the scale length by almost 1-1/2". It’s obvious that now all of the notes on the neck are a half step above standard EADGBE tuning. To get the notes back to standard tuning, you must tune each string down a half step. What’s happened? The strings are now noticeably looser, more sensitive to the touch, more bendable, with perhaps a bit less volume or punch.
So in the simplest terms, a player who wants the greatest volume and projection might gravitate toward a longer scale instrument, while a player who wants the more delicate expressiveness of note bending might prefer a shorter scale instrument.
- Tonewoods. In general, resonant woods like rosewood accentuate the bass response. Lighter woods like mahogany influence the treble response. Harder woods like maple aid in projection.
- Size. Smaller guitars typically accentuate the high-end trebles. Larger guitars typically impact the more resonant bass frequencies.
- 12 versus 14-fret bodies. The extra internal air cavity above the soundhole on 12-fret guitars typically adds hollowness to the tone that is advantageous for fingerstyle techniques, but is not always good for rhythm strumming.
- Scale length. Longer scale lengths at the same pitch put strings under greater tension. Shorter scale lengths can be tuned up to higher pitches.
- Strings. Obviously, lighter strings are under less tension than medium strings—lighter stings bend easier and are lighter to the touch. Medium strings are stiffer with more volume.
I’ve heard many singer-songwriters say that they prefer the bassy warmth of the large dreadnought body as an appropriate accompaniment to their vocals. I’ve heard just as many fingerstylists and recording studio artists extol the virtues of smaller-bodied guitars for their clarity. You can acquire an assortment of different guitars to suit the variety of your playing needs, or gradually focus on a particular size and shape.
My best advice is to pick up and play as many different guitars as you can. Each instrument has its own personality. Having a basic understanding of how the many variables impact the tone and projection of an instrument will help you focus on what guitar is most right for your particular playing style.
[Updated 12/1/21]
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Tom Bedell in the Relic Music acoustic room, holding a custom Seed to Song Parlor with a stunning ocean sinker redwood top and milagro Brazilian rosewood back and sides.
A born storyteller, Bedell doesn’t keep his passion to himself. On Friday, May 12, at New Jersey boutique guitar outpost Relic Music, Bedell shared some of the stories he’s collected during his life and travels as part of a three-city clinic trip. At Relic—and stops at Crossroads Guitar and Art in Gilbertsville, Pennsylvania, and Chuck Levin’s Washington Music Center in Wheaton, Maryland—he discussed his guitars and what makes them so special, why sustainability is such an important cause, and how he’s putting it into practice.
Before his talk, we sat in Relic’s cozy, plush acoustic room, surrounded by a host of high-end instruments. We took a look at a few of the store’s house-spec’d Bedell parlors while we chatted.
“The story of this guitar is the story of the world,” Bedell explained to me, holding a Seed to Song Parlor. He painted a picture of a milagro tree growing on a hillside in northeastern Brazil some 500 years ago, deprived of water and growing in stressful conditions during its early life. That tree was eventually harvested, and in the 1950s, it was shipped to Spain by a company that specialized in church ornaments. They recognized this unique specimen and set it aside until it was imported to the U.S. and reached Oregon. Now, it makes the back and sides of this unique guitar.
A Bedell Fireside Parlor with a buckskin redwood top and cocobolo back and sides.
As for the ocean sinker redwood top, “I’m gonna make up the story,” Bedell said, as he approximated the life cycle of the tree, which floated in the ocean, soaking up minerals for years and years, and washed ashore on northern Oregon’s Manzanita Beach. The two woods were paired and built into a small run of exquisitely outfitted guitars using the Bedell/Breedlove Sound Optimization process—in which the building team fine-tunes each instrument’s voice by hand-shaping individual braces to target resonant frequencies using acoustic analysis—and Bedell and his team fell in love.
Playing it while we spoke, I was smitten by this guitar’s warm, responsive tone and even articulation and attack across the fretboard; it strikes a perfect tonal balance between a tight low-end and bright top, with a wide dynamic range that made it sympathetic to anything I offered. And as I swapped guitars, whether picking up a Fireside Parlor with a buckskin redwood top and cocobolo back and sides or one with an Adirondack spruce top and Brazilian rosewood back and sides, the character and the elements of each instrument changed, but that perfect balance remained. Each of these acoustics—and of any Bedell I’ve had the pleasure to play—delivers their own experiential thumbprint.
Rosette and inlay detail on an Adirondack spruce top.
Ultimately, that’s what brought Bedell out to the East Coast on this short tour. “We have a totally different philosophy about how we approach guitar-building,” Bedell effused. “There are a lot of individuals who build maybe 12 guitars a year, who do some of the things that we do, but there’s nobody on a production level.” And he wants to spread that gospel.
“We want to reach people who really want something special,” he continued, pointing out that for the Bedell line, the company specifically wants to work with shops like Relic and the other stores he’s visited, “who have a clientele that says I want the best guitar I can possibly have, and they carry enough variety that we can give them that.”
A Fireside Parlor with a Western red cedar top and Brazilian rosewood back and sides.
The Gibson EH-185, introduced in 1939, was one of the company’s first electric guitars.
It’s hard to overstate the importance of electric guitar in shaping American popular music over the last half-century. Its introduction was a revolution, changing the course of modern musical styles. Today, when we think of the guitars that started the revolution, we think of the Stratocaster and the Les Paul, guitars held against the body and fretted with the fingertips. But the real spark of this musical mutiny was the lap-steel guitar.
In the early 20th century, guitar music was moving out of the parlors of homes and into public spaces where folks could gather together and dance. Guitarists needed to project their sound far beyond where their wimpy little acoustic instruments could reach. Instrument manufacturers began experimenting with larger body sizes, metal construction, and resonators to increase volume.
Around this time, George Beauchamp began experimenting with electric guitar amplification. He settled on a design using two U-shaped magnets and a single coil of wire. Beauchamp was in business with Adolph Rickenbacker, and they decided to stick this new invention into a lap steel.
If we put on our 1930s glasses, this decision makes perfect sense. The most popular music at the time was a blend of Hawaiian and jazz styles made famous by virtuosos like Solomon “Sol” Hoʻopiʻi. Photos of Hoʻopiʻi with a metal-body resonator abound—one can imagine his relief at being handed an instrument that projected sound toward the audience via an amplifier, rather than back at his own head via resonator cones. Beauchamp and Rickenbacker were simply following the market.
As it turned out, the popularity of Hawaiian music gave way to swing, and electric lap steels didn’t exactly take the world by storm. But Beauchamp and Rickenbacker had proven the viability of this new technology, and other manufacturers followed suit. In 1937, Gibson created a pickup with magnets under the strings, rather than above like Beauchamp’s.
“When I plugged in the EH-185 I expected to hear something reminiscent of Charlie Christian’s smooth, clean tone. But what I got was meatier—closer to what I associate with P-90s: warm and midrange-y.”
The first page of Gibson’s “Electrical Instruments” section in the 1939 catalog features a glowing, full-page write-up of their top-of-the-line lap steel: the EH-185. “Everything about this new electric Hawaiian Guitar smacks of good showmanship,” effuses the copy. “It has smoothness, great sustaining power, and an easy flow of tone that builds up strongly and does not die out.”
Picking up the 1940 EH-185 at Fanny’s House of Music is about as close as one can get to traveling back in time to try a new one. It is just so clean, with barely any dings or even finish checking. Overall, this is a 9/10 piece, and it’s a joy to behold. Speaking of picking it up, the first thing you notice when you lift the EH-185 out of the case is its weight. This is a much heavier instrument than other similar-sized lap steels, owing to a length of thick metal between the body and the fretboard. The catalog calls it “Hyblum metal,” which may be a flowery trade name for an early aluminum alloy.
This 1940 EH-185 is heavier than other lap steels in its class, thanks to a length of metal between its fretboard and body.
Photo by Madison Thorn
There are numerous other fancy appointments on the EH-185 that Gibson didn’t offer on their lesser models. It’s made of highly figured maple, with diamond-shaped decorations on the back of the body and neck. The double binding is nearly a centimeter thick and gives the instrument a luxurious, expensive look.
Behind all these high-end attributes is a great-sounding guitar, thanks to that old pickup. It’s got three blades protruding through the bobbin for the unwound strings and one longer blade for the wound strings. When I plugged in the EH-185 I expected to hear something reminiscent of Charlie Christian’s smooth, clean tone. But what I got was meatier—closer to what I associate with P-90s: warm and midrange-y. It was just crying out for a little crunch and a bluesy touch. It’s kind of cool how such a pristine, high-end vintage instrument can be so well-suited for a sound that’s rough around the edges.
As far as electric guitars go, it doesn’t get much more vintage than this 1940 Gibson EH-185 Lap Steel. It reminds us of where the story of the electric guitar truly began. This EH-185 isn’t just a relic—it’s a testament to when the future of music was unfolding in real time. Plug it in, and you become part of the revolution.
Sources: Smithsonian, Vintage Guitar, Mozart Project, Gibson Pre-War, WIRED, Steel Guitar Forum, Vintaxe
