This just in: tonewood makes absolutely no difference on an acoustic guitar.

[aarontunes]

Interesting study: https://newatlas.com/guitar-wood-types/58139/


Shall I give my assessment of this article, or let y'all go first?

 

[DangerousR6]

Interesting study: https://newatlas.com/guitar-wood-types/58139/


Shall I give my assessment of this article, or let y'all go first?

Sure, what say you? :toothy12:

 

[AirCap]

Aaron.... Don't we have enough BS here already?

 

[spe111]

All 52 "guitarists" in the study played Wonderwall (because that's the only song they know).

 

[aarontunes]

nnngkay....here's my take:


I would really like to know who the players were.


Studies show that most studies conducted at colleges are conducted by middle/upper income white kids on middle/upper income white kids. That is a pretty well-established flaw in many "studies".
In my experience, college-age kids who play guitar don't have the most experienced ears.


Also, based on the article, the test seemed to have been done with an end-goal in mind: to prove that we should stop using endangered and non-sustainable woods.


All that said, I doubt I could tell the difference between Braz Rosewood and Indian Rosewood in a blind test. Ditto Mahogany vs Sapele. However, I feel confident I could tell the difference between Maple and Rosewood.


But, my burning questions is: what cheap, non-endangered, sustainable woods do the testers suggest we use?

 

[spe111]

One of the real drawbacks to the internet is no matter what you do and what you're interested in, there's someone out there saying you're a terrible person for doing it. It's there and gets pointed out whether there's one person saying it or a billion. We'll adapt to that eventually.

 

[Rick]

I like that they were wearing welding goggles! I wish they had a picture of that.  I concur that the backs and sides make no or a deminimus difference.  Go ahead throw your eggs at a guy that's been playing ovations for years.  (My oldest one was made in 1976)

 

[TBurst Std]

Actually, an awesome sounding wood is Orange Osage.  Looks closer to Maple, sounds much more like Rosewood.  Played a McKnight made with it that I wish I had the coin for. 

 

[dsn716]

One of the real drawbacks to the internet is no matter what you do and what you're interested in, there's someone out there saying you're a terrible person for doing it. It's there and gets pointed out whether there's one person saying it or a billion. We'll adapt to that eventually.

I vehemently disagree. We shouldn't have to adapt to that. It is unfortunate, but we created that, with our "everyone is a winner" and "everyone gets a trophy" society that we have now.
It's difficult to chime in on this whole thing without getting political. And, I understand that is frowned upon here.
Like Aaron said, "the study seems to have been conducted with an end-goal in mind", and I think that is spot-on. So to me, this study is a waste of time and money. I'll continue to buy guitars made from the woods I want them to be made from. And, when they stop making them from those woods, I'll stop buying guitars.

 

[pirate]

Just 2 quick comments, one, ALL studies are done with a goal in mind. It is the creators theory, who then decides on a testing procedure to prove or disprove the theory. The big issue is poor scientists that don't want the data to prove them wrong and choose to misinterpret the data.

The second, is I remember years ago reading an article from Bob Taylor that while different tone woods produce different tones in a VERY broad sense, and the tone range overlap between them is far greater than most realize, meaning that while some may say rosewood is not as bright as maple, but he sees plenty of examples where inside the overlaps, there are rosewood guitar examples far brighter than maple examples, and that you really have to compare one to one, and decide what your own ears hear, and in many cases, there may not be a difference discernible to that individual. He also referenced his famous pallet guitar build (made from a random shipping pallet he grabbed from his loading dock area) that baffled many in blind comparison tests.

 

[Logrinn]

It says in the article: ”When they assessed the sound quality and playability of the guitars, their ratings for all six were very close.”
Wouldn’t that be pretty obvious? The sound quality would surely be high. And since all guitars were made by the same luthier, wouldn’t it be fair to assume that the playability were very similar?
Now if they had ”... assessed the sound difference ...” - well, then I’m sure they would have given completely different answers.

Statistics ... bah, humbug!

 

[spe111]

One of the real drawbacks to the internet is no matter what you do and what you're interested in, there's someone out there saying you're a terrible person for doing it. It's there and gets pointed out whether there's one person saying it or a billion. We'll adapt to that eventually.

I vehemently disagree. We shouldn't have to adapt to that. It is unfortunate, but we created that, with our "everyone is a winner" and "everyone gets a trophy" society that we have now.
It's difficult to chime in on this whole thing without getting political. And, I understand that is frowned upon here.
Like Aaron said, "the study seems to have been conducted with an end-goal in mind", and I think that is spot-on. So to me, this study is a waste of time and money. I'll continue to buy guitars made from the woods I want them to be made from. And, when they stop making them from those woods, I'll stop buying guitars.

There's lots of things we shouldn't have to adapt to, but we have and will continue. I also think you're making some kind of assumption about how I think we'll adapt...

 

[AirCap]

Statistics ... bah, humbug!

Attributed to both Mark Twain and Benjamin Disraeli....
"There are 3 kinds of lies: Lies, damnable lies, and statistics"

 

[JPilot]

This is the actual journal article:

https://asa.scitation.org/doi/10.1121/1.5084735

I haven't had a chance to go through it yet, but many of the questions here look like they have been addressed. I'll post my thoughts after reading it in it's entirely.

 

[swarfrat]

The beauty of acoustic guitars is that there is wood, metal, and glue. Within a given line, construction is the same. So...unless you're willing to concede dryads that live in the wood, it sort of has to be the wood. (Unless you want to start a new gimmick and advertise that all of your guitars are glued up with both magnetic and electrostatic fields so that the glue crystals properly align during setting. Bam - some luthier desparate to make a name for himself thank me later.)

 

[spe111]

I started reading that study and within a few paragraphs they mentioned Brazilian rosewood several times. I don't see how that's even relevant in 2019 and just tells me they're either too uneducated to be credible or they're intentionally being dishonest.

 

[aarontunes]

I started reading that study and within a few paragraphs they mentioned Brazilian rosewood several times. I don't see how that's even relevant in 2019 and just tells me they're either too uneducated to be credible or they're intentionally being dishonest.

I had the same thought when I saw that one of the guitars was made from Braz RW.

It's like making a piano with Ivory keys to prove that it doesn't sound better than one with plastic keys, and then the whole piano industry shrugging their shoulders and saying "OK...but we weren't using it anyway". (It's not a perfect analogy, but you know what I mean.)

 

[Rick]

Here's what you want to know:
E. Conclusions
The results of our study indicate that steel-string acoustic guitars with backs and sides built using traditionally prized, expensive, and rare woods are not rated substantially higher by guitarists than guitars with backs and sides built using cheaper and more readily available woods. The poor ability of guitarists to discriminate under blinded conditions between guitars with backs and sides made of different woods suggest that back wood has only a marginal impact on the sound of an acoustic guitar.

We all knew this right?

 

[spe111]

I've tried owning guitars with different back and sides, not based on my worry for some specific kind of tree but just because I wanted to know if I'd like them better. Ovation, hated. Taylor with a walnut back and sides, hated. I currently have a Martin with "Siris"? and I actually think it sounds pretty good. They're marketing it as between rosewood and mahogany, and I think that's true but probably a little closer to the rosewood side.

I've said this before many times, listen to a brand new D-18 and a brand new D-28. They definitely sound different and consistently different among different D-18s and D-28s.

This study is like someone who only drinks kool aid telling wine connoisseurs (real ones, not pretend) what kind of wine they should like.

 

[Seamas]

The back and sides have an effect on the tone, but they are the area of the guitar where substitutions to similar density woods--or even  composites/engineered material can be done with minimal impact. I mean a Rosewood back and sides are quite different from Mahogany, but the difference between species of Rosewood are not that much, same for mahogany and sapele.

The top, and the top bracing, are going to be far more important; as would be the shape/size of the soundbox and the placement of the bridge/neck (12 fret or 14 fret)