Archtop guitar
Gibson & Epiphone guitar
An Archtop guitar is a steel-stringed acoustic or semi-acoustic guitar with a full body and a distinctive arched top, whose sound is particularly popular with blues and jazz players.
Typically, an archtop has:
* F-holes similar to members of the violin family.
* Humbucker pickups.
Various use of the term archtop
Although archtop normally refers to a hollow-bodied instrument, some makers of solid-bodied guitars with carved bellies also refer to these as archtop to distinguish these from flat top guitars. For example, Gibson refer to the standard Gibson Les Paul as an arch top to distinguish it from flat top models such as the Les Paul Junior and Melody Maker.
A continuum exists from these solid body, purely electric instruments to purely acoustic instruments similar to the original Orville Gibson design, including:
* Solid body instruments, such as the Les Paul standard, with a carved but non-sounding belly.
* Instruments with a solid core but hollow wings, such as the Gibson ES-335. In these the bridge is fixed to a solid block of wood rather than to a sounding board, and the belly vibration is minimised much as in a solid body instrument.
* Thin-bodied semi-acoustic instruments, such as the Epiphone Casino. These possess both a sounding board and sound box, but the function of these is purely to modify the sound transmitted to the pickups. Such guitars are still intended purely as electric instruments, and while they do make some sound when the pickups are not used, the tone is weak and not normally considered musically useful.
* Full hollowbody semi-acoustic instruments, such as the Gibson ES-175; these have a full-size sound box, but are still intended to be played through an amplifier.
* Prototypical archtops, such as the Gibson L-5, although most often fitted with one or more pickups and normally amplified if pickups are present, also retain a full-size body and a powerful acoustic tone suitable both for chords and for melody work.
All of these types may be loosely described as archtop, but only the last possesses the characteristics most often associated with the type.
Construction Archtop guitar
The top or belly (and often the back) of the archtop guitar is either carved out of a block of solid wood, or heat-pressed using laminations, and the belly normally has two f-holes, the lower of these partly covered by a scratch plate raised above the belly so as not to damp its vibration. The arching of the top and the f-holes are similar to the violin family, on which they were originally based. The contours of the arching profile are usually derived in an ad hoc fashion.[1]
Archtops are generally fitted with thicker strings (higher gauged round wound and flat wound) than conventional acoustic guitars, and have extra strength to allow for this.
Although any true archtop has a rich tone unamplified, most archtop guitars have some sort of pickup/microphone system, and many are intended primarily for this purpose and so are semi-acoustic electric guitars. Most pickups on modern archtops are humbuckers placed in bridge and/or neck positions. Since archtop guitars are prone to acoustic feedback when used with high-gain amplification, it may be problematic using them in certain types of performance situations.
Some archtop guitars have Bigsby vibrato tailpiece or other tremolo arm systems. Most tremolo systems cannot be fitted to an archtop owing to the need to cut large holes in the belly to accommodate the mechanism, but the Bigsby and the long tailpiece versions of the Gibson Vibrola can both be fitted.
Although factory production of purely acoustic archtops has almost died out, the L-7C acoustic archtop is still available from the Gibson custom shop. Archtop guitars are likely to remain in production in some form as long as interest in jazz guitar and early rock and roll music persists. See for example the Lee Ritenour L-5 Signature guitar.
An Archtop guitar is a steel-stringed acoustic or semi-acoustic guitar with a full body and a distinctive arched top, whose sound is particularly popular with blues and jazz players.Typically, an archtop has:
* F-holes similar to members of the violin family.
* Humbucker pickups.
Various use of the term archtop
Although archtop normally refers to a hollow-bodied instrument, some makers of solid-bodied guitars with carved bellies also refer to these as archtop to distinguish these from flat top guitars. For example, Gibson refer to the standard Gibson Les Paul as an arch top to distinguish it from flat top models such as the Les Paul Junior and Melody Maker.
A continuum exists from these solid body, purely electric instruments to purely acoustic instruments similar to the original Orville Gibson design, including:
* Solid body instruments, such as the Les Paul standard, with a carved but non-sounding belly.
* Instruments with a solid core but hollow wings, such as the Gibson ES-335. In these the bridge is fixed to a solid block of wood rather than to a sounding board, and the belly vibration is minimised much as in a solid body instrument.
* Thin-bodied semi-acoustic instruments, such as the Epiphone Casino. These possess both a sounding board and sound box, but the function of these is purely to modify the sound transmitted to the pickups. Such guitars are still intended purely as electric instruments, and while they do make some sound when the pickups are not used, the tone is weak and not normally considered musically useful.
* Full hollowbody semi-acoustic instruments, such as the Gibson ES-175; these have a full-size sound box, but are still intended to be played through an amplifier.
* Prototypical archtops, such as the Gibson L-5, although most often fitted with one or more pickups and normally amplified if pickups are present, also retain a full-size body and a powerful acoustic tone suitable both for chords and for melody work.
All of these types may be loosely described as archtop, but only the last possesses the characteristics most often associated with the type.
Construction Archtop guitar
The top or belly (and often the back) of the archtop guitar is either carved out of a block of solid wood, or heat-pressed using laminations, and the belly normally has two f-holes, the lower of these partly covered by a scratch plate raised above the belly so as not to damp its vibration. The arching of the top and the f-holes are similar to the violin family, on which they were originally based. The contours of the arching profile are usually derived in an ad hoc fashion.[1]
Archtops are generally fitted with thicker strings (higher gauged round wound and flat wound) than conventional acoustic guitars, and have extra strength to allow for this.
Although any true archtop has a rich tone unamplified, most archtop guitars have some sort of pickup/microphone system, and many are intended primarily for this purpose and so are semi-acoustic electric guitars. Most pickups on modern archtops are humbuckers placed in bridge and/or neck positions. Since archtop guitars are prone to acoustic feedback when used with high-gain amplification, it may be problematic using them in certain types of performance situations.
Some archtop guitars have Bigsby vibrato tailpiece or other tremolo arm systems. Most tremolo systems cannot be fitted to an archtop owing to the need to cut large holes in the belly to accommodate the mechanism, but the Bigsby and the long tailpiece versions of the Gibson Vibrola can both be fitted.
Although factory production of purely acoustic archtops has almost died out, the L-7C acoustic archtop is still available from the Gibson custom shop. Archtop guitars are likely to remain in production in some form as long as interest in jazz guitar and early rock and roll music persists. See for example the Lee Ritenour L-5 Signature guitar.