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Post by Deleted on Apr 23, 2009 23:38:21 GMT
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Post by tark on Apr 24, 2009 1:36:34 GMT
I have an NRP polychrome baritone tricone - its one of the most fabulous sounding guitars I have ever heard. However it did take a long time to get to sound that way. When I first had it the bottom string was just dead which may have been due to the string slot in the saddle being a little too tight. The guitar now has a set of 'hot rod' cones and a bridge of my own design with intonation adjustment.
It's true that Bob Brozman asked NRP to make the baritone design and cooperated with them on the design - neck dimensions and so on. The neck is huge and fat and takes a bit of getting used to. The NRP baritone is not designed to go a low as some baritone designs - there is no agreed spec or tuning for baritones (there isn't really one for standard guitars either). I am slightly surprised that they used a standard tricone body, you might think a bigger body would suite the lower pitch.
Bob certainly gets a unique sound out of all his resonator guitars, baritone included.
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Post by subtoxin on Apr 24, 2009 2:19:48 GMT
Yeah, I had the same problem with a pinched bass string that never sounded quite right (on a baritone Polychrome steel body.) To their credit NRP sent me some higher gauge bass strings, and that improved the sound. If I could find one, brass or otherwise that didn't have that issue I think it would be worth it. But with strings that thick I would want to be able to tune down to low A or G. The non-baritone models are already fairly versatile.
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Post by bod on Apr 24, 2009 8:02:07 GMT
Don't know if it is of any interest by way of comparison, but JMT uses a custom 8 string Ellis baritone tricone - to good effect IMHO - you can catch him playing and talking about it on youtube: Pictures and further info at www.ellisguitars.com/ Dave
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Post by Deleted on Apr 24, 2009 16:52:02 GMT
Listen to Catfish Keith playing one of these baritone tricones, he really knows how to get the most out of the range of these instruments.
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Post by melp on Apr 24, 2009 19:39:12 GMT
Hi All,
I think Baritones are really cool, love the double bass like sound on Bob B's video. The 8 string Ellis looks like a bit of a monster, but a interesting idea to have a bass and guitar on the same neck, but the split capo looks like a bit of a handful.
Think I will have a go a a "normal" tricone first. But really like the sound.
Cheers
Mel
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Post by melp on Apr 26, 2009 9:36:02 GMT
Chris,
I think you are dead right about trying it first. In the longer term I am also interested in one of these, but no way would I buy without trying it first. I had a look around the likely shops in the UK but could not find anybody who had one in stock.
Bob Brozman's comments on his site suggest that the reason he designed it only down to B on the 6th string is that the cones may not work well lower, like a "normal" baritone. But I guess that its all about experimenting to get the string tension right and the cones still working.
I am going to get a "normal" tricone first and then I guess just wait until I bump into one of these awesome instruments and check it out. Then just hope I can get spare the 2 grand + it will cost.
I have a Roland VG99, which has a baritone patch and does alternate tunings electronically. I will have a fiddle and see what it can do.
regards
Mel
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Post by wolvoboy on Apr 26, 2009 10:14:04 GMT
The only guy i know who had one for sale is the guy i bought my Duolian from.http://www.frankwellguitars.co.uk/about. based in shrewsbury i know his guitars sell way below book price he also has a 12 string tricone for sale i actually had a play on it,and it sounded fantastic. wolvoboy
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Post by wolvoboy on May 4, 2009 11:15:17 GMT
Sorry chris didnt get to play the baritone , ithink it had very heavey strings on it not to sure what they were,but i did get to play the 12 string tricone,and that was amazing,i think that it was going fairly cheap around£1350 which is grat value for a mint guitar,got to be honest i dont know how he sells them so cheap.if you look in the sold section the 1931 duolian is the one i bought of him wolvoboy
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Post by Michael Messer on Jun 13, 2009 11:28:54 GMT
Hello Chris,
My apologies - this thread escaped me! I was away a lot in April.
Baritone resonator guitars: My opinion is based on seeing and playing a few National Reso-Phonic baritone guitars and one or two hand-built ones.
The two players that spring to mind regarding these guitars are Bob Brozman & Catfish Keith. They both sound pretty good when they play theirs and Tark, whose opinion I respect is very happy with his, but whenever I have picked one up it does nothing for me. I think what Tark has said about the body size is why I don't like them. The body is not big enough for the low frequencies to form properly. NRP and other reso makers experimented with bass guitars a few years ago, and they were okay plugged as an electro-acoustic bass, but as an acoustic resonator bass, they did not work.
Chris - don't go by my words, try one and see what you think.
Shine On Michael.
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Post by LouisianaGrey on Jun 14, 2009 10:37:46 GMT
As the maker of a reso bass I think to say it doesn't work is a bit harsh, although fundamentally I agree with you, Michael. I used a spider cone which I think gives a warmer tone than a biscuit cone. It gives plenty of volume acoustically so the notes are clearly audible in a live situation, unlike most acoustic bass guitars I have tried, but I agree that because of the body size you don't get the rounded bass tone that you would get from a double bass or guitarron. Through a mike on stage it works fine but benefits a lot from some bottom end added to the EQ.
I don't think there's any way round the body size problem so it would be interesting to try a baritone with a larger body. Compared to regular acoustics Nationals have fairly thin bodies, so it seems to me that adding more body depth might be a way of increasing the resonance of the lower frequencies without making the guitar physically more difficult to actually get your arms round.
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Post by Michael Messer on Jun 14, 2009 11:16:48 GMT
Hi Pete,
Having never tried a Dobro-style resonator bass I can't comment. I had forgotten that you make those. I hope to get to play it someday.
Regarding resonator basses with National-style cones, I hold by what I said. I have never played one (acoustically) that actually sounded like a bass should sound. Plugged in is a different thing and with some EQ tweaking they work fine.
Good to see you contributing to the forum again, Pete.
Shine On Michael.
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Post by tark on Jun 16, 2009 1:10:58 GMT
My take on this is that a great deal of the character of an acoustic guitar is determined by the low end response. The bass response is determined by the Helmholtz resonator formed by the body cavity and the depth and diameter of the sound hole or holes (note - rolled f holes are deeper that flat-cut). The problem with the Tri-cone design is that for whatever reason the Dopyeras decided to make it with two large basket weave grilles. I think these grilles (holes or ports) are too big even for a standard pitch tri-cone to develop a strong bass. Bob Brozman always says he has no problem with bass from a tri-cone but I think this is partly because he uses very heavy gauge bass strings and partly because he almost always performs with a mic and can get tons of bass by moving the body so the mic picks up the sound from the grilles.
My solution is to block off the lower set of grille holes, lowering the Helmholtz resonance and improving the bass. I have done this on my baritone and fitted a bridge of my own design which apart from allowing me to set intonation (with a non-compensated bridge an NRP baritone is way out of intonation) also changes the tone slightly.
As a result my baritone tri-cone to my ears has a wonderful resonant piano like tone. It still does not have massive amounts of fundamental bass. Its a bit like the modern electric bass players who use pickups and tone control settings to give that wirey solo sound.
To get true bass response from a resonator instrument there is no way around it - you need a bigger body with a correctly sized sound hole. This is why the resonator basses don't really work acoustically with a standard size body. The wedge body shape used by Linda Manzer might help here with the problem of fitting a bigger body under the arm.
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Post by subtoxin on Jun 16, 2009 2:29:57 GMT
Even with the bass string issue I loved my baritone. But what is the point of a baritone is you can't comfortably tune down to a low A or G? Even lower? You can get close with non-baritone with thicker string gauges, sometime I go down to B with minimal issues (more rattling and fret noise played away from the bridge.) Kudos to Catfish and Brozman for showing the potential of those instruments. Would a larger steel/brass body really make any difference?
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Post by steverino on Jun 16, 2009 5:29:55 GMT
This issue of bass response from resonator instruments is one of considerable interest to me. IMO we have worlds yet to conquer!
Acoustically, a piston radiator (cone) of a given size needs to quadruple its excursion each descending octave to maintain constant power output. All resos built to date lack this ability, primarily due to excursion limiting from the string load sitting on the cone and greatly limiting its movement. I have found that limbering up a cone's suspension by thinning helps somewhat. Supporting the cone from underneath with a coil spring to take part of the load helps as well, but not enough. The cone must have enough downward force exerted on its outer edge to prevent buzzing, and this amount also seems sufficient to largely stifle the bass response. Grrr! If it were not for this situation we should have bass to burn, as we have a 9.5 or 10.5" cone in a bass reflex enclosure.
I built an experimental spider bridge reso with a 5' long 50Hz. exponential horn rear loading the cone. This was an experiment to try to raise the output in the low frequencies by 10dB or so, well within a horn's capabilities. It works to an extent, and growls with authority when I strum it in passing, but the design didn't increase bass output much relative to the midrange as I had hoped it would. What I had forgotten to consider is that a horn theoretically loads to infinity above its flare frequency, so the mids are elevated in level nearly as much as the bass.
Tark makes a good point that a larger body is needed if Helmholtz resonance is to effect greater bass output. The huge bass guitarron used in the Mariachi band comes to mind here.
To some extent our hearing fills in the missing fundamental when hearing a partial series that implies a really low note. What would be cool would be a reso that could sock the listener in the gut with fundamental bass energy, but we've a ways to go yet to get there.
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