Today, I will talk about the most common
soundboard wood used and that is the Spruce. This is the most common top wood
that could be found in to any music/ guitar store and you will see that at
least 80% of the guitars hanging on the walls have some sort of spruce top. The
reason for this is that Spruce has a very high strength/weight ratio and it
also has a significant amount of elasticity to it. The Function of a guitar top
requires a large amount of strength and elasticity which makes spruce the
popular option.
Types of Spruce
As
of right now the most common soundboard wood is the Sitka Spruce due to its
superior strength and the ability to bend a lot before it actually breaks. The
sound is consistent and very appealing to the eye. Spruce has strong
articulation and has a great bass response.
Adirondack Spruce
This spruce is commonly seen on pre-war guitars and is still used today
on many high dollar Acoustic’s. The grain patterns and property’s of Adirondack
Spruce give it an even higher Elasticity/Strength/Weight Ratio. This is
partially due to the wider grain pattern that is common in Adirondack Spruce. By
having wider grain Adirondack spruce has more flexibility and elasticity
to it making it a more responsive and brighter wood than Sitka spruce.
Generally speaking spruce is known for its durability and its clarity. It
does not compress or distort when played aggressively.
Cedar: The finger
picking wood
Cedar
is on of the most popular alternatives to spruce. It is softer, not as strong
or as elastic as spruce. It is, however, more stable with changes in moisture
content. It has a powerful finger style tone with much brilliance and sustain, clarity,
and focused bass, with a dry sound. Cedar does have a tendency to
compress if you play it aggressively with a flat pick. Cedar is very common on
classical guitars but is seen on steal string guitars.
Mahogany and Koa
When
working with warm tone woods it is not uncommon to see guitars built with the
same top as the back and sides. This is because the warmer, more elastic woods
work as soundboard woods and expand tonal quality. Generally these guitars will
have less overall volume due to the less elasticity in the wood but have great
variety in tone.
Stay tuned for more posts! Comment below on
the type of guitar/soundboard wood that you currently have and what is your favorite guitar!
Very interesting topic today Ed. I currently play a Takamine EG523SC Jumbo Body acoustic. It has a solid spruce top and flamed maple back and sides. I absolutely love this guitar and think it sounds just amazing. It is slightly bigger than a dreadnought acoustic that you discussed in a previous post. In your experience, do these larger bodied guitars require more upkeep to keep the wood in good shape? Is there any more stress on the bridge than in a regular sized acoustic? What do you recommend to do in order to extend the life of a guitar and to properly maintain it over the years? I rather enjoyed reading about the different types of wood used in guitars. I didn’t know that Spruce was the most common type of wood used. I’m not surprised to see it in my guitar now. I look forward to some more discussion in this area in the future. Good post.
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