characteristics of a broken-in guitar
 

What have you noticed from guitars that you have owned and played for a while? I notice on mine a warmer more bassier tone and also a little more volume. Just curious what your experiences are. Thanks.

hard to tell, actually. i just play them. some days it may be humid and they sound muddy;other days it is dry and they all sound great. daily and yearly changes in us will affect that also. it is all very subjective.

play music!

That depends on the guitar. I never found it to be the major difference some claim.

A new Larrivee and new Martin sure showed differences I'd describe as feeling and sounding happy and sounding better even with dull strings. No explosion.

My HD-20 was years old when I got it, well used, and I kept it up for 5 more years. No new HD-28 ever seemed like that guitar.

My Santa Cruz is a 2009 and it never seemed to change as much as other guitars I've had. It was always turbocharged by comparison. When it was new Richard Hoover said while not exotic woods it was made from a stash of old wood. I never know how much is marketing hype but it's always been a super guitar.

This is for sure. My beloved keepers are overall pristine but now I do see swirl mark micro scratches, a tiny ding and scratch on one and some fret wear. I'll call those for sure characteristics of a broken in guitar.

I've noticed my all solid Chinese Bedel has gotten much louder and the Sitka top is turning a very pretty golden hue. I've had it about four years.

Not trying to start an argument but how do you tell? My ears just might not be good enough but I would think that the change in sound would be gradual. Seems it would be akin to watching kids grow. Hard to tell from a day to day basis. Do you guys record it when it is new and record it again at a later time to compare?

Not to open a can of worms but you can never discount the facts that as you age, your hearing changes, also the temp & humidity in any given room changes (any acoustic instrument sounds "better" in a colder room IMHO), different strings, even a different pick can make a guitar sound completely unlike what you've heard out of it before.

Cannot be totally objective, maybe...maybe not? On thing I am sure of in my case is this, MORE TIME=MORE DINGS!

Some guitars need a few minutes of “rough” treatment to open them up to being played. I had an Alvarez that sounded better the more it got played.
But straight out of the case, wasn’t inspiring.

My personal experience is that generally I notice a wee bit more bass volume and resonance after some months of daily playing, and what was more noticeable was that the initial 'tightness' in the sound slowly shifts to something more relaxed and open when strummed. Also, what I heard as a slight edginess to the treble when fingerpicking becomes a little rounder. Just my two cents. I've owned a Bourgeois Vintage OM for about 10 years, which I've sold, and currently using a beautiful Goodall TROM, both in Adi/EIR and generally speaking these are the small but noticeable changes I've observed