Getting through ONE acoustic guitar gig - Cab Selection

[Nate74]

Background: I gig primarily on upright bass, but also have been playing guitar for some 25 years or so.

A friend of mine just hit me up to fill in with his Irish folk band so I assumed he meant on bass since that's what he's seen me play most but he said he really liked my guitar playing and that was what he wanted me to play for this upcoming gig with his group.

I'm thinking through what I might want to use for amplification and am turning to the group here for some guidance.

I have done some acoustic guitar stuff in the past where I've just plugged my K&K equipped Blueridge into a Red-Eye preamp then into the house system and it seems to work OK. But those were situations where I was just backing a vocalist with no other instruments so stage mix was pretty easy to sort out.

I do something similar when I don't want to lug my bass amp along for upright gigs where I use a ToneBone PZ-Pre and go straight into the house system. I do that at festivals where we have a good sound system and I can get good fold-back onstage. Works out pretty well and I know the PZ-Pre can work with any piezo pickup, not just my upright's.

For upright gigs where I handle my own sound I use an Acoustic Image Clarus into either an ACME single 10" or a custom built LDS 2x8. Both do an excellent job giving me a good acoustic bass tone, but I haven't tried them yet with acoustic guitar. I see from my reading here that the Clarus head get's used for acoustic guitar but would either of my current cabinets be suitable?

I also have a pair of powered 10" PA speakers and a pair of 12" powered PA speakers that I could bring into the mix.

I really don't want to invest any money into gear for just a one-time sub gig and am hoping some combination of what I already have will be enough.

His band usually uses a pretty decent PA with a pair of JBL EON's and a Soundcraft board with decent onboard effects. Not sure about monitoring though and their regular guitarist always has his own amp.

I'm open to any and all comments on what to try first and things to consider.

Thanks in advance.

[El Conquistador]

K&K to RedEye is a great signal path for a solo guitarist. I play in a small band with this exact signal path but, it goes into a Fishman SA220 and I am extremely satisfied with it.

The caveat is that K&K is a sound board transducer, and, as such, can be subject to feedback in a really loud band situation. I am not saying it will, but, it sounds like it is going to get loud in this band. In that situation, you may need to go to a UST pickup that while not as natural sounding, is much less likely to feedback.

Steve

[martingitdave]

The Irish folk bands I sat in with were generally not that loud. Depends on the venue, but DI to house is usually plenty. K&K should hold up. Are you playing standard tuning or DADGAD?

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

[lschwart]

I also think you'll be fine with the K&K guitar into either the Red Eye or the PZ-Pre. Find out if they'll have monitoring for you. If not, one of those 10" powered PA speakers should be more than adequate. One advantage of the PZ-Pre over the Red Eye might be the feedback notch, more EQ, too if needed, and it gives you few more routing options, but either will do the job. What kind of 10" powered speaker are we talking about.

The Clarus head will also do the job, but you'll just have to test your cabs to see how they do with guitar, and it would be a less streamlined set up.

Louis

[royd]

I think either the LDS or Acme bass cabs would work quite well for acoustic guitar. They both specialize in full range cabs that are rather flat in frequency response... exactly what you'd want for acoustic guitar.

[Nate74]

I guess I didn't realize how similar the demands of acoustic guitar are with those of the upright bass. I'm quite pleased to hear I have some options already in-house. I'll get a chance to mess around with both cabinets and the two preamps this weekend a bit.

In terms of volume, they do play with an electric bass and drummer but from the several times I've seen them, they certainly aren't very loud, though I'm always in favor of my own monitor, either off an amp or off a wedge at my feet.

Thanks all for the input and advice.