Resonator Pickup?
 

What is a good choice for a round neck spider cone Reso pickup?

I see that Paul Beard offers a few choices but I have no idea which one would be a good choice for strumming and flat picking on a Reso.

I would prefer one that doesn't need a battery is possible.

My Rayco has a Baggs of some sort. No idea if they still make it. Sounds real good, although I more fingerpick and strum with my fingers. No battery.

When I ordered my Gold Tone Paul Beard round neck spider bridge resonator I had them add the Fishman passive pickup. It works well. I've gigged with it plugged in a few times.

An Sm57 mic' on stage. Those guitars, with medium gauge strings, have a great forward throw of sound. Plus there is no big old sound hole to accidentally point the mic into like on a flattop; so you can get away with moving around while you are playing.

That is what I use when playing with my band.
When I'm doing my solo shows for Assisted Living Centers, I use a pickup in my gigging guitar.
I want to be able to just use the same cord for both my acoustic guitar and the Reso.

I don't know if Elmer is still making the Sixtus mag p/u. His website is still live. They are a very slimline surface mount p/u and his system of using shade magnets to balance the p/u for pb strings is genius! The p/us are cheap and he is a good guy. I think that he is a paramedic from what I recall, so doesn't have a great production capacity.

Anyway, if you can get hold of one (about $65) it would give you a nice mellow plug and play option without having to attach anything to the bridge, spider or cone - so your acoustic sound will be unaffected.

K&K do a tricone and a spider option ... I have one in my tricone, and it's very useable ...

I use to use a Shure SM57 in front of my Resos live and it is a good sound for dobros, but a mic can be a problem in many ways....

So down the path of the pickup I went and after an awful 3 or 4 songs with a Fishman reso pickup straight to a desk at the blues jam night, yikes it sounded like tearing cardboard, I started using a Fishman Aura pre to give the pickup sound a bit of ‘air’ or ‘mic’ sound....

Recently, I have a Tonedexter with soundfiles made with, ha ha, a Shure SM57 and a Schatten reso pickup on my Nationals! Tonedexter also has feedback notch! Sounds like a National recorded in a small studio with a...ha 57!

Schatten also make dobro pickups - not tried one, but...


BluesKing777.