A Rosewood Worthy of Comparison

[Bruce Sexauer]

Everything eats energy, in the case of wood used in guitars it can be called “damping”. Different tone woods absorb (turn into heat) different aspects of the energy which is why they don’t all sound the same. While EIR may well have a higher overall damping, BRW also has some damping. No two woods are quite the same. Pernambuco is spectacularly low in damping which is why it is one of my all time favorites, but its clarity does not sound good to all ears.

This thread has gone places that other similar threads failed to, which is Great!

[Jabberwocky]

Originally Posted by svea

...If it is largely about marketing, then why do we always seem to return to the Holy Grail of tone wood for reference?

Because we were taught that BRW was the Holy Grail from the day we didn't know any better and first stepped into a guitar shop and learnt about it from...a guitar elder! These biases are passed on from one generation to another. Oft repeated, it becomes accepted as the truth. BRW is the Holy Grail because "everyone" who knows more than I do says so. Any newbie to this forum soon learns the same thing.

Hifi speakers, flatscreen TV salesmen know this: goose up the treble, goose up the bass, set the TV on dayglo VIVID. They catch the ears and capture the eyes. Loud and dayglo sells. In the less salubrious parts of town, painted ladies practise the same tactics: show legs and cleavage and lots of make-up. OK, I am no saint and go to parts of town mamma always told me I should not ever go as a child.

EIR is demure, conspicuously inconspicuous in a way that BRW is not. We are drawn to BRW immediately. Koa for that matter, too. But as any man who has made the mistake of marrying the woman who wears a lot of make-up knows, there may not be much there there.

The endangerment to Brazilian RW trees, the high cost demanded of BRW makes its distinct tonal colouration an unworthwhile chase. It is not necessarily a better tonewood. It is just rings differently. We are conditioned to hear this BRW ring as tonally superior and desirable.

Give an EIR guitar a deeper listen and hear what it can do for your music, for your songs. Don't live by the dogma of other guitar players.

Trouble with EIR is that it is just too common, it is just too good. It is too affordable and we like to get what is above our pay grade. It is like D'addario strings, so good that it becomes common.

I heard Jason Vieaux recently. At the end of the piece, Jason revealed that he was playing his new EIR Gernot Wagner, not his BRW Gernot Wagner. Jason sounds like Jason. His music did not suffer for his use of the EIR Gernot Wagner.

I must be a hypocrite because as I said, I am hardwired by early exposure to the received wisdom of guitar elders and conditioned to desire BRW. For those who have not been so hardwired and conditioned, give EIR a good listen. Forget about BRW landscaping, forget about rarity, forget about bragging rights that accrue from its high boutique pricing, forget about its smell even. Give EIR a good solid listen and see if you do not actually prefer its conspicuously inconspicuous tonal palette to the obviously coloured sounding chiming rumbling BRW.

All IN MY Very Humble Ha'p'orth of Opinion, of course.

[mercy]

I didnt say Braz had no damping. I think that it is common knowledge that EIR and other woods have higher damping than some others. You may like that but what it means is that it doesnt use the energy you put into the guitar efficiently. The classical guitar world understands that and so, many put rosewood bridges on their guitars with ebony fingerboards. Yes ebony is even higher damping than any true rosewood that I know of. I want all the sound a guitar can produce, perhaps a Pernambuco is a guitar I would like.

[Looburst]

I own a Brazilian B&S guitar and it's the best sounding and playing guitar I have. Course it was built by none other than Dana Bourgeois.

[J Patrick]

Originally Posted by Goodallboy

He was most likely referring to his SCGC Tony Rice Professional.

It had Brazilian back and sides.

...i know he loves those SC's....but the one time I saw him he was playing the Martin...fwiw the best Dread I ever played was a Santa Cruz Tony Rice Pro.....I have a standard SC Tony Rice and for my tastes and budget it's perfect...but the Brazilian/German pro models are really spectacular...

[jessupe]

Some thoughts on this;

First we should define the properties that matter as far as we are concerned.
We have Volumetric mass density, or density, which generally translates to weight based on dimension{not always} then we have damping and or the materials ability to absorb vibration or energy and then there is radiation which is the rate that the speed of sound travels through the material.

Now we could take the best supposed materials and give them to someone who has never made an instrument, has no wood working skills and assuming at the end that person constructed something that could actually be played, the chances of that instrument sounding good would be pretty slim.

The reason why is that the entire "thing" IS about MASS, and or how you take the inherent properties of whatever material you have and BALANCE them properly with the DESIGN of your architecture to come up with an end products who's MASS is HARNESSING the inherent properties.

That a long way of saying how thick and thin,where it is thick and or thin,of the plates,braces,tone bars, the weight, stiffness, pliability, and density based on size or material or weight and after all put together the way that "schemes" energy distribution works with the mass in its entirety.

Mass produced guitars have "safe" targets and can be just great, but only once in awhile hit a real winner,purely luck based on those materials working well with those dimensions and overall mass.

Whereas a custom builder who has experience will be more likely to hit winners more often than not based on learning about properly distributing mass based on a familiarity with the process and the materials they are using.

That being said, I've heard guitars that were made by novices with 2nd rate material that sounded better than a guitar made by a pro builder with top notch materials....I don;t think that's common, but it sure can happen.

It's all about your mass and what you do with it within the properties.

It is a mistake to think that high radiation and low damping is wanted throughout the entire instrument, you want certain aspects of each, you want to achieve tonal happiness through equilibrium, often times being brought right to the edge of structural integrity, with a safe buffer zone for longevity

[rogthefrog]

Originally Posted by mercy

The problem with EIR is it eats energy, its called damping, where Braz uses it. Its just a fact that the two trees are different.

Come again? :huh:

[jessupe]

Originally Posted by rogthefrog

Come again? :huh:

Well it is a fact the two trees are different, I don't know about the other stuff.

the only thing I remember actually eating energy was some monster on the show Ultraman

[Elroy Bean]

I saw a vid of Bob Taylor tapping on two small blocks of wood, one being Braz and the other EIR. The Braz had a distinctive bell-like ring as compared to the EIR which was noticeably duller. Of course, so much more is at play in a fine sounding guitar, however I came to the conclusion the hype about Braz rosewood was not all hooey.

[Sonics]

Originally Posted by Elroy Bean

I saw a vid of Bob Taylor tapping on two small blocks of wood, one being Braz and the other EIR. The Braz had a distinctive bell-like ring as compared to the EIR which was noticeably duller. Of course, so much more is at play in a fine sounding guitar, however I came to the conclusion the hype about Braz rosewood was not all hooey.

There's a difference, but does that difference justify many $$$$?

YMMV...

[lt20dbl]

I watch most of the Tony study and finally turned it off. Unable to detect any difference that matters. A better test would be not to watch the video. Just listen and then check to see if you were right. Several times, perhaps leaving the room between guesses. yawn.

[The Bard Rocks]

More interesting I found was that often there was no difference to me, yet at other times there was, and when it was different, the difference was - ready for this? - just what people had been saying for years and years.

[Doranged]

It seemed to me that the BRW was brighter on the treble strings in Tony's demo. Couldn't tell the difference on the lower strings

[Steadfastly]

Originally Posted by svea

I love all of the replies so far! Thank you.
If it is largely about marketing, then why do we always seem to return to the Holy Grail of tone wood for reference?

See how marketing works?

[printer2]

Just to say it again, is it the tree that is so different or the conditions it grew to size in? Think of the old growth Adirondack (red spruce) as compared to the trees grown to size since the old growth was cut? Is the wood the same? Now take that idea and transport it to India, if they have some old growth trees does it compare to old growth Brazilian? Not every set of Brazilian is considered fantastic. If we planted Brazilian rosewood trees on a plantation in Brazil in 100 years would that wood compare to the old growth wood?

And the old growth wood with differences in the sets? Is the tree that was cut at the edge of a clearing as good as a set from a tree from a jungle that it had to fight for each leaf? Maybe there is more to the wood than saying it is wonderful because it is Brazilian. Also the way it is used, if the luthier does not take advantage of its properties, say making a stiff back, is the use of Brazilian a waste and the tonal properties that the set has goes to waste?