Ghost Pickup Systems. Anyone Tried Them?

I've been having trouble with my electric lyre guitar (It has exchangeable fingerboards each fretted for a different microtonic scale). The top e is too quiet compared to the b string and some of the other strings are not very even in volume. I have tried correcting for this by adding one piece of a precision bass style neck position pick up to pick up the sound from the top e and add to its volume. This has improved things, but it is not without it's problems.

I believe that the problem stems from my choice of very light gauge strings and high action. However, I don't want to change these aspects of the design.

Someone suggested ghost pickup systems, made by Graph Tech.

There are a lot of positive features, but I haven't tried them and I would be interested in the opinions of those who have.

I am particularly interested in the stratocaster style bridge pickups
http://youtu.be/RhGA1c3E47c
http://www.graphtech.com/product-41-2/

I want to be able to control the volume of each string separately. Also controlling the tone of each string separately would be useful.

Can you run the pickups without a preamp? If so, what resistance potentiometers would be suitable as volume controls for each string? What resistance potentiometer would be suitable to control the overall volume of the mixed sound of the separate strings?

The video mentions "natural compression". I am concerned that this will reduce or complete destroy the ability of the guitarist to create dynamics by plucking strings louder or more quietly. Is this a problem?

They also sell a preamp like module that converts the guitar sound into midi.
http://www.graphtech.com/product-11-2/
Does anyone know if this is capable of working microtonally? (I mean, can it reliably convert the sound of a guitar fretted for microtonal music into midi?)

Mark,

Have you considered using one or more piezo pick-up? I have been having good
luck with them. These are affordable and sound good:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002C741BI

I have been clamping them in place but you could do a permanent install with
glue. - I'd try it in addition to the pick up.

I used piezo pick ups for my cannon video and also my hammer dulcimer (where
I used 2 for stereo - I have an old texas transducer piezo from the early
80's but the one I gave the link for is better.)

Chris

On Sat, May 28, 2011 at 1:03 PM, Mark <mark.barnes3@...> wrote:

>
>
> I've been having trouble with my electric lyre guitar (It has exchangeable
> fingerboards each fretted for a different microtonic scale). The top e is
> too quiet compared to the b string and some of the other strings are not
> very even in volume. I have tried correcting for this by adding one piece of
> a precision bass style neck position pick up to pick up the sound from the
> top e and add to its volume. This has improved things, but it is not without
> it's problems.
>
> I believe that the problem stems from my choice of very light gauge strings
> and high action. However, I don't want to change these aspects of the
> design.
>
> Someone suggested ghost pickup systems, made by Graph Tech.
>
> There are a lot of positive features, but I haven't tried them and I would
> be interested in the opinions of those who have.
>
> I am particularly interested in the stratocaster style bridge pickups
> http://youtu.be/RhGA1c3E47c
> http://www.graphtech.com/product-41-2/
>
> I want to be able to control the volume of each string separately. Also
> controlling the tone of each string separately would be useful.
>
> Can you run the pickups without a preamp? If so, what resistance
> potentiometers would be suitable as volume controls for each string? What
> resistance potentiometer would be suitable to control the overall volume of
> the mixed sound of the separate strings?
>
> The video mentions "natural compression". I am concerned that this will
> reduce or complete destroy the ability of the guitarist to create dynamics
> by plucking strings louder or more quietly. Is this a problem?
>
> They also sell a preamp like module that converts the guitar sound into
> midi.
> http://www.graphtech.com/product-11-2/
> Does anyone know if this is capable of working microtonally? (I mean, can
> it reliably convert the sound of a guitar fretted for microtonal music into
> midi?)
>
>
>

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com, Chris Vaisvil <chrisvaisvil@...> wrote:
>
> Mark,
>
> Have you considered using one or more piezo pick-up? I have been having good
> luck with them. These are affordable and sound good:
>
> http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002C741BI

Mark: The Ghost Pickups I am asking about are piezo electric, but built into a fender stratocaster style bridge and with separate wires for each bridgelet, in theory allowing separate volume control for each string.

The product you have linked to looks like what I'd call a contact transducer. I really like the sound of it on your canon recording, which surprises me because my experience of contact transducers is that they usually sound truly awful to me. Bridge piezo pickups on acoustic guitars often sound truly awful to me too, though this may be just the cheaper pickups, or pickups without good preamplification.

Maybe I should try the one you have linked to. I find it hard to see how it will improve the problem of different strings having different volumes, though.

Thank you for your suggestions.

I still can't find anything to suggest the ghost pickups are piezo - I
missed that fact entirely.

The reason I'm suggesting piezo is because high action usually equals a
large string to pick up difference and pickups are sensitive to distance and
string size.

Have you looked at the article on pickups on wikipedia yet? It might be
helpful.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pickup_%28music_technology%29

I think my piezo transducers might be working as good as they are because
I'm using a heavy spring clamp. Also, I recently (last year) had a Shadow
under the bridge passive piezo installed on my classical guitar and I liked
it.

Here is an example of how the Shadow piezo sounds (classical guitar with
loop station)

http://alonetone.com/vaisvil/tracks/nylon-66

Chris

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Ghost PUPs are piezo

Rich Duckworth

Lecturer in Music Technology

Department of Music

House 5

Trinity College

Dublin 2

Ireland

Tel 353 1 896 1500

It's the most devastating moment in a young mans life, when he quite reasonably says to himself, "I shall never play The Dane!"

--- On Sun, 29/5/11, Chris Vaisvil <chrisvaisvil@...> wrote:

From: Chris Vaisvil <chrisvaisvil@...>
Subject: Re: [MMM] Re: Ghost Pickup Systems. Anyone Tried Them?
To: MakeMicroMusic@yahoogroups.com
Date: Sunday, 29 May, 2011, 19:36

I still can't find anything to suggest the ghost pickups are piezo - I

missed that fact entirely.

The reason I'm suggesting piezo is because high action usually equals a

large string to pick up difference and pickups are sensitive to distance and

string size.

Have you looked at the article on pickups on wikipedia yet? It might be

helpful.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pickup_%28music_technology%29

I think my piezo transducers might be working as good as they are because

I'm using a heavy spring clamp. Also, I recently (last year) had a Shadow

under the bridge passive piezo installed on my classical guitar and I liked

it.

Here is an example of how the Shadow piezo sounds (classical guitar with

loop station)

http://alonetone.com/vaisvil/tracks/nylon-66

Chris

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]