Pick Up for the Avalon Eclipse

[adhamh]

Hi,

I have a L.R. Baggs pickup in my Lowden s35c. It was already installed when I bought it, and its highly unimpressive.

I also have the Fishman Elipse Blend in my Avalon Rio. Its a dream. So responsive. The internal mic can give trouble if you're in a venue prone to feedback. But to have the option to go all undersaddle or a blend of both when possible is fantastic!

A friend of mine has a Lowden and has tried every pick-up system imagineable, and his recommendation is that the Fishman Rare Earth Blend is the best pick-up in the business.

Hope that helps somewhat.

Adam

[Dattan]

Hi John!
If you like the Fishman blender sound, have you considered the Fishman Ellipse? That way you can keep the sound, but get the controls out of your way.

Oh, and a happy start on the new year for everyone!

[Dattan]

Sorry, I forgot to ask Adam: Have you experienced any problems with the Ellipse falling of or loosing it´s position from the soundboard/soundhole?

[adhamh]

John,

Well I'm not 100% sure what model of L.R. Baggs pick-up is in my Lowden. It may have been the previous owner put in a cheaper model. But I've had a lot of trouble with it. Volume is always problematic. The guitar always sounds like its got too much treble, even if the treble is down and the bass is right up. Acoustically the guitar is fantastic. So warm and crystal clear. And I believe that the pick-up system is supposed to simply amplify the natural characteristics of the guitar, but this certainly doesnt come across through the L.R. Baggs system I have.

Back to the Fishman. The controls are inside the sound-hole. If you look at the pics on my Avalon Rio post you can see the controls inside the sound hold curved to the shape of the guitar. You only have volume and blend. But its great to not have to cut a hole in your beautiful Avalon. And what I've done is to just buy an L.R. Baggs para acoustic D.I. Box, which is basically an external graphic equalizer. So you can still do it yourself if you're like me, and you dont trust sound engineers.

The Fishman Rare Earth is the same principle. The controls are inside the sound hole along with the pick-up. However, I have heard that the controls are difficult to access if you are performing. On the Ellipse blend its a lot easier to access the controls as they're not underneath the strings, and you can just stick you finger inside the top of the sound hole to adjust volume or blend.

Hope that helps. Pick-ups are such a vitally important component in live performance and its so important to get it right. Its much better to take time and pick the right one than to rush it and buy one that your not happy with. Our Avalons only deserve the best!

Adam

[oberon]

Depends on your plugged in situations as to what would work best for you, but when it comes to the sound from pickups I don't think you can beat K&K minis for a great acoustic sound with little fuss, and no clutter inside your guitar. (Greypicker, you have a guitar with a sound worth preserving plugged in, as i'm sure you'll agree.) I have fitted K&K minis in my Lowden O25, Lowden S10 and Fylde Oberon, and am about to fit them to my Fylde Ariel. The guitars each retain their individuality better with this set up than many other pickups I have tried.

Some folks feel K&K minis to be feedback prone, but I have no problem, perhaps because I play in relatively low volume situations and I rarely, if ever, use any monitoring either with church band, ceilidh band or fiddle/guitar, guitar/vocal combinations.

Much of the time I also use a K&K Pure XLR preamp for extra mid-range control - a very simple, quick and intuitive preamp to use. I also carry a Boss eq pedal as a backup which is also easy to use, not quite such a subtle rendition of the acoustic guitar sound, but fine for band use. I use instead a Baggs PADI in my church set up, because I can leave it there with my carefully twiddled default settings ready to go as the venue conditions are fairly constant. I find using the PADI in differing venues tricky as it takes me ages to get it right - too many things to fiddle with for a simple bloke, but good sound eventually.

I always feel that the Fishman soundhole pickups have a slightly "electric/metallic" sound to them. I know it can be minimised with careful eq, but these pickups don't do it for me, thouh many people really like them.

I did manage to get a reasonable Lowdenish sound with an active i-beam in my O25, but the K&K sound is so much more faithful to the acoustic sound to my ears.

Good luck!
Best wishes,
Keith

[jcstrings]

I have a baggs ibeam, i put it in a classical and it was really bad, super bassy and not tweakable.I contacted Baggs and they said 'too bad'.
Then i had it put into my lowden and its pretty good, but not great.
It depends if you want a mic type sound or a p/u sound.
I suggest a blending of the two, since mic is very thin sounding usually.
JC

[Moldy]

I'm interested to know whether anyone has tried the Fishman Aura pedals (the ones with six different options for your guitar choice (Jumob, 12 string etc)). How good are they as a different option?

[rocksteady]

I have an Aura blend and I like it. In addition There is a web site that downloads daily new guitar models to choose from.

I have a FIshman prefix premium blend, but you have to install it on the outside of your guitar. I also have and Fishman Ellipse blend. It sounds real good also with out any guitar modifications.

And if you by anychance have to play in an amplied situation, the the ellipse still allow a person to place a sound hole feedback buster in without any interference by the preamp.

Good luck.

Don

[chris c]

I also have an Aura, not one of the newer pedals but the big one with which you can download images from the Aura website.

It sounds fantastic with my Avalon Jacques Stotzem signature, but I'm spoiled with this guitar : there are no less than 10 images that can be downloaded for this particular model. The Aura really reproduces the sound of the guitar as if it was played through an expensive studio microphone... amazing.

I also use it for my Avalon 12-string, although there seem to be no images for a rosewood jumbo, let alone an Avalon. But one of the available images still sounds very good, though less impressive than with the JS.