Tone equation. Is it the amp? The guitar? The pickups? The wood?

gball said:
A lot of times the main question I have to answer for a particular piece I am going to play is not which guitar or amp but which speaker cabinet to pug the amp into.
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I agree! That's why I have tree cabs all with different speakers. They are also configured in a 1X12 a 2X12 and a 4X12. Great variety!
 
gball said:
A lot of times the main question I have to answer for a particular piece I am going to play is not which guitar or amp but which speaker cabinet to pug the amp into.
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This,,, gball is right on the money. The speakers & cab have the final say in our tone & like anything else, speakers types each have a unique voice. Cab design also plays a big part. Cheers
 
Col Mustard said:
kernel says

1. soul (including creativity and originality, artistic voice)
2. practice (including experience & history, and CONFIDENCE...)
3. technique (including pick choice, or bare fingers)
4. Tone controls (including pedals, EQ, amp controls)
5. Amp quality (including design, components, workmanship, power)
6. Signal chain (including pickups, cables, speakers)
7. Guitar characteristics (including setup, scale length, fretwork,
Pickup Placement, nut and bridge contact, nut and bridge material,
quality of components and whether it's stolen or not...
8. Hair, if any... including How Big, how clean, how radical, or how absent
9. Pants... including how tight, how clean, whether they even fit
10. fingernails (how long, how clean, how strong)

I'm sure there are more factors to the quest for tone, but that's enough for now.

THE QUEST FOR TONE HAS NO FINISH LINE
SO IT'S TECHNICALLY A DEATH MARCH...
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Told you tone was everywhere.
 
Gahr said:
I always found the "tone is in your fingers" expression to be a bit strange. I wouldn't say tone as such is in your fingers at all. Style, skill, choice of notes, musicality and melody are in your fingers (and in your way of thinking about music), but not actual tone. That fact that a player is instantly recognizable no matter what guitar is because of his or her personal playing style, not tone. B. B. King would be recognizable if he played on a Stratocaster, but he would sound like he was B. B. King playing, well, a Strat. The sound of the Strat would not magically become identical to a Gibson ES345 just because B. B. was playing it. You play and sound like yourself no matter what guitar or rig, but the actual tone will not be the same. Now, where and you pick on the strings will be important, and how cleanly you play (in a technical sense) so your technique definitely matters, but it's still not really your fingers that create the tone. They "only" create the music.

For guitar tone I believe the speaker and amp are the most influential parts of the equation, then (disregarding any effects) the pickups and their placement in relation to the bridge.
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^^^This. Very well-said, Gahr.

“Tone” is not in your fingers.

Your fingers (which are really just doing what your brain tells them to do) provide the dynamics, the expressiveness, the unique stylings that make your playing discernible as your playing.

The “tone”...the fundamental characteristics of the sound...are a result of the components used to produce the sound.

“Music” is in the fingers; “Tone” is in the gear.
 
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;>)/
 
It's all off them. I don't totally buy "it's in the hands." To get actual "tone" you need equipment that can actually produce at least marginally decent sound, stays mostly in tune, etc. You STILL can't do it without the hands- I'd say soul- which is where it really comes from, unless you're a technician. But you need a certain level of gear too. Not cork-sniffer gear, but an adequate basic setup.
 
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