Hot are you amplifying your L?

[Hotspur]

So I'm almost certainly going to buy an L-O3R in the very near future.  The question for me is how to amplify it, I'd love to hear from people who have amplified one (or any other L) and hear what solutions worked for them. I'm not a huge fan of cutaways, and don't love the barn doors.

I tend to be a fairly quiet player. I rarely use a pick, and a lot of why I want to amplify is so that I can play in small group settings (another guitar + keys + a singer, maybe a cajon) and not have to change my style to be heard. I do occasionally play with more of a full band (drums, bass, etc).

I expect that most of the time I'll be playing through something like a Fishman Loudbox Mini, although there will be times I'm going through a PA. Down the road, adding a pre-amp is possible.

I'm not really a fan of the K&K, from demos I've heard. It's got a "thuddy" quality, to me, that I find unpleasant. Does anybody have L+K&K+Loudbox Mini experience that suggests I'm too worried about that? The absence of batteries is a plus.

It sounds like the lyric, which was probably my frontrunner, doesn't have a ton of fans when it comes to the L body shape. Maybe I've missed some posts, but it seems like they don't dance so well together.    One of the reasons I signed on this forum was to find people with L+Lyric experience.

I'd prefer not to use an UST, since the guitar will primarily be played acoustically. Also not a huge fan of that sound.

Something like an M80 maybe isn't a great fit for my style, since it seems to shine in loud/band-oriented settings, although as mags go, its the best I've heard and I like that it's responsive to percussive playing in a way that maybe the sunrise isn't.

So anyway, with that context, any recommendations? What do you use? What are its limitations? What are you happiest about with it?

[unclrob]

I'm a fan of the Anthem SL but part of the system include's a UST which with this pu system is more for bass responce the overall sound.I have tried the Lyric in a bunch of Larrivee's and have found that the unit works ok in a dread but the L,LS and OM seem to dislike it.The Anthem has a pre-amp built into the endpin and use's a battery inside the guitar but when I'm running direct into the PA I use the PARA Direct from Bagg's in my main guitar.In my LS I have an Active Ibeam which sounds pretty good.Though I play mostly thru a PA I have clients that use varies acoustic guitar amp's to a happy end.Hope this helps.

[George]

I have a K&K in my L-09R and My C-03K and they both sound different (but I am a flat picker).  Many fingerstyle players prefer the LR Baggs Ibeam, which uses a very similar strategy for amplifying from underneath the soundboard...

[247hoopsfan]

I have a L body 40th Anniversary Edition with an Imix I had put in at the factory by Matt Larrivee when I picked up the guitar.  I regularly play plugged in to a PA at a large church, run through a Baggs Para DI to the house.  Sound great.  I also do weddings and other gigs with a Marshall AS50D.  With the Imix you can blend the sound between the body and bridge pickup.  Has no effect on the acoustic sound that I can tell, and I am pretty picky.

[Gordon Currie]

I had an old (ca 1990) Fishman UST piezo + mini mic system installed into my 1978 L-26. I wired the piezo to the Tip/mic to the Ring of the stereo endpin jack and used a Rane AP13 to EQ and blend.

Recently I added a newer L-03R and decided to try K & K Pure Mini. It sounds very acceptable for situations where I have no setup/sound check (open mikes, sitting in).

When i control the setup, I always use the mini-mic blended with the pure mini.

Of course, there is nothing like a professional sound person who knows mike placement setting up mikes for your guitar. Unfortunately, that kind of gig is pretty rare for me these days.

-Gordon

[headsup]

Just to add yet more confusion to the mix, I have pretty much settles on the LR Baggs, Element system on all my stage Larrivee guitars.
This includes,. L09 FM, C09 BZ, OM60 & C 05. It's the most consoistant, easy to instal, and the stealth volume/tone controls are a real treat when needing to do a quick on stage tuning.

I'm also doing a good bit more tapping, while playing, either on the strings or using y thumb as a percussion aid while playing and the Element picks this up nicely with out being over bearing.

Also, of all the systems I've installed on my own gutars and hundreds of others, they are the most consistent.
And te only time I had to call LR Baggs, about the difference in sound between the regular version and the VTC version, the house tech had all the time in the world for me.
I was impressed.....

[carruth]

I play fingerstyle. I use K & K pure mini. Hard to beat it.

[Hotspur]

I play fingerstyle. I use K & K pure mini. Hard to beat it.

What's your typical signal chain? Preamp, amp or PA, etc?

I was leaning towards the Lyric before I started digging into other users experiences, now I'm leaning towards a K&K.

[carruth]

At small gigs, I just go straight into the PA using a lead that has a preamp built in and is powered up by phantom power.   At big gigs I use the K & K preamp.

[L07 Shooting Star]

When I was gigging (playing rhythm guitar) in a 5-piece cover band, I plugged my L-07 with K&K into a Baggs Paracoustic preamp, then into a switchbox, then into my Fender tube guitar amp.  The eq etc. on the preamp was pre-set to get a realistic acoustic sound from the Fender amp. on the clean channel.  The other input on the switchbox received my electric guitar.  I used the switchbox to go back and forth between songs as required.

When I have played with just one or two others at a staff party or something like that in a smaller venue, I just plugged either my L-07 or L-40 12-string (both K&K equipped) directly into a powered mixer/PA amp. and used the eq and other controls on the mixer to get my acoustic sound.  This gives excellent results.

If I'm just practising at home or for a solo performance in a smaller space, I plug either of those guitars and a vocal mic directly into a Traynor "Acoustic Master Studio" amp.  That amp. has all the eq, controls, and effects I need, so I can get by without the external preamp in that situation as well.  The acoustic sound with this setup is very nice.

I would say that in some or even many setups you don't need an external preamp in the chain when using the K&K transducers, but I think it is worthwhile to have one in your back pocket when you need it.  If you are plugging into a standard guitar amp. you will greatly benefit from one.  Some would say the Paracoustic is not suitable or compatible with the K&K system, but I don't find that to be true at all.  That said, if I was buying a first preamp anyways, I would go with the K&K preamp as that only makes sense, really.

You may be interested in the method I use to pre-set the controls on all of the above setups to obtain what I believe to be the best acoustic sound.  Keep in mind, I do this in my basement practice room just before the gig, and the settings may have to be tweaked once you get to the sound check stage in the venue.  The method assumes that the most realistic acoustic sound is still obtained by using a microphone as opposed to any kind of pickup or transducer.  Basically, I use the guitar's sound, played through a microphone (SM58) directly plugged into my PA, as my reference:

I mic the guitar using standard practise for mic placement.  I set all the controls on the PA system to get the sound that is (to my ears) most like the guitar unmiked.  I place another identical mic in front of the speaker of the amp that I plan to play through (again using "standard" mic placement in front of the speaker).  I play the guitar through the guitar mic directly into the PA, then play it again with that guitar mic turned off and the amp mic turned on.  I adjust the controls on the preamp, amp, mixer, or combination thereof, including volume, until they sound as identical as possible to the straight miked guitar.  This involves a lot of switching back and forth and "remembering".  I record the settings on paper so I can repeat them when I get to the gig.  During the sound check, I start with these settings and adjust accordingly.

[Paattyjohn]

Hi everybody!
I've installed a Highlander Piezo and a L.R. Baggs Lyric Microphone in my L , with two separate jack outputs. Then I use two L.R. Baggs Para DI, one for each pickup and it goes directly to the PA.
If you don't have tried it, I highly recommend the Highlander Piezo. Not more expensive than a LR Baggs or similar, and the sound quality is far better. It gives me a powerful, low sound and its sound it's very close to a mic, too.
Then, the Lyric gives a less powerful sound, but it's just like being recorded with a regular microphone. The sound quality is excellent.
Mixing the two pickups I get a very rich sound.