Your QuickStart Guide To Resonator Guitars

First up on my list today is your Resonator Guitar Survival Guide .

Ok .

Because I think there's a lot of myths surrounding resonator guitars .

And it's like , oh , well , I can't , I can't play a resonator guitar .

I'm not good enough or I can't play a resonator guitar because I don't play slide or I can't play a resonator guitar because I have to learn a whole new style of play .

That's just not true because resonator guitars , you can tune them to standard tuning and play everything that , you know , on a regular guitar , on a resonator guitar and it's gonna sound awesome .

It's another , it's another sonic flavor to add to your arsenal .

So I wanna discuss Resonator guitars today because I want you to be able to walk into your local guitar store or shop online and know what you're looking at and be confident enough to give them a shot because they're really fun .

I mean , Resonator guitars are truly magical instruments .

So let's dig in the first choice that you're gonna need or the first choice that you'll be confronted with when it comes to Resonator guitars is neck type .

Ok .

Now , what I'm talking about here is the actual profile of the neck .

You're either gonna see a round neck resonator guitar or a square neck resonator guitar .

And luckily for us here , I've got both on hand .

This is a round neck if I can get out of the stand .

This is a round neck resonator guitar .

The neck is round .

You play it like the standard guitar .

OK .

This over to my right is can get this one out of the stand is a square neck resonator guitar .

You can't fret .

I mean , you , you literally can't fret this .

The , the nuts sitting the in the , the strings are about a half inch off the fret board and square neck resonator guitars are made to play flat in your lap .

So think um like Dobro style or like bluegrass dobro .

Um Sometimes people call it lap slide .

All of those names .

Suffice for a square neck resonator guitar .

So first choice round neck or square neck , square neck is exclusively for lap style playing round neck .

You can play your standard stuff , uh , that you play on your normal guitar or you can play with a bottleneck slide or something like that .

Ok .

So now that we got that out of the way , now let's get into the meat and potatoes of the dish , ok ?

Because Resonator guitars have resonator systems in them .

That's what help them make the sound that they do and you're probably gonna run into three of the most common resonator systems when you're out there looking at resonator guitars .

And I want you to be able to tell the difference between the two and I want you to be able to hear the difference between , I'm sorry , between the three , I said two , there's three .

So let's start with the most common resonator system and that is a single cone resonator that is of a biscuit style .

OK .

Now you're gonna be looking at a picture and you'll see that the single cone resonator , it's like a aluminum speaker cone that's pointed inside the guitar's body and the strings go over this wooden saddle that sits on top of a wooden disk and that's lovingly referred to as the biscuit .

Now , these particular guitars sound extremely distinct because they're , they're very barky .

They have this beautiful kind of thump and , and really strong projection , but they decay really quickly .

They don't have a ton of sustain .

They may have a little bit more sustain than a standard flattop acoustic guitar .

But in the resonator guitar world , single cone biscuit style resonators have a very quick decay .

So they're really good for slide .

They're great for blues .

Uh If you , if you find yourself , uh , finger picking like rag Timey or real Thumpy blues .

A single cone biscuit style resonator is the one that I definitely think you should check out .

And it's probably the most common out there .

If you look at many national guitars , oftentimes they are a single biscuit cone style guitar .

In fact , the one that I have here next to me is a single cone biscuit style resonator guitar .

This is a uh a super Collegian that was actually made by National and under the hood .

It is a single cone biscuit style resonator and it has just a beautiful thumb , just a really nice projection , good , strong sustained , rather , I'm sorry , good , strong projection , but a little bit shy on the sustained end of things .

Uh So the notes die pretty quickly , but they're very strong right off the get go .

The next resonator style that you're gonna run into is called a Spider bridge or a spider cone resonator style .

Now , this particular resonating system is a lot different than the biscuit style because the cone is actually inverted .

The cone of a spider bridge is actually outward like much like a speaker .

So think of the guitar as a speaker cabinet and that aluminum resonator cone is shooting out .

And on top of that resonator cone looks like , uh actually looks like a spider web and the strings go across that on top of a wooden saddle .

I happen to have an example of a spider cone bridge here .

And this is my beard bell beard guitar , uh from the front , you , you'd never be able to know .

But if you look under the cover plate , you'll start to see that spider web kind of bracing system that the saddle sits on and that is what indicates a Spider bridge resonator guitar .

These guitars are common on square neck guitars , obviously .

Um , and also round neck and what's significant about these Spider Bridge resonating systems is that they're very long unsustained .

They're very good at note articulation .

They're really lush and huge sounding .

They might not be as loud as a single cone biscuit style resonator guitar , but for what they lack in volume , they make up for in sustained .

So if you like doing slide really long kind of sensitive uh passages , if you will uh Spider bridge resonator guitar would be a great option for you .

And last , but certainly not least , probably the most intimidating of all the resonators is a tri cone .

OK .

So a tri cone as the name suggests is three resonators .

There's 3 10 inch resonator cones kind of oriented like the biscuit style or resonator , but they're three , right ?

There's two on the base end of the side , uh the base side of the guitar and a single one on the side of the guitar and running across them is a metal or like a cast aluminum T and that's what the strings actually run over .

Now , the beautiful thing about tri cones is that they actually marry the bark of a single cone biscuit and the sustain of a Spider bridge resonator .

So you get this beautiful projection , this strong projection , but also this nice long uh tail on the note , they're great for slide , awesome for alternate tunings .

And I actually happen to have one here .

This is a Mule tri cone and from the front , you'd say , well , tone , that's not much of a tri cone , but this is actually modeled after a 1927 national where they put a tri cone resonating system in a single cone body more on this guitar here in a second .

In fact , you'll be able to hear it much better than um if I played it with this microphone .

So that's , that's the basics of resonator guitars .

Can you play a resonator guitar right now ?

Absolutely .

You don't need any special skills .

You just need to want to make beautiful sounding music and grab a resonator guitar and you absolutely will be able to just a quick run over again .

So neck profile is , is the first option you're gonna run into , uh you're gonna run into round next or square , next square , next are exclusively lap style playing and round next , you can do pretty much whatever with and then you go into the resonating systems .

You've got a single cone biscuit bridge which is real barky think , single cone biscuit for bark .

Then you have a spider bridge , resonator think spider bridge for smooth and sustain .

And then you have a tri cone which is kind of that , that middle ground of sustain and bark .

And uh you're actually gonna hear somebody play a tri cone here when we get to who I'm listening to this week .

But I digress , I want you to now be able to go into your local guitar store and con take a resonator guitar off the wall .

Be able to look inside it and know what you're looking at .

More importantly , be able to play it and have fun with it because it's resonator guitars are so cool .

It's like an instant sonic addition to your guitar arsenal and you don't have to learn anything new .

It just sounds amazing .