RIG RUNDOWN
from the outlet to the ear!
After 40 years of performing, I have reached a new perspective on "live" rigs. I've engaged the KISS method - Keep It Simple Stacy!
Here we go; from the Harp-Guitar I plug my 1/4" monster cable into a Sonic Research ST-300 Tubo tuner, then into a Fishman Platinium pre-amp, then into my Hughes and Kettner Era 2 acoustic guitar amp. The amp is plugged into a Surge X power conditioner - a new concept for me outside of the studio - and then into any 120V outlet. After nearly 40 years of performing through Fishman amps, I found the Hughes and Kettner Era 2 acoustic guitar amplifier and to my ears, the Hughes-Kettner is the best sounding acoustic guitar amp I have ever heard or played through.
It (the amp) boasts' 400 watts of pure transparency - meaning if your guitar sounds bad, it will sound bad loudly; and if you have a great sounding guitar, or Harp Guitar, it will sound fantastic.There's plenty of headroom for the hard driving players out there!
I have a couple of Fishman Matrix thin-line under the saddle acoustic guitar pickups in both my old Dyers, an element on the 6 string side, and a separate element on the bass side; after a conversation with Fishman, it was recommended to wire both elements to the single end pin pre-amp then then into an external preamp to further boost the signal.
For whatever reason, both my Dyers, with this set up, produce an even tone from string one down to string twelve. Perfectly EQ'ed right out of the gate!
So the signal chain IS simple; instrument, tuner, preamp, Era 2 amp, power conditioner, outlet!
There's less room for line noise and loss in fidelity resulting in a great sound and a quick and easy set up!