What Is An Acoustic Guitar, Did You Ever Think About It？

General Idea of Acoustic Guitar

Acoustic guitar is a fretted stringed instrument in general. It belongs to “lute family” which covers classical guitars, flamenco guitars, bass guitars, mandolins and ukuleles.

The common of those instruments is the player plucks or strums the strings using a plectrum (like pick) or fingers to produce tone or sound. Through pressing frets on different positions on the neck to control the pitch of notes played.

Basically, the sound of acoustic guitar is created by the resonance of the acoustic guitar body through the vibration of strings. And during this process, no electrical amplification is required， though there are many acoustic guitars have electrical functions in modern period.

How Acoustic Guitars Produce Sound?

As mentioned, acoustic guitar produces the sound is basically through the vibration of strings. The vibration from strings is transferred to the guitar body through the bridge and projected through the soundboard (top of the body) and internal chamber of the guitar. Depending on the different frequencies (controlled by the frets on different positions), making different pitches. Besides, the tonewood material used for the construction of guitar heavily influences the quality of the sound.

Unlike electric guitars, acoustic guitars do not require electric system to make the sound. Although the vibration of the strings still plays critical role to make the sound of electric guitars, the quality of the sound is mainly determined by electric system like cables, switches, amplifiers, pickups, etc.

The Difference Between Body of Acoustic Guitar and Electric Guitar

The construction of acoustic guitar requires complicated procedure like cutting, bending, routing, etc.

Through the construction guitar body, we can see the typical difference. For acoustic guitar body, we need to cut the top and back according to the designed shape. Then, we need to bend the side. Besides, there also bindings to decorate and reinforce the strength of body. Don’t mention the bracing system inside.

Comparatively, to make electrical guitar body is easier. It mainly involves CNC work like cutting and routing, etc. Normally, there’s no bending work for side building and no bracing construction work is required. The dimensional precision of slots for loading of electric system may be more important.

For shapes of acoustic guitar body, you can visit our previous article: Acoustic Guitar Body: Key Part of Guitar for more details. The design of electric guitar shape is more flexible since the construction of electrical guitar body is not limited by side bending. Various of the types of electric guitar body can be found.

Final Thought

When we plan to write this article, the purpose is not to teach players about the definition of acoustic guitar, you can find answers everywhere and the definition is not so hard to understand. We just think this is an interesting topic to talk about. So, we share our opinion here.

As there are various opinions, we welcome you to CONTACT US to share your idea for an interesting discussion.