Shins said:

High tension ( heavier guage) strings produce less volume and sustain.  They are also hard on your fingers.  In my opinion tone is significantly worse too.  Unless you are down tuning I don't see the point.  Seems to me heavy Guage is a nu-metal trend.

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Perhaps on electric, I can see why that might be the case.
On acoustic and classical guitars the picture is definitely very different.

They're not really hard on your fingers man 
You get used to it in a few days
Sitar on the other hand, lawd I don't know why

Repertoire89 said:

Shins said:

High tension ( heavier guage) strings produce less volume and sustain.  They are also hard on your fingers.  In my opinion tone is significantly worse too.  Unless you are down tuning I don't see the point.  Seems to me heavy Guage is a nu-metal trend.

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Perhaps on electric, I can see why that might be the case.
On acoustic and classical guitars the picture is definitely very different.

They're not really hard on your fingers man 
You get used to it in a few days
Sitar on the other hand, lawd I don't know why

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Shins said:

SRV tuned his guitar to Eb

Checkmate.

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Shins said:

Repertoire89 said:

Shins said:

High tension ( heavier guage) strings produce less volume and sustain.  They are also hard on your fingers.  In my opinion tone is significantly worse too.  Unless you are down tuning I don't see the point.  Seems to me heavy Guage is a nu-metal trend.

---

Perhaps on electric, I can see why that might be the case.
On acoustic and classical guitars the picture is definitely very different.

They're not really hard on your fingers man 
You get used to it in a few days
Sitar on the other hand, lawd I don't know why

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The reduction in volume and sustain is actually even more pronounced on an acoustic than electric.

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Shins said:

On acoustic guitars, heavy high tension strings are even worse because they pre-load the bridge and sound board which limits it's capacity to vibrate.

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Repertoire89 said:

Shins said:

On acoustic guitars, heavy high tension strings are even worse because they pre-load the bridge and sound board which limits it's capacity to vibrate.

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Interesting train of thought.

I've thought about it from the perspective you present, generally what I've heard people say is something to the effect of "more power driving the thicker strings = more volume".

As a vocalist however, this would not work. You produce volume through resonance in the facial cavity, resonance not "projection" of power.


However, analogies can sound perfect without being relevant.
I learned on the piano that mechanical analogies do not translate to anatomical realities, long story there...



I have no opinion on the matter, it is an interesting idea though.

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Shins said:

With high tension heavies the strings do have more mass and can hold more energy (in theory)  however that is not the only factor at play.  The way that energy transfers to the sound board is even more important.

Basically with high tension heavies, the player must do more work to produce the same amplitude of vibration, yet the vibration does not transfer as well to the sound board.

So what I'm saying is that high tension heavies are inefficient, you need to do more work to produce less sound.  Not only that, you've also fucked up the playability of your guitar and your technique will suffer even further depreciating the sound.

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That is largely the comparison I was making with vocals.

Its interesting how similar the ideas are in a purely mechanical sense, I've attempted to write out a neat comparison, but classical vocal technique is a relatively abstract subject. Not looking to write a book here, so fuck it

Shins said:

Honestly I think heavy strings are some kind of subconscious Freudian phenomenon where desire for heavier strings are a reflection for a desire for a larger "appendage"

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Personally, I took the heavy string idea up way back when I was into blues and American folk music.

That being said, there is a lot of machismo in those genres. Its very overt, but it makes sense if you consider that a lot of these guys were black musicians traveling the south during segregation. Not only do they have to deal with racism, but the belief that they're playing degenerate devil music.

I'm not going to pass a verdict on where this comes from, because I'm not a guitarist (played guitar 11 years, but I'm a vocalist) however I pin the machismo behavior of those people to the violence of the times and circumstances.