Koa Tonewood Electric Guitar
Balanced clear tone is only outshone by the beauty of its honey rippled grain.
Koa tonewood electric guitar. A lower density koa guitar tends to produce a more mahogany tone whereas denser sets tend towards the rosewood spectrum. Hard northern soft southern the most popular option is hard ash due to the bright tone and high sustainability. Hawaiian flamed koa acacia koa. Koa is a hard dense tonewood that accentuates with mid and upper ranges providing good articulation and crispness in the upper ranges.
It s just too expensive. Falling between rosewood and mahogany is koa a tonewood martin first used on guitars in 1917 as a craze for all things hawaiian swept across america. Long loved as a bright tonewood for ukuleles koa perfect for rhythmic strumming is warm like mahogany with a kiss of maple s clear treble. It also yields great clarity definition and sustain.
It s prized for its rich golden coloring curly figuring and agreeable sound. Indeed koa instruments are rarely mass marketed and typically produced as limited editions or special models. Ash is a tonewood that comes in two main types. Koa is native to hawaii and is used commonly on ukuleles but less so on guitars.
But those in the know will attest to their greatness. The great debate of the best tonewood for steel string guitars will go on forever and rightfully so. This is why koa is rarely found on the modern production guitars of today. In addition to koa tonewood we also supply curly mango tonewood for making beautiful sounding mango ukuleles and mango guitars.
Ash is one of the most common tonewoods for electric guitar bodies. Dark brown with streaks of blonde. Our goal is to help you find the very best koa wood for building your next koa ukulele or koa guitar. Wide board sets for guitars are becoming more difficult to get no matter how fast the tree grows.
They are most often described as a warm sounding mahogany to a brighter sounding rosewood. It holds its tone nicely when strummed with good response. Bass response slightly less than east indian rosewood and treble response a bit less than genuine mahogany. Koa guitars are a niche product.
Soft ash is also commonly called swamp ash. Best known as the tonewood of gibson s radical modernistic series of the late 1950s the flashy flying v and explorer as well as more recent guitars that follow these templates korina is a warm resonant and balanced performer. We supply koa ukulele and koa guitar instrument sets for both acoustic and electric guitars. Hawaiian koa by contrast does not have the same widespread recognition in the tonewood world.
Koa is a highly figured tonewood that looks beautiful as a soundboard.