Could someone throw some light please - Mark, Please Help

[Nbhatt]

Friends,

Following link is from music of Indian mandolin (mini-guitar) player U.Shrinivas (also a member of Shakti group). In this song there is some subtle yet very evident guitar effect in action. I think its an effect that subtly alters the envelope of the tone (a filter may be?) of his instrument but i could be entirely wrong. I will highly appreciate if you could guide me in the right direction here.

http://www.fivestrings.net/javali.mp3

or

http://www.fivestrings.net/333.mp3

http://www.fivestrings.net/111.mp3

Regards,
N Bhatt

[David Schwab]

I don't hear anything except some reverb. You're just hearing the sound of the instrument, and the way it's being played.... it sounds like very light strings too.

Great playing too!

[Mark Hammer]

Sounds to me like you're listening to a mohan veena. This is a guitar-like instrument that has the raised frets found on a sitar, permitting the user to bend the notes individually at the fret very much like a bender wheel on a synth. That's probably what you are hearing. Irony of ironies, one of the greatest proponents of the mohan veena is Vishwan Mohan Bhatt http://www.vishwamohanbhatt.com/veena.htm

[David Schwab]

Mark, I was trying to think of the name veena, but it was escaping me!

I just love those Indian instruments.

[Nbhatt]

Mark, David,
Shrinivas does not play a mohan veena. There is no slide, he plays his little guitar like normal spanish guitar. That's the precise reason why i was interested in knowing how to get that tone. All i know is that he uses low action, uses reverb/delay and tunes his instrument CGCGC. I have the same instrument/setup but that tone eludes me. I have my own sound samples on
www.fivestrings.net but when you compare his tone to mine there is this subtle/ intangible difference in the note attack. May be it is some expensive hi-fi processor he uses

[David Schwab]

I have a really good ear for hearing effects, and I don't hear any, except reverb.

Is he using a metal pick? All I'm hearing is very light strings and the sound of the pick on the strings. There also seems to be some high EQ.. brings out those tones. How is his instrument amplified? It also sounds like he's picking right over the fretboard.

It might have a lot to do with his attack, how he holds the pick, etc. I know that when I play my own guitars and bases they sound different then when someone else plays them, and alternately I sound the same on someone else's instruments.

These are subtle things, but the tone really is in your fingers.

[David Schwab]

I Googled U. Shrinivas... he's playing a mandolin?

http://www.mandolinshrinivas.org/mandolin.htm#

They seem to point out that his modified mandolin sounds different. I also see it looks like a solid body, and he has a pickup located by the bridge.



As an instrument maker myself, I can attest that having a custom made instrument will surly give you a unique tone. You will need to find out more about his mandolin and try to make yours like it.

[Mark Hammer]

I listened again to all 3 samples, and the only thing I can hear in there that isn't exactly what you might hear from a Nashville country musician is the raised fret. This is the same sort of fret you find on a sitar, that lets you bend the note in a more dramatic fashion. There is no slide, as you correctly point out, but the note bending made possible by raised frets more than compensates. Not unless you are talking about something other than the bend at the start of notes.

[Nbhatt]

Thank you Mark. Thank you David.
I think with responses from both of you i can now phrase my question more accurately. It is not the bend or slide that i have the doubt about, i am able to do both on my instrument. Yes, he is bending strings and sliding but what is bothering me is the "tone" (that trebly bloom/swell of the note). Is it just a result of light gauge strings and some extra clean amp with reverb ? could be there something like very mildly applied volume pedal or it is the amp that could be adding that swell ?

[David Schwab]

To me it just sounds like the instrument... just light gauge strings and some reverb. It might also be from having very low action.

[Jag]

Two things I notice;

1) I agree with David, it's most likely very light strings which are giving the effect you are noticing.

2) There could be a compressor on the instrument set to moderate to light compression with quick attack and release times. Maybe 2:1 compression ratio with 0.1ms Attack and 50ms Release?

Jag

[Mark Hammer]

Boy, it's whole lot easier to look smart when answering a question if the question you THINK you're answering is the question being asked.

Upon re-listening, I'm inclined to agree with Jag. What you are hearing is a kind of coloration produced by compression. Ideally, short tight strings would produce a very quick decay because of their stiffness. Just as importantly, physics would dictate that the harmonic content would disappear fairly quickly, relative to longer floppier strings.

The player here is obviously using a lighter string, given the bending they are achieving, but the string is still fairly short, implying the same sort of quick-decay-quick-treble-loss I suggested. I called up the Windows Media Player RTA visualization ("bars" from the "Bars and Waves" visualizations) and slowed the playback speed down to half. Under those circumstances it is easy to see the dynamic range is seriously limited, and that the harmonic content at initial attack is not that much greater than during the decay phase of the note. Given that many forms of compression often tend to reduce apparent treble that makes perfect sense.

What remains in question is the KIND of compression used and the parametric settings. The absence of much impulse signal at the start of a picked note suggests that, yes, attack time is set quite fast to put the kybosh on sudden peaks. Determining what the release/decay time is, though, is a tougher thing to guess since it is difficult to disentangle from the playing style of the musician. My hunch is that the threshold is set to moderate, rather than high, and the amount of compression (ratio) is also moderate, meaning that all notes get affected a reasonable amount but dynamics are not totally suppressed. I have no idea as to brand/type of compression used.

Funny aside. I bought an old Ashly SC-55 Stereo Compressor/Limiter two summers ago, and only stumbled onto a scanned manual for it yesterday. Here's a quote: "In the early 1960's, when musicians began looking at the recording process as a way to create new sounds, the pumping effect which had been avoided like the plague by earlier engineers, was suddenly seized upon and utilized as a creative tool, laying the groundwork for many of the sounds which are now considered indispensable in contemporary music. In this role, the compressor is used because you can hear it working, and control of dynamic range is only a secondary consideration." (emphasis added) In this particular recording you posted, it would seem as if the compression is being used to provide a particular tonality to the instrument by virtue of what compression does to tone.

[David Schwab]

"In the early 1960's, when musicians began looking at the recording process as a way to create new sounds, the pumping effect which had been avoided like the plague by earlier engineers, was suddenly seized upon and utilized as a creative tool...

There's a story about when the Beatles were recoding Nowhere Man, they wanted a brighter sound from the 12-string guitar. So John Lennon went to the engineer (probably Geoff Emerick) and asked him to turn up the treble. He said they weren't allowed to do that, but Lennon pestered him until he patched two input strips together in series to get enough highs... that and a crazy amount of compression, and a classic sound was born. Emerick was worried he was going to get caught and fired!

But getting back to this tone... yeah try some compression... that should really help get that tone.

I just love listening to these clips. U. Shrinivas sure can play that thing! I saw Shakti with McLaughlin years ago. Great music!