Over the years, people have – for better or for worse – tried to talk about where tone comes from. Many players say it comes from your fingers. They are then quickly dispatched by obnoxious gear freaks who say tone comes from your gear. So who’s right?
The answer is… both and neither. How’s that for not taking sides? 🙂
Actually, my opinion is that either of these views together are only a small part of what I call Tone – with a capital “T.” From my perspective, there are two types of “tone:” The first, “tone” with a little “t,” is the natural sound produced by your guitar(s), effect box(es) (if any), and amp(s). In other words, “tone” is the sound of what’s in your rig.
The second, what I call “Tone” with a capital “T” is the sound of your gear, combined with your – for lack of a better word – heart; that is, the emotion and passion that travels from the center of your being to your fingers, onto your strings and fretboard, down through your rig, and out your amp. Tone is the music you express through your gear that is uniquely you.
In that light, I tend to gravitate to the “tone is in your fingers” camp, in that what you “feel” while you’re playing is transmitted to your fingers which in turn manipulate your guitar. And I think that’s where the important distinction must be made from those who say your tone is simply your gear. Of course, the quality of your gear and the purity of the signal are certainly important factors to consider. But music played with no passion and feeling just sounds flat and uninteresting, even through great gear.
On the other hand, even what could be considered cheap or crappy gear played by someone who can truly express themselves will sound great – and they will sound like themselves, no matter what gear they play. I was watching a video recently of a guy down in LA who is session musician that uses a Squire Strat and a Sears Silvertone amp, and he’s on a lot of big-name groups’ albums.
To add to that, around the middle of last year, I was listening to an interview with Ronnie Montrose, and he recounted a story from his early days where he was sitting at a table with Carlos Santana, taking a break from a recording session. Apparently Carlos had a new guitar and amp that he was showing everyone. Ronnie picked up the guitar started playing, and everyone was amazed that even with Carlos’ gear, he sounded like himself!
So to sum up, yes, tone comes from your gear; yes, tone comes from your fingers. But Tone – your sound – comes from your heart.
Guitar Gear 
I fully agree w/ Ronnie . . . .You should sound like YOU . . .no matter who’s gear you play through.Thats YOUR TONE.
My view is that your sound is one thing and it comes from your fingers (or heart, brain etc). It’s the way you hold the pick, how you bend the strings, how you angle your fingers, how hard you press the strings and so on.
The tone of an instrument is another thing. I was involved in a guitar company for a couple of years and that really opened up my eyes and ears to all the factors that can alter the tone of a guitar. It’s not always about the price. A cheap guitar that’s well assembled can sound great and an expensive guitar that’s not so well assembled can sound like shit. That’s one of the reasons that many of the Japanese Squier guitars from the 80’s sound great – the build quality was superb.
All pieces like wood, finish, hardware, soldering, cables, strings, pickups and so on affect the tone. Usually just a little, but if the guitar is very well bulit for instance the pickups will make a bigger difference. It’s almost a question of not fucking anything up in the process. One mistake could make the rest of your efforts meaningless.
Well, long post… I guess my point was that how you play is your sound, but the instrument itself can definitely have a tone…
Leif, well said! And I dig your line “it’s almost a question of not fucking anything up in the process.” Tone freaks like ourselves are constantly tweaking, and it is so easy to mess up your tone with the placement of just single thing in your signal chain. But then again, getting all this gear and finding out whether it works for your “Tone” is what makes it fun. 🙂
I had a great conversation over dinner last night with John Kasha of Kasha amps, and we got on the subject of tone. We talked about how all these things like effects, axes, and amps that we add to our rig to affect our “Tone” are like little spices that add subtle nuances to the dish we serve up in our music. Really great analogy!
What if you’re not happy with what your heart plays?!
Just get a new heart or practice 6 – 8 hours per day 😉
[…] 12, 2009 by goofydawg A couple of months ago, I wrote an article entitled, “Where DOES TONE Really Reside?” where I discussed the equipment vs. fingers religious debate that seems to rage on the […]
What you call “tone” (with a lower case t) is more or less what the dictionary defines as “timbre”. This is what a “tone control” is designed to alter.
If you play a single note on your guitar, thereby largely eliminating the effect of your playing style and technique, you still hear the timbre of the note – and, as you say, this depends mostly on your gear. The player does play a part too, of course, in terms of what type of plectrum she uses, where she picks the string, how hard she attacks the instrument, and so on.
What you referred to as “Tone” (upper case t) is something entirely different – I’d be tempted to call it “musicality”. Give David Gilmour a $99 Squire Bullet Strat and a $69 solid-state guitar amp, and what he plays will still move you – his choice of notes, timing, bends, dynamics, vibrato and so on is unmistakable, and it comes from him, not his gear. He’s always very musical, no matter what the tone (timbre) of the gear he’s playing might be.
The quality of the English language has deteriorated over the decades as TV decimated the size of the average persons vocabulary, and that is one of the reasons why this sort of confusion arises so easily. The widespread misuse of the word “tone” is one of ten thousand examples.
IMO, the easiest way to sound good as a musician is to have attractive timbre. Play even one or two notes, and people will listen and like what they hear, because the sound is intrinsically beautiful. If you can also manage to play with musicality too, then you’re going to be one of the greats.
-Nemo