Different Types of Guitars

by: Patrick Carpen - articlecity.com
The guitar is one of the most popular musical instruments, and it has earned a world-wide fame throughout the decades for its melodious sound and tone. These amazing instruments are found in a wide variety of sound quality, playability, and in terms of overall appearance. There are different types of guitars, each of which are chosen depending on certain factors and convenience of the professional guitarist, or the aspiring guitar players.


The first major variety in the list of the many types of guitar includes the Acoustic guitar. There are scores of guitars under the brand Acoustic, varying widely from one another. An acoustic guitar is made of a wooden structure, fixed with a soundboard, and it is free from any external inclusion. The sound emerging from this category of guitars is generally softer than the other instruments included in the orchestra bands. However, they can be accordingly amplified and modified with the needs and requirements of the musician or that of the band. There is, again, a broader variety of these acoustics that include classical and flamenco guitars, steel string guitars, and many more to be discussed. The category extends to both amplified and non-amplified guitars that are used in the different registers, such as the acoustic bass guitar.

Designed exclusively for the execution of a solo polyphonic melody, the magical guitar produces music similar to that of a pianoforte. The finely placed nylon strings on the guitar sound melodious with any music, from jazz to classical. The modern forms of classical guitars were pioneered by Antonio Torres Jurado. There is a roster of classical guitars classified distinctively according to their functions and usages. These include the tiny requinto, the larger guitarron, and many more. The requinto is a well-famed type, found mostly in the Latin-American nations as an associated part of the guitar family.

There are also the more reformed and simplified versions of the classical guitars. The Renaissance and Baroque guitars are smaller in size and are comprised of only four to five courses of strings attached to it. Often used in an ensemble for rhythmic purposes, these two types are quite common in musical performances. While the Renaissance guitar is comparatively simple and plain, the Baroque guitar comes highly embellished in the on its entire structure including the neck and body.

Included among the many other guitar types are the Portuguese guitars, the twelve-string guitars, which are exclusively meant for their traditional Fado song, the Archtop guitars, the Flat-top (steel-string) guitars, the traditional seven-string Russian guitars with an open G major tuning, Acoustic bass guitars, Tenor guitars, Harp guitars, the smaller Guitar battente, extended-range guitars, and the resonator, resophonic, or Dobro guitars.

The electric guitars have become one of the most common and significantly used instruments in any musical ensemble or performance. These guitars basically use electronic pick-ups to amplify the sound and vibration of the strings. They come in a solid or semi-solid structure, and do not use much of the body structure to produce sound. They use amplifiers to produce the maximum amount of sound that is emitted from the instrument.