So, I was idly scrolling my FB feed when yet another ad popped up to drive me to distraction. Because guitars are my fatal attraction, this one caught my attention. Not that it was any old guitar, oh no, not this ‘un. This specimen was little more than a fretboard attached to a thin-line body which gave the bridge somewhere to grasp, with removable fashioned metal rods clipped onto both sides to replicate the hourglass curves of a guitar. This was far too space mission for the traditional work of beauty that’s been hundreds of years in the making. As if something Kryten, the droid from Red Dwarf, might have played if the script writers back in the day had considered making him, instead of Dave Lister, the fleeting muso.

Live music can be a beautiful, exciting, even uplifting experience and the sharing of a musical talent is one of humanity’s great gifts. However, as most of us mere mortal musicians might agree, what is definitely not a spectator sport are the hours of composing, developing, investigating style and tempo, fluffing, cursing, repeating, screaming at fingers for not doing what brain wants them to do, until, eventually, fine tuning a piece of music to the point that the player (me) is confident and competent enough to share the ‘gift’ with others.

Since my wife retired, those sometimes tedious, frustrating and repetitive hours of personal inspirational angst have been a little more difficult to find without driving Kathy to the point of homicide. Despite the fact I generally rise early and sometimes ridiculous (to others) hours, I can’t practice as even the sounds of an acoustic guitar played as softly as possible easily permeates stud walls, ear plugs and slumber.

So, this enticing ad marketed the instrument as a ‘Silent Guitar’. My ears pricked up, seeing that a headphone jack incorporated into the body allowed for practice at a far lower volume than an acoustic guitar offered, yet marketing promised it would play and sound just like the real deal. Seeing the benefits and, considering it was only a few hundred dollars, I decided to cut and paste the external link and share in an email to the boss, to see if she might understand my dilemma and consider it a sound investment for solidarity, good relations and my continued uprightedness.

After her brows had resumed their usual position, and I guess being an academic and, appreciating the possibilities of not spending time at His Majesty’s pleasure, Kathy did what she does with everything else, and that’s research the hell out of it. Being a non-musician, she knocked my socks off by both agreeing that it was indeed a great idea and yet, suggesting that I might need to spend a few extra readies to get something from another manufacturer that would impress me, rather than be merely a solution. Why not go for this one, she suggested, before sending me a link to the Yamaha website. I hadn’t considered Yamaha as a serious contender and so the link well and truly opened my eyes.

What a lovely wife I have!

And there was I, thinking I’d never buy a Yamaha guitar until Friday, where we welcomed this rather stunning beauty into the fold. The SLG200S plinks away from the outside like an unplugged electric guitar and yet through the headphones has all the tonality of a stunning acoustic instrument. It has, of course, a standard input jack to permit its amplification as with all electric and most acoustic instruments.

Cunningly concealed within this beautifully crafted block of mahogany, rosewood and maple sits the heart of the technology designed to recreate the body resonance of an acoustic guitar, right down to its natural sustain and decay. 

Not just the digital replication, piezo pickups mounted behind the bridge capture the ‘live’ resonances and nuances of an acoustic guitar and can be blended with the digital sound.

Because the guitar is lightweight and can be disassembled, it’s handy for lengthy performances and travel as hand luggage (TBC).

For anyone interested in learning more, here’s a review: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tuXIwsNmY6o

What was the instrument that brought silent guitars to my attention, I hear you ask, yet failed to impress enough to purchase? I feel it’s best I keep that to myself. Anyone interested enough will no doubt do their own research.