Getting more growl

[Precision87]

Hi all! First time post here. I have a '72 rhodes suitcase that I acquired several years ago. Everything works great, but is seems to have a very round bell tone to it. Although its nice and healthy, I would prefer a little bit more growl and dirt. Despite various playing dynamics, and even the use of tube amps, It doesn't seem to want to growl.

So My question is, What's the best way to achieve this?
Should the pickups be closer to the tines?
Should the tines be perfectly centered at the pickup polepieces while at rest?
Is there anything that can be done to the preamp (mod) to produce a little bit more midrange tone?
What else am I missing?

Again, I'm sort of a noob, so go easy on me.  Thanks for any help.

[AFeastOfFriends]

There's a handful of factors in getting a barky tone, but the one that affects it the most is the position of the tines relating to the pickups. The closer the tines are, the more 'bark' it will have. The relation of the end of the tine and the crest of the pickup also has an affect in how much harmonic versus how much fundamental. I have mine pretty close, don't know the exact distance, and just above the crest of the pickup. Then I run that through the preamp with the volume and EQ all the way up, and then into my Twin Reverb. It's a good balance between the tone my Rhodes does best and the tones I'd like to mimic from recordings.

I'd also recommend reading the manual here http://www.fenderrhodes.com/service/manual.html

[Abraham]

Move the pickups closer!

[Max Brink]

Here's the best way to get the most bark, or growl, from your Rhodes:

1) Check escapement levels from bass through treble. In some cases you may find that the sound that you are going for it going to drift a little bit from the manual's specifications in the bass and treble depending on the character of your Rhodes.

2) Voice the instrument for ideal balance of overtones note by note.

3) Make sure the pickups are as close as possible. In some cases you will need to back some of the pickups off of the tines in order to have the right volume balance note by note and octave by octave.

4) Repeat steps two and three. After the pickups are moved, you'll have a very minor change on the voicing, go back over each note and fine tune them at least one more time to get the most out of your Rhodes.


That said, some Rhodes will have more grit than others and all of them will have their own unique voice. Even two Rhodes from the same year setup nearly identically will sound distinctly different played side by side. Some have more grit than others, I find some of the late '70's models to be nasally, and they range from bright as a bell to dark and mellow. Typically, the '72's to have a brighter bark than around '74-'75 that you may find will have the beefier mids that you may be describing.


Going through the other questions:

-The tines should be fairly close to centered but as long as it is within the face of the pole piece from left to right then you should be fine. The vertical placement of the tine to the pickup during voicing will have much more significant affect.

-The Peterson preamp on the '72 has a very fussy EQ circuit. You'll find that the bass knob especially has a huge peak around the 7-8 range and I usually will have to find the sweet spot within the range of the peak to get the levels that I like. A good toy for this may be the Speakeasy Stage Box. It's a solid state stomp box sized preamp that brings up the full voice of the Rhodes. I have one that I'm currently selling if you are interested in trying it out shipping would be pretty cheap--just shoot me an email on the contact form of my web page or a message through our facebook page.

[Max Brink]

...Also, does your '72 have the pedestal bump modification? You'll want as much dynamic play in the keys' action as possible.