The Truth About Tonewoods in Solid-Body Electric Guitars

Introduction and Context

Tonewood Debate: In guitar communities, the influence of “tonewoods” – the wood species used for a guitar’s body, neck, or fretboard – on sound has been hotly debated. In acoustic guitars, it’s well established that wood choice strongly shapes the instrument’s tone and resonance. However, for solid-body electric guitars, which rely on magnetic pickups and amplifiers rather than a resonating soundbox, the effect of wood is less obvious and often questioned. Manufacturers have long marketed exotic or heavy woods as enhancing electric guitar sustain and tone, while skeptics argue that pickups and electronics dominate the sound.

Acoustic vs. Electric: It is crucial to distinguish between acoustic and electric contexts. In an acoustic guitar, the wooden soundboard and body directly produce and color the sound – the wood’s stiffness, density, and damping shape the vibrating air and thus the tone. In a solid-body electric guitar, by contrast, the string’s vibration (sensed by magnetic pickups) is the primary sound source, and the solid wooden body’s role is largely structural (to hold the strings and pickups). Solid bodies were originally introduced to minimize acoustic feedback and unwanted body resonances. Ideally, a solid body is stiff and massive enough that it doesn’t audibly “ring” like an acoustic soundbox. As a result, many assume the choice of wood in a solid electric guitar has negligible effect on tone. Nonetheless, as we will see, subtle mechanical interactions between string and wood can influence the vibration decay, frequency response, and playing feel of an electric guitar.

Research Scope: This article examines the effect of tonewoods in solid-body electric guitars through a scientific lens. Focusing on peer-reviewed studies in acoustics and psychoacoustics, we will explore the physical mechanisms by which wood can influence string vibration, review experimental measurements of these effects, discuss what differences are actually audible to human ears, and debunk or confirm common myths about tonewoods using validated findings. The emphasis is on solid-body electrics – where wood’s influence is subtle – as opposed to acoustic guitars where the effect is overt. All evidence cited comes from controlled experiments, signal analyses, or rigorous modeling, ensuring a neutral and technically grounded perspective.

Physical Mechanisms: How Wood Can Influence String Vibrations

String-Structure Coupling: In a solid-body electric guitar, the strings are coupled to the wooden structure at the bridge and the neck (via the nut or fret). When a string vibrates, it not only produces sound in the electromagnetic pickup, but also exerts forces on the guitar’s body and neck. If the wood and structure are not infinitely rigid, they will respond by vibrating slightly themselves. This introduces a feedback loop: some string energy transfers into the wood (exciting body/neck vibrations) instead of remaining in the string’s motion. In physics terms, the string is coupled to a vibratory system (the guitar’s body/neck), and together they form a mechanically coupled system. The degree of this coupling depends on the mechanical impedance or conductance at the string’s attachment points – essentially how easily the structure can be driven into vibration by the string. A stiff, massive support has low conductance (resisting motion), while a flexible or resonant support has higher conductance (allowing more motion).

• Rigid vs. Flexible: If the guitar body and neck were infinitely rigid and massive, the string would behave as if anchored to an immovable object, conserving its energy and vibrating longer. In reality, all woods have some elasticity and finite mass. A lighter or more flexible wood will vibrate more in response to the string, acting as a sink for the string’s energy and causing the string’s vibration to decay faster. A denser or stiffer wood offers a more rigid termination, so less energy is transferred out of the string, yielding longer sustain. This is why electric guitar lore often associates heavier, harder woods with better sustain. Scientific studies confirm the principle: for example, making a guitar body from stiffer wood (ash) versus a softer wood can raise the structure’s resonant frequencies and reduce energy loss from the string.

• Damping in Wood: Beyond stiffness and mass, wood has internal damping properties – the tendency to dissipate vibrational energy as heat. Different species vary: some hardwoods (e.g. maple, ash) tend to have low internal damping (ringing more), while others (e.g. mahogany, basswood) have higher damping, which can “soak up” vibration more quickly. In an electric guitar, high damping wood can absorb string energy faster, shortening sustain, whereas low damping wood will transfer energy back and forth more efficiently or store it longer. A recent experiment directly comparing ash and walnut bodies found the walnut (less stiff, higher damping) guitar had measurably higher vibration damping in the lowest resonant mode of the instrument, corresponding to shorter sustain, compared to the ash body. Notably, this effect was observed both in the wood’s vibrational response and in the actual pickup output signal, indicating that the wood’s damping affected the audible sustain of the strings.

Resonances and Dead Spots: The wood body and neck form a complex object with many resonant modes (natural frequencies at which they prefer to vibrate). If a string’s frequency (or one of its harmonics) coincides with a structural resonance, energy transfer is amplified – the string dumps energy into the wood more readily at that frequency. This can lead to uneven decay times across the fretboard, including the notorious phenomenon of dead spots. A “dead spot” is a note (usually on one string at a certain fret) that dies out significantly faster than neighboring notes because the string’s energy is siphoned into a resonant vibration of the neck or body.

• Neck Conductance: Pioneering measurements by Fleischer and Zwicker (1999) showed that at dead spot frequencies, the guitar neck’s mechanical conductance (mobility) is locally very high – meaning the neck readily vibrates, absorbing the string’s energy. They measured decay times of notes on real guitars and correlated them with in-situ vibration measurements on the neck. The result was a clear inverse correlation: where the neck vibrated strongly (high conductance), the string’s decay time (sustain) was short (a dead spot), and vice versa. Figure 1 illustrates this effect: on a sample electric guitar, the G-string fretted at the 3rd fret (a dead spot) decays nearly twice as fast as at the 6th fret (a normal “live” note), corresponding to a pronounced resonance in the neck at the dead spot frequency. This underscores that wood properties and construction (especially the neck wood, attachment method, and headstock design) can create frequency-dependent sustain variations. Many bass and guitar players are familiar with specific dead notes on their instruments; scientifically, these are tied to how the instrument’s material and structure vibrate in response to those notes.

Whole vs. Parts – Body, Neck, and Fingerboard: In a typical solid-body guitar, multiple wood components are involved – a neck (often maple or mahogany), a fretboard (rosewood, maple, etc.), and a body (alder, ash, mahogany, etc.). The neck+fingerboard assembly often has a greater impact on string vibration than the body alone, because the neck is relatively long and thin (less stiff than a stout body) and can flex with string tension. Indeed, studies indicate the string/structure coupling occurs mainly at the neck rather than the body for many frequencies. This means neck wood and construction (e.g. bolt-on vs. set neck) strongly affect sustain and dead spots. Players commonly claim to hear differences between, say, a maple vs. rosewood fingerboard, attributing brightness or snap to one versus the other. From a physics standpoint, the fingerboard is part of the vibrating neck system; differences in its density and stiffness can shift neck resonance frequencies or damping. Perceived differences due to fingerboard wood have been investigated: one experiment by Paté et al. swapped only the fingerboard material and found small but measurable differences in the guitar’s frequency response and sustain, which were even perceptible to trained listeners under test conditions. Thus, while the body’s contribution is not zero, the neck/fretboard wood can be equally or more influential on the vibration behavior of the strings.

Vibration Modes and Frequency Response: The wood’s properties set the stage for the guitar’s modal frequencies – essentially, the specific tones at which the guitar’s structure likes to vibrate. A stiffer, higher-density wood generally yields higher resonant frequencies (the guitar’s modes occur at higher pitches) compared to a softer, lighter wood. For example, a 2021 study in Materials compared identical guitars made with ash vs. walnut bodies and found the ash (higher modulus of elasticity) led to higher modal frequencies for the whole instrument (e.g. the lowest body/neck resonant mode was ~118 Hz for ash vs ~108 Hz for walnut). Higher resonances mean the instrument is less likely to strongly interact with lower guitar notes, which can be beneficial: indeed the same study found the ash guitar had reduced overall damping in the critical low-frequency mode and correspondingly longer sustain for low notes and their harmonics. Conversely, the walnut instrument, with a more compliant body, showed more damping at those frequencies, potentially translating to a softer attack or quicker decay on low notes.

It’s important to note that solid-body guitars typically aim to keep resonances out of the most musically important range, or at least subdued, to achieve a fairly even response. Unlike an acoustic guitar where strong resonances are desired (for loudness and tone color), an electric guitar’s ideal might be closer to an “infinite beam” that doesn’t steal energy from the strings. In practice, no wood is completely rigid, so every electric guitar has some degree of resonance and damping – the question is one of magnitude and whether these effects are large enough to hear.

Magnetic Pickups and Wood Interaction: A common question is whether the pickups themselves (being magnets) exert any influence on sustain or tone in relation to wood. High-strength pickup magnets can exert a small drag force on strings (sometimes called magnetic damping), but experiments have shown this effect is negligible in normal setups. One rigorous study separated two damping mechanisms – the string’s intrinsic losses vs. losses due to coupling with the guitar – and explicitly showed that electromagnetic pickups do not provide any additional damping to the string’s vibration. In other words, the pickup only senses the string; it doesn’t appreciably hinder its motion. Moreover, the pickup is mainly sensitive to a specific polarization of string vibration: it “hears” the vertical motion (out-of-plane, i.e. perpendicular to the guitar body) much more than horizontal motion. This means if the wood’s vibration causes the string to move in a slightly different pattern, the pickup might register a change in amplitude or sustain. However, the direct motion of the wood or pickup itself (often called microphonics if audible) is minimal – one study found vibrations of the pickup in a solid-body were less than 1% of the string signal, too small to matter. Thus, wood influences the electric guitar’s sound indirectly: by affecting the string’s vibration decay and spectrum, not by adding its own acoustic sound as in an acoustic guitar.

Experimental Evidence: Measurements of Tonewood Effects in Electrics

Sustain and Decay Time Measurements: A number of controlled experiments have quantified how different woods alter the decay rate of vibrating strings (i.e. the sustain). A landmark study by Paté, Le Carrou, and Fabre (2014) in J. Acoust. Soc. Am. provided a theoretical and experimental framework for electric guitar sustain. They identified two main damping sources for a plucked string: (1) internal string losses (air resistance, internal friction in the metal, etc.), and (2) mechanical coupling to the guitar’s neck/body. By measuring an isolated string versus one mounted on a guitar, they quantified how much faster the string decayed on the instrument. Crucially, they could predict the decay time (T30) of any given note if they knew the string’s own damping and the guitar’s mechanical conductance at the neck. The prediction matched measured sustain times well, validating that the wood-induced damping at the neck is the dominant factor behind variations in sustain across the fretboard. Moreover, they confirmed that an electric guitar pickup faithfully captures these decay variations – the pickup’s output showed the same inhomogeneous decay times (dead spots, etc.) as measured by sensors, and adding electronics did not mask or alter the sustain differences.

Another study by Ray et al. (2021) directly compared two identical guitars, one with an ash body and one with a walnut body, to isolate the effect of body wood. Using accelerometers, impulse excitations, and careful plucks, they measured the modal damping and sustain of open strings. The ash-bodied guitar, being stiffer and heavier, showed lower damping (tan δ) in the lowest modes (e.g. 0.093 vs 0.121 for walnut in the 1st mode) and correspondingly longer decay times for the low E2, A2, D3 strings’ harmonics. The differences were statistically significant: e.g. the walnut body caused about 30% higher damping in the first mode and nearly double the damping in a high-frequency mode (~0.046 vs 0.026) that corresponds to upper harmonics. Notably, these measurements were reflected in the pickup signal as well – when comparing the actual electric output, the walnut guitar’s low notes decayed faster and with lower peak amplitude than the ash guitar. This confirms that even in the amplified sound, wood-induced sustain differences can appear. However, it’s also important to note the magnitude: Ray et al. found no significant decay time difference on fundamental frequencies of most strings. The main differences arose in certain overtones (higher harmonics) of the low strings, and one particular mode of a higher string. In other words, the overall sustain of a note (dominated by the fundamental) might be very similar between woods, with differences creeping in for the higher-frequency components of the sound. This nuanced result suggests that tonewood effects in electrics are real but subtle, affecting certain frequency components and not others.

Frequency Spectrum and Timbre: Besides sustain, researchers have examined whether different woods alter the spectral content (timbre) of the electric guitar’s sound. Since the wood can favor or damp certain frequencies, it might change the balance of harmonics in the string vibration. Jasiński et al. (2021) tackled this question by recording a series of notes on a specially built test guitar with various body woods and analyzing the output spectra. They found measurable differences in the spectral envelope (the distribution of energy across frequencies) between wood types, as well as differences in the overall signal level. For instance, one wood might produce a slightly stronger fundamental but quicker decay of high overtones, whereas another wood might let high-frequency harmonics ring a bit longer. These differences were quantified and then compared to known psychoacoustic thresholds. The encouraging result was that the magnitude of the spectral differences exceeded the just-noticeable difference (JND) for timbre changes as reported in the literature. In plain terms, the changes in tone caused by swapping wood were larger than the smallest differences the average ear can detect, hinting that they should be audible under ideal conditions. Indeed, the study conducted an informal listening test and reported that average listeners could reliably distinguish sounds from different tonewoods in a controlled setting. This provides evidence that wood can impart a perceptible “fingerprint” on an electric guitar’s tone, even if that fingerprint is subtle.

On the other hand, other studies found minimal impact on certain timbre metrics. A 2015 experiment by Puszynski et al. measured standard psychoacoustic parameters – sharpness, roughness, specific loudness – of electric guitar notes recorded from guitars made of various woods. They reported that changing the body wood produced no significant change in these timbre descriptors. The wood type did affect the sound envelope and maximum amplitude (consistent with sustain and attack differences), but did not appreciably alter qualities like brightness or harshness as quantified by those metrics. Additionally, whether the sound was recorded via magnetic pickup or an external microphone did not change the outcome – reinforcing that the pickup-captured tone was not immune to wood differences, but those differences lay in amplitude and decay rather than dramatic spectral reshaping.

How to reconcile these findings? It appears that wood-induced spectral differences exist, but they are relatively small variations superimposed on the string’s primary tone. For example, one wood might cause a 1–3 dB difference in certain frequency bands of the guitar’s output. In isolation (quiet room, single notes), the ear can detect such differences if it knows what to listen for, as Jasiński et al. demonstrated. But these differences might not substantially move the needle on broad metrics like “sharpness” or on heavily masked signals (like in a full band mix). In summary, material choice can subtly shape the EQ of the guitar’s output, but not to the extent of creating a radically different voice – nothing like the difference between two pickup types or amplifier settings, for instance.

Case Study – Fingerboard Wood: One specific focus has been whether the fingerboard (fretboard) wood affects the tone, since many electric guitars offer maple vs. rosewood fingerboard options. A controlled test by Paté et al. (2015) involved building guitars identical in every way except for the fingerboard material (ebony vs. rosewood), and then conducting listening experiments with guitarists. The study found that players could discern differences, but the effect was not huge – it manifested as subtle variations in brightness and attack. Acoustically, ebony (denser, harder) gave slightly longer sustain and a brighter initial transient than rosewood. This aligns with the general rule that harder woods reflect string energy, maintaining high-frequency vibration longer, whereas softer woods absorb a bit more of the “edge” from the string vibration. Interestingly, the players described the differences in qualitative terms that matched objective spectral data, demonstrating a link between measurable physics and perceived tone. This level of rigorous testing reinforces that even small wood changes can be audible under the right conditions, though they remain secondary effects compared to pickups or amplifier EQ.

Summary of Measurements: Taken together, high-precision measurements confirm that:

• Sustain/Decay: Wood properties (density, modulus, damping) measurably affect string decay times. Stiffer, lower-damping woods yield longer sustain; more compliant, higher-damping woods lead to shorter sustain, especially at certain resonant frequencies. Dead spots are an extreme case of this, rooted in wood/neck resonances.

• Amplitude: The maximum amplitude (or initial attack) of notes can differ with wood – likely because a wood that quickly absorbs energy yields a slightly lower peak in the pickup signal. One study found the wood type significantly influenced the max sound pressure level of the recorded notes (ash vs. alder vs. etc.), implying some woods produce a “punchier” attack.

• Frequency Content: There are subtle shifts in the harmonic content. For instance, certain woods might let the fundamental ring a bit stronger relative to overtones or vice versa. Spectral differences have been observed and can exceed threshold of hearing in controlled tests. However, they do not radically alter the overall tonal character as much as, say, changing the pickup or tone knob by a large amount would. Psychoacoustic analysis showed no large changes in roughness/brightness metrics for different woods, confirming the differences are modest.

• Consistency: Many experiments emphasize repeatability – e.g. plucking machines or consistent hammer impacts – to ensure differences aren’t just playing variations. The credible studies report statistically significant results after multiple trials, which increases confidence that differences (even if small) are real and due to the material, not randomness.

Psychoacoustic Perspective: Can We Hear the Difference?

Ultimately, the practical importance of tonewood in electric guitars hinges on psychoacoustics: whether the human ear and brain can perceive the differences that physics measures. We’ve already touched on listening tests that suggest audibility under controlled conditions. Here we delve deeper into how wood-related differences compare to known hearing thresholds and perceptual factors:

Just Noticeable Differences (JNDs): The JND for various sound attributes gives a yardstick for audibility. For loudness (sound level), the JND is on the order of 1 dB for mid-level sounds – a change smaller than that is hard to detect. For frequency/timbre, it’s more complex: a change in spectral content needs to be significant in at least part of the spectrum to be heard. One study on brass instrument timbre found that certain spectral envelope alterations had JNDs on the order of a few percent change in formant amplitude. In the guitar context, if a wood change leads to, say, a 2–3 dB difference at certain harmonics, this is above threshold and likely audible as a slight tone color difference. On the other hand, if the difference is only 0.5 dB spread over many frequencies, it might go unnoticed. The Jasiński et al. study explicitly noted that the spectral differences from wood exceeded typical JNDs for timbre, suggesting audibility. They further buttressed this by the informal listening test where non-expert listeners could tell recordings apart at better-than-chance rates.

Perception of Sustain: Human perception of sustain or decay time is not very acute unless the differences are large. A player will certainly notice if one note dies in 1 second while another rings for 3 seconds (that’s a dead spot scenario). But a change of, for example, 5% in decay time is subtle – often masked by musical context or playing style. If a guitar made of Wood A has a sustain of 5.0 seconds for a note and Wood B yields 4.5 seconds, it’s doubtful a listener could perceive that 10% difference during normal play. However, extreme cases like dead spots (sustain cut in half) are absolutely noticeable – guitarists routinely identify specific frets that “choke out” quickly. It’s worth noting that musicians often focus on feel as much as sound: a note that dies faster can feel different to play (less feedback to the fingers), potentially biasing the player’s perception of tone. In blinded tests where playing feel is eliminated (recordings played back), small sustain differences might be even harder to detect.

Masking and Context: In a full band mix or with heavy distortion, tiny spectral or sustain differences can be masked. The human auditory system has a masking effect where loud sounds and complex mixtures make it difficult to pick out slight tone differences in one instrument. For example, the difference caused by wood might be apparent on a clean, isolated guitar tone, but completely drowned out once you add drums, bass, and a saturated amp. Psychoacoustically, the wood’s effect might lie below the threshold of audibility in realistic scenarios even if it’s measurable in the lab. This explains why player opinions vary: in solo or studio conditions one might swear the mahogany body sounds warmer than alder, but in a live band setting, that distinction may all but vanish.

Psychoacoustic Metrics: As mentioned, Puszynski’s work checked metrics like sharpness (related to high-frequency content perceived) and roughness (fluctuation in amplitude or dissonance) and found no significant wood effect. Specific loudness (loudness within critical bands) also did not vary significantly with wood. These results imply that from a broad psychoacoustic standpoint, the tone remained within the same ballpark regardless of wood – i.e. a guitar doesn’t transform from “bright” to “dark” or “smooth” to “harsh” solely because of body wood, when evaluated with those standard measures. What might change is more subtle: the envelope shape (how the sound evolves over time) and some fine spectral details. The ear is relatively insensitive to very slow amplitude changes, so differences in the decay tail might go unnoticed unless one is critically listening for the cutoff point. On the other hand, the attack portion of a note is more perceptually important (we identify instrument sounds largely from the first few milliseconds). If wood affects the attack transient – for instance, a harder wood could produce a snappier, more percussive attack – that might be audible even if sustain differences are not. Some guitarists anecdotally report that guitars with very hard bodies (like acrylic or metal bodies) have a sharper attack and quicker rise to full volume than wooden ones, which could be related to lower damping in the initial moment of the pluck. Rigorous studies on the attack transient are rarer, but it’s a fertile area for psychoacoustic analysis.

Blind Tests and Listener Bias: There have been informal “blind tests” among guitar communities where listeners attempt to tell guitars apart by tonewood. The results are often mixed, with many listeners failing to reliably distinguish tonewoods by ear alone when brand, pickups, and other factors are constant. This suggests that expectation bias plays a role – if one knows a guitar is made of a prized wood, they might expect a richer tone and thus report hearing one. Proper double-blind tests (few of which exist publicly for electric guitars) are needed to truly quantify detection rates. The Paté 2015 fingerboard study in Acta Acustica is one of the few formal listening tests, and it did show above-chance identification by guitarists, but it also noted the differences were not “night and day.” The listeners could tell ebony vs rosewood a bit better than guessing, but not 100% perfectly – indicating the effect, while real, was modest and required concentration to notice.

Human Hearing Thresholds: Another aspect is frequency dependence of hearing. The ear is most sensitive around 2–5 kHz frequencies and less so at very low frequencies. If a wood change mostly affects sustain at 100 Hz (low E’s fundamental) or subtle overtones at 6 kHz, those might be near the edge of hearing sensitivity. A small change at 3 kHz, however, would be more noticeable. It happens that most strong string fundamentals (open notes) on guitar lie between ~80 Hz and 330 Hz, where the ear’s sensitivity is lower and room acoustics can dominate. The differences Ray et al. found were mainly in higher harmonics (e.g. 300–600 Hz range), which might be somewhat audible. Meanwhile, Jasiński’s spectral differences presumably included changes in higher-frequency overtones (1–4 kHz), likely why listeners could tell.

In summary, psychoacoustically, tonewood differences in solid electric guitars are at the threshold of subtlety: under isolated conditions they can be heard (and have been measured to exceed JNDs), but in typical use they can easily be overshadowed by other factors. A skilled ear might detect a slightly quicker decay or a bit more high-end “air” in one guitar versus another, but the average listener might never notice unless it’s pointed out.

Myths vs. Scientific Findings

Guitar lore is full of claims about tonewoods. Here we contrast some common myths with what rigorous science indicates:

• Myth: “Wood doesn’t matter at all in an electric – it’s all electronics.”
  Findings: False in the strict sense – wood does have an effect, but it is indeed much smaller than in acoustic guitars. Scientific studies show that wood choices influence sustain and subtle aspects of tone by modulating how the string vibrates. The pickup and electronics dominate the overall frequency response, but wood-induced differences, while not large, are measurable and audible under the right conditions. It’s not “all in the electronics”; rather, the wood forms part of a complex feedback system with the strings. However, from a practical standpoint, swapping pickups will produce a far more obvious change in tone than swapping body wood – a perspective that science supports by quantifying wood’s effects as subtle frequency response tweaks and sustain changes, not massive tone shifts.

• Myth: “Heavier guitars sustain longer.”
  Findings: Often true, to a point. A heavy guitar usually means more wood mass (and often stiffer wood), which increases the mechanical impedance at the string’s anchor points, leading to less energy loss from the string. Experiments confirm that guitars made with higher-density, stiffer woods (like ash or maple) tend to have slightly longer sustain and less damping than lighter, softer woods. The Ray et al. study explicitly recommends “heavier woods with a more ordered structure” for lower vibration damping and better sustain. However, weight alone is not the only factor (construction and wood internal damping matter too), and beyond a certain point, extremely heavy materials (like metal bodies) may not yield proportional sustain benefits due to other loss mechanisms. But as a rule of thumb, this folk wisdom has a basis: e.g. the classic heavy Les Paul (mahogany+maple) is known for sustain, whereas a very light guitar might have a more “open” resonance but shorter natural sustain.

• Myth: “Certain woods have inherent tonal ‘colors’ (e.g. mahogany = warm, maple = bright).”
  Findings: Partly true, partly exaggerated. In acoustic instruments, these wood tonal descriptions have merit. In solid electrics, the tonal color differences are subtle. Mahogany is generally less stiff and more damped than maple, which could translate to a slight reduction in high-frequency vibrational sustain – thus a “warm” (i.e. less bright) tone, as commonly claimed. Maple’s high stiffness can preserve more high-frequency vibration, potentially yielding a “brighter” attack. Scientific measurements of spectral differences align with these clichés to a degree: harder woods tend to support more high-frequency energy (hence brighter sound), while higher damping woods can attenuate high harmonics faster (hence darker sound). However, the magnitude of these effects is small. They do not create a different EQ profile anywhere near what, say, turning a tone knob down would do. So while one can say wood X tends to be a bit brighter than wood Y in an electric guitar, in blind tests many people struggle to reliably hear it. The myth in error is the magnitude – some marketing language would have you believe each wood species has a drastically unique tone, which is not supported by controlled evidence. The differences are real but minor.

• Myth: “Exotic tropical tonewoods are necessary for the best electric guitar sound.”
  Findings: Not supported by evidence. Many exotic woods (rosewoods, ebonies, etc.) are used more for aesthetics, durability, or historical prestige than for any scientifically proven tonal superiority in electric guitars. With sustainability concerns rising, researchers are investigating locally sourced or non-traditional woods for electric guitars. The audibility study by Jasiński et al. was partly motivated by questioning tropical tonewood use and found that alternatives can produce sounds within the perceivable range of those tropical woods. In other words, as long as the wood has comparable mechanical properties (stiffness, density, damping), it can produce a very similar result. The selection of wood should be guided by material properties (like modulus of elasticity) rather than mystique. In fact, Puszynski’s thesis suggests modulus of elasticity correlates with sustain and peak output more than the species name does. This means a domestic wood with high stiffness could perform just as well as a rarer exotic species. The myth that only certain rare woods yield “premium tone” in electrics is largely marketing; builders and scientists have shown excellent instruments made from oak, pine, cherry, and other non-traditional timbers that are sonically on par with the usual suspects when using the same hardware and design.

• Myth: “Bolt-on neck guitars have less sustain than set-neck guitars because of wood coupling.”
  Findings: There is some truth here related to construction rather than wood species. A bolt-on neck (like Fender style) introduces a mechanical joint which can be a point of energy loss, whereas a glued set-neck (Gibson style) may provide a more continuous wood connection. Fleischer’s research on dead spots included comparing a bolt-on vs set-neck guitar and did observe differences in sustain characteristics and resonance behavior. However, the difference is not solely “more sustain vs less” – it can affect where the resonances lie (hence which notes are dead spots). A well-executed bolt-on can still sustain very well (and is used in many bass guitars known for sustain). The myth oversimplifies a complex interplay of joint design, neck mass, and wood contact area. From a wood perspective, it reminds us that the assembly method and structural coupling (screws, glue, etc.) also govern how energy flows out of the strings. Two guitars of identical wood but different neck joints will likely differ more than two guitars of identical design but different wood species. So while not the focus of this article, it’s worth noting that how the wood pieces are connected is as important as the wood itself for the instrument’s vibrational behavior.

• Myth: “Magnetic pickups only pick up string vibrations, so anything the wood does is moot.”
  Findings: This myth arises from misunderstanding the role of wood. It is true the pickup senses string motion, not wood motion. But the wood influences what the string is doing! If the wood causes the string to lose energy faster or alters its motion, the pickup output reflects that. Experiments explicitly show the pickup signal carries the imprint of wood-induced effects (like differing decay times and frequencies). The pickup doesn’t “care” why the string is vibrating a certain way – it just converts the mechanical motion at each moment into an electrical signal. So if a softer wood causes a certain harmonic to decay 20% faster, the pickup faithfully reproduces that decay. The myth might stem from confusion with acoustic guitars, where wood creates sound by vibrating air. In electrics, wood doesn’t add new sound directly, but it modulates the string’s behavior, which in turn modulates the pickup output. Therefore, saying pickups make wood irrelevant is false; a more accurate statement is “pickups and electronics can overshadow wood effects, but do not eliminate them.”

Conclusion: Reconciling Physics and Perception

Solid-body electric guitars are a marriage of vibrating strings and a supporting wooden structure, and while the electromagnetic pickup transduces the sound, the wood quietly shapes the string’s vibration in the background. High-rigor academic research has shown that the choice of wood for the body, neck, or fingerboard can influence sustain times, frequency response, and the occurrence of dead spots in measurable ways. Denser, stiffer woods generally provide longer sustain and subtly brighter tonality by minimizing energy loss, whereas lighter or more damped woods may shorten sustain and soften certain frequencies. These effects are rooted in vibration mechanics – differences in material stiffness, mass, and internal damping lead to differences in how the string’s energy is absorbed or reflected.

However, magnitude matters. The consensus from scientific literature is that tonewood effects in electric guitars are second-order influences. They exist, but are relatively small compared to primary factors like pickups, amplifier EQ, or even the guitar’s construction design (bridge type, neck joint, etc.). Psychoacoustic analysis and blind tests indicate that while listeners can discern wood differences under controlled conditions, those differences often fall near the threshold of typical hearing, especially once other sounds or distortions come into play. For the performing or casual listener, the nuances contributed by wood may be masked or simply not critical to the musical experience.

From a myth-busting perspective, many simplistic claims don’t hold up to scrutiny. Wood alone won’t make an electric guitar suddenly sound like a completely different instrument; there is no magical “tonewood” that bypasses the fundamental limitations of an electric guitar’s sound chain. At the same time, the blanket dismissal that wood has zero effect is inaccurate – a more correct view is that wood has some effect, but one must use high-resolution measurements or careful listening to reliably detect it. This nuanced position is actually reflected in the experience of many guitarists: they might describe subtle differences in feel or tone between guitars of different woods, but also acknowledge that those differences are small and often overridden by amplifier or effect choices.

Practical Implications: For guitar builders and enthusiasts seeking the last ounce of tonal refinement, understanding these findings is useful. If maximum sustain is the goal, using stiff, low-damping woods (and a design that minimizes energy loss at joints) will provide an advantage. If a certain tonal balance is desired, wood can be one of the fine-tuning tools – e.g., choosing a maple neck or ebony board for a tad more snap, or mahogany for a touch of warmth, knowing these translate to subtle shifts in the decay of high frequencies. On the other hand, for those worried that a cheaper wood or a composite material might ruin their tone: science offers reassurance that as long as the material has decent structural properties, the resultant sound can be made virtually indistinguishable from traditional tonewoods by ear. The sustainability angle is important here: given that exotic tonewoods are scarce, research like Jasiński’s suggests we can use alternative woods without significant sonic sacrifice, focusing on mechanical property matching rather than species name.

Continued Research: The field of guitar acoustics continues to develop. New methods (like laser vibration analysis, advanced signal processing, and rigorous double-blind listening tests) are being applied to further demystify the influence of every component. Future studies may investigate other factors like the influence of finish (lacquer thickness), wood aging, or the role of neck reinforcement (truss rods, carbon fiber) on tone. For now, the truth about tonewoods in electric guitars, as supported by high-rigor research, can be summarized thus: Tonewoods do shape the sound of solid-body guitars, but in delicate ways. They affect the vibration coupling and damping which in turn affects sustain and subtle tone color. These effects are real and measurable, yet typically small – audible under scrutiny, but often overshadowed by bigger elements in the signal chain. Knowing this, players and builders can approach the topic with neither mystical reverence nor cynical dismissal, but with a balanced, evidence-based understanding of how wood fits into the electric guitar’s tone equation

References

Journal Articles

• Ahmed, Sheikh Ali, & Adamopoulos, Stergios. (2018). Acoustic properties of modified wood under different humid conditions and their relevance for musical instruments. Applied Acoustics, 140, 92–99. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apacoust.2018.05.017

• Ahvenainen, Patrik. (2019). Anatomy and mechanical properties of woods used in electric guitars. IAWA Journal, 40(1), 106–S6. https://doi.org/10.1163/22941932-40190218

• Bennett, B. C. (2016). The sound of trees: wood selection in guitars and other chordophones. Economic Botany, 70(1), 49–63. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12231-016-9336-0

• Calvano, Silvana; Negro, Francesco; Ruffinatto, Flavio; Zanuttini-Frank, Daniel; & Zanuttini, Roberto. (2023). Use and sustainability of wood in acoustic guitars: An overview based on the global market. Heliyon, 9(4), e15218. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2023.e15218

• Carcagno, Samuele; Bucknall, Roger; Woodhouse, Jim; Fritz, Claudia; & Plack, Christopher J. (2018). Effect of back wood choice on the perceived quality of steel-string acoustic guitars. Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, 144(6), 3533–3547. https://doi.org/10.1121/1.5084735

• Jasiński, Jan; Oleś, Stanisław; Tokarczyk, Daniel; & Pluta, Marek. (2021). On the audibility of electric guitar tonewood. Archives of Acoustics, 46(4), 571–578. https://doi.org/10.24425/aoa.2021.138150

• Martinez-Reyes, José. (2015). Mahogany intertwined: Enviromateriality between Mexico, Fiji, and the Gibson Les Paul. Journal of Material Culture, 20(3), 313–329. https://doi.org/10.1177/1359183515594644

• Paté, Arthur; Le Carrou, Jean-Loïc; & Fabre, Benoît. (2015). Modal parameter variability in industrial electric guitar making: Manufacturing process, wood variability, and lutherie decisions. Applied Acoustics, 96, 118–131. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apacoust.2015.03.023

• Paté, Arthur; Le Carrou, Jean-Loïc; Navarret, Benoît; Dubois, Danièle; & Fabre, Benoît. (2015). Influence of the electric guitar’s fingerboard wood on guitarists’ perception. Acta Acustica united with Acustica, 101(2), 347–359. https://doi.org/10.3813/AAA.918831

• Paté, Arthur; Le Carrou, Jean-Loïc; Teissier, François; & Fabre, Benoît. (2015). Evolution of the modal behaviour of nominally identical electric guitars during the making process. Acta Acustica united with Acustica, 101(3), 567–580. https://doi.org/10.3813/AAA.918853

• Puszyński, Jakub; Moliński, Wojciech; & Preis, Andrzej. (2015). The effect of wood on the sound quality of electric string instruments. Acta Physica Polonica A, 127(1), 114–116. https://doi.org/10.12693/APhysPolA.127.114

• Zorič, Anton; Kaljun, Jasmin; Žveplan, Ervin; & Straže, Aleš. (2019). Selection of wood based on acoustic properties for the solid body of electric guitar. Archives of Acoustics, 44(1), 51–58. https://doi.org/10.24425/aoa.2019.126351

Theses and Dissertations

• Applegate, Brian Charles. (2021). Rise and fall of iconic guitar tonewoods and evaluation of alternative species. Doctoral thesis, University of Edinburgh. http://dx.doi.org/10.7488/era/1695

Conference Proceedings

• Paté, Arthur; Le Carrou, Jean-Loïc; & Fabre, Benoît. (2013). Ebony vs. Rosewood: Experimental investigation of the influence of the fingerboard on the sound of a solid-body electric guitar. In Proceedings of the Stockholm Musical Acoustics Conference (SMAC 2013) (pp. 182–187). Stockholm, Sweden.

• Margetts, Rebecca, & James, Michael. (2023). Quantifying the properties of guitar tonewoods. In Proceedings of the 154th Audio Engineering Society Convention (Paper 76). Espoo, Finland: Audio Engineering Society. ISBN 978-1-942220-41-1.