Ebony and Rosewood (a discussion)

[cerebrix]

What do you like about each of these fretboards?

 

NOT what you like vs each other but for example

 

Maple:

Reasons......

 

Rosewood:

reasons.......

 

what do YOU find each of their characteristics to be?

 

this one should be fun cause i think fretboard preference goes WAY beyond just tone. I started thinking a lot about this topic when i realized I can LOVE a fretboard material for its feel yet HATE what it does to the guitars tone, and sometimes vice versa (depending on the material)

 

GO!

[pixelchemist]

i just like unfinished fretboards... i actually like the rougher surface of rosewood... i really like the look of ebony and its hardness...

[thunder100]

Hello

 

I have all 3 major possibilities

 

Maple,painted

Rosewood

Ebony

 

Tone difference is there but highly exagerated.Yes Maple is more shiny crisp Rosewoon darker.If I play all the guitars unplugged the mahagony/ebony G&L is more warm/dark then the ash/rosewood but I think they are very similar in real tone major difference is the mahagony.

 

What a matters more to me is surface(the painted maple is not as easy to play(I am not EC) as more slippery) where I like the untreated more and radius as well as fret condition.

 

So today I go for Rosewood if in question

 

Roland

[knotty]

unless you have very low frets the string does not touch the board anyway so I cant see it making that much difference to tone, if any

[strtdv]

To my ears the difference in tone is small, to a degree where it would not influence my choice in guitar.

 

I like the way maple necks age, and are pretty much maintainance free, until you need a refret

 

Rosewood looks nice, needs a bit of maintainance, and refrets are easy.

 

I'm not really a fan of very dark ebony boards, purely for aesthetic reasons.

[billybilly]

I like the look of a maple board, but my fingers stick to any finished surface. Yes I know some of you don't touch the board with your fingers, but I do.

 

Rosewood is middle ground to me. It's natural, and some boards have tight grain, and I like those. I don't like lightly colored rosewood. Just looks bad. My fingers are quite free on rosewood.

 

I like ebony the best. It's slippery for me and I like the dark color. I find that it has better sustain and articulate highs, ever more so than maple. So much so that I would not use an ebony board on an ash body guitar. Just too bright.

 

Alder body with ebony or Mahogany body with ebony are my favourite.

 

Billy

[thunder100]

 

I like the look of a maple board, but my fingers stick to any finished surface. Yes I know some of you don't touch the board with your fingers, but I do. Rosewood is middle ground to me. It's natural, and some boards have tight grain, and I like those. I don't like lightly colored rosewood. Just looks bad. My fingers are quite free on rosewood. I like ebony the best. It's slippery for me and I like the dark color. I find that it has better sustain and articulate highs, ever more so than maple. So much so that I would not use an ebony board on an ash body guitar. Just too bright. Alder body with ebony or Mahogany body with ebony are my favourite. Billy

 

 

How do you treat your ebony?

Lemon oil like rosewood?

 

Thanks

 

Roland

[billybilly]

Yep, but not very often. I reckon twice a year is plenty. Depends on climate too. If you live in the desert, more often. I live in the tropics, less often.

[stormin1155]

I like the feel of unfinshed wood, so that drops maple to the bottom, since it starts looking pretty dirty if left unfinished. I love the look and feel of ebony the best. A lot of Indian Rosewood is really not that attractive... uninteresting grain patterns and just sort of a greyish brown. For that, I have nothing against staining it black. It doesn't look exactly like ebony, but to me black looks better than dull brown. Rosewood is easier to work and much more forgiving than maple, especially if it is finished maple.

 

I agree with the other posters that tonal differences are over exaggerated. Yes, they are there, but there are so many other things in a guitar that influence tone and sustain that it's pretty hard to attribute it to the fretboard wood.

[mister natural]

For me, don't care if there is a audible diff from the same guitar, with the same everything else using maple/rosewood/ebony. Seems impossible to measure or hear a difference with so many other variables

 

Like several of the guys above, I like the feel of wood unfinished beneath my fingertips. Both my guitars have ebony with no position dots, my bass has rw with them. My old Tele had a maple neck & I grew out of it. I chose all of these instruments b/c they felt great to my hands & sound fantastic. I recco you let the individual instrument speak to you & go from there

[Jkater]

Out of eight guitars, five are ebony and three are rosewood. I used to think that I prefered ebony but my last purchase is a gorgeous Warmoth neck equipped Pacifica with a nice RW fretboard. to really compare, you'd have to be able to switch fretboards... not likely to happen any time soon so let's just say that ebony holds the frets better.

[fly_with_v]

I always thought there was a lot of tone differnece, until my latest guitar. My 2 Gibsons and 1 Epi with Ebony fretboards are all mohogany including the neck. My latest ebony fretboard guitar is a Michael Kelly and it is mahogany with a maple neck and ebony fretboard. Until this guitar, I definately had a brighter sound with the ebony's, but this guitar is more like the rosewood tone. Could be the quality of ebony or the underlying wood. I don't know.

 

Regardless, I like the feel of ebony best by far. It is smoother, slicker, denser, and looks better to me. Rosewwod is nice too and I tend to feel the sound is warmer then ebony. I can not stand maple fretboards.

[JC777]

I tend to think of Ebony and Maple as having similar tone.

 

They both tend to be bright and snappy, just a color preference.

 

Rosewood seems warmer.

[Maess]

This is totally subjective, but here is my rating in order:

 

Ebony

Maple

Rosewood

 

I, personally, find Ebony to be the fastest and most comfortable, plus I love black.

 

I love the feel of maple, and find it almost as fast as ebony.

 

Until about 1.5 years ago, I hated rosewood, for no particular reason as it turns out. I think it all goes back to the craptastic Squire Bullet I had in the 80s. The grain on that board was HUGE...

[AndersonTech]

Of natural wood boards, ebony feels the best to me. Contrast-wise, all black, dense ebony makes shell inlays "pop" against it. Too bad it's been harvested almost out of existence.

 

Maple just looks "right" on certain guitars - especially Strats and Teles. Because maple has a painted finish, it does feel different to me than unsealed wood.

 

Rosewood is a mixed bag. I prefer tight grained fretboards that are either almost all black or those that have some nice contrasting colors. Again, shell inlays can look really good in contrast rosewood. Cheaper (soft, open-grain) rosewood boards wear away faster than ebony or maple boards.

 

For ultimate "playability", my favorite is a composite fretboard - but that's a topic for a different discussion.

[Cold Gin]

unless you have very low frets the string does not touch the board anyway so I cant see it making that much difference to tone, if any

 

 

lol

 

 

 

 

 

[Cold Gin]

Maple and ebony have similar tonal characteristics, snappy, percussive, bright.

 

Rosewood is warmer but there is some difference between different types of rosewood. I dont like indian rosewood that much.

 

 

Once you plug it in the difference in tone is negligible at best, especially if you play with OD/distortion.

 

 

Both from a playability perspective and tone wise I like all three. Purely based on looks I prefer tinted maple and a jet black ebony board (or a rosewood if it's tight grained and also very dark).

 

 

The thing that breaks a deal for me when it comes to necks is pale maple or grey/brown looking rosewood.

[guitarcapo]

Ebony advantages:

 

1. Holds frets better

2. Better contrast and cleaner cut for inlays

3. Wears longer due to it's density

 

Disadvantages.

 

1. Holds frets better so harder to refret without chip-out

2. Hard to find quartersawn with out defects anymore

3. Expensive.

 

Rosewood advantages:

 

1. Maybe a slightly better tap tone.

2. Uh... I got nothing else. Because quality ebony is better.

[Finch88]

Ebony looks nice, feels nice, and sounds nice, but so does rosewood. I actually prefer rosewood, but my one gripe with some rosewoods is the amount of grime that gets built up on it.

[ihavenofish]

i like purpleheart fretboards... cause it purple duh.

[Pine Apple Slim]

Im kinda a traditionalist. Maple boards go on Fender style guitars. On Teles I tend to prefer maple, Strats, I tend to prefer rosewood, but maple is fine too.

 

If its a Gibson style set neck guitar, its gotta be rosewood, or ebony is fine if you wanna get fancy.

[CompleteGuitard]

I like both, but I tend to favour rosewood boards mostly because I find they match better with more colors. Maple looks good with a few colors, but I think if any of my other instruments had a maple board they'd look hideous.

 

For me its mostly aesthetic, but rosewood is appealing because of the lower maintenance over the years. Sometimes, if the tech isn't super careful or just makes a mistake, maple does chip when the guitar is being refretted and that can totally change the dynamics of the guitar if the refinish isn't done just right.

[cngracin]

Maple has the best tone for me

[LARRY L]

I ended up with grey wear marks on my maple frett board guitar. I liked the warmer tone I'm getting on my new strat with a rosewood fret board. My 32 year old Ibanez LP, w/ rose wood fret board has held up well with a lot of playing over the years. You can see some grooves if you get a light to reflect on it but for the most part it is not noticeable.

[DonK]

I like boards that are very hard and very smooth - maple is far and away my favorite - which is why I prefer ebony over rosewood. I also like the (generally) darker color of ebony.