A wide range of instrument amplifiers is now available, some for general purposes and some designed for specific instruments and even for particular sounds. Traditional guitar amplifiers come up with a clean, warm sound, a sharp treble roll off at 5 kHz or less and bass roll off at 60 to100 Hz, often with built in reverb and tremolo units. Bass amplifiers have extended bass response and tone controls optimized for bass guitars (or more rarely, for upright bass).
Higher end bass amplifiers sometimes include compressor or limited features, which help to keep the amplifier from distorting at high volume levels. Keyboard amplifiers have a very low distortion and extended flat frequency response in both directions. Keyboard amplifiers often have a simple onboard mixer, so that keyboardists can control the tone and level of several keyboards. Acoustic amplifiers are designed specifically to produce a clean, transparent, acoustic sound when used with acoustic instruments with built in transducer pickups and microphones.
Some well known brands of guitar amplifiers
While there are almost innumerable manufacturers of guitar amplifiers, we will be discussing the most important brands that have created history in guitar amplification.
Carvin Corporation
The Carvin Corporation is a musical instrument and equipment manufacturer, located in San Diego, California, well known among guitar players for their guitars. Carvin was founded in 1946 by Lowell Kiesel, and originally manufactured guitar pickups. Carvin Corporation manufactures acoustic and electric guitars, bass guitars and accessories, amplifiers, live studio sound equipments, microphones and lighting gears.
Korg Corporation
Korg Corporation is a Japanese multinational corporation that manufactures electronic musical instruments and guitar tuners. The company is one of the most widely used and respected names in the electronic music world. Founded in 1962 in Japan by Tsutomu Kato and Tadashi Osanai, Korg was originally known as Keio Electronic Laboratories because its fledgling offices were located near the Keio train line in Tokyo and Keio can be formed by combining the first letters of Kato and Osanai. Yamaha Corporation has always been a major partner of Korg, supplying them with circuitry and mechanical parts.
Marshall Amplification
Marshall Amplification is a British company which designs and manufactures electric guitar amplifiers. Marshall Amplifiers are well known and highly popular among guitarists. Marshall Amplifiers were originally built as direct copies of Fender amplifiers, but soon incorporated certain traits which made them more favorable to guitarists seeking a heavier sound. Like most professional level amplifiers, Marshall amplifiers still use valve preamp and power amplifier stages instead of solid state devices. Marshall also manufactures cheaper solid-state or hybrid devices.
Vox
Vox is a musical equipment manufacturer, which is most famous for making the AC30 guitar amplifier and the Vox electric organ. Founded in Great Britain, Vox is now owned by the Japanese electronics firm Korg. In 1959, with sales under pressure from the more powerful Fender Twin and from The Shadows, who requested amplifiers with more power, Vox produced what was essentially a double powered AC15 and named it the AC30.
Roland Corporation
Roland Corporation is a Japanese manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, electronic equipment and software. It was founded by Ikutaro Kakehashi in Osaka on April 18, 1972 with 33 million yen in capital. Some of the recent amplifiers from Roland Corporation are Roland SH 201, Roland Juno G, Roland MV 8800 and Roland V Synth GT.
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