Composite pickup apparatus for stringed instruments

Abstract

A pickup for a string under tension of a musical instrument having an improved planar response uses a pair of mechanically independent pressure transducers preferably adjacent to one another which provide independent support to transversely adjacent points of the string. The independent transducers allow the string to roll slightly on one transducer when applying pressure to the other as a result of the string vibration, thus increasing the sensitivity of the pickup in planes near the plane of minimum sensitivity. The transducers may rest on a common massive element which is resiliently coupled to the bridge of the instrument. The transducers preferably have rounded string-contacting surfaces in order to reduce the magnitude of the shear forces exerted on the pickup when the string tension is varied.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.