+1 on the greatnesso of PASV4.

I'd say leave it as is.
If your catalog was done on an Alto, no need to switch PUs and render it obsolete.

Instead, explore the new possible tonalities on your PASV4.
Maybe you have your old sound too baked in, and if you give PASV4 a couple more tries, you'll find a different balance or place to stand on.

Ultimately, just send me the Alto , whichever PU it has.

Well, I gave my SG-12 its maiden run on a gig over the weekend, just trying to get a handle on the personality and capabilities of the PASV4. First let me say that I'm shocked by all of the sounds contained within this amazing unit; there are more tonal options than I've ever experienced before. Endless combinatons here .

With that being said, I now must face another truth with regards to how this pickup effects the sound of the ol' Heartstrings duets. Coming to this pickup after being SO used to the A2, it was a rough deal. We arranged and recorded our first three CDs with a combination of Stickup+ACTV2 or two ACTV2s. We really found our sound within this framework, and we've performed these songs for years now and have made it our "home base", so to speak. When using the PASV4 on these songs, a good amount of songs didn't like it. The P4 is a different animal, a very "extreme" pickup, at least to my ears. The filter knobs introduce radically different tones with each successive turn of the knob, and I can see where that would be infinitely useful. But when you have a sound that you want to tweak just a LITTLE, it ain't gonna happen I spent a lot of time struggling to get a sound that was in the ballpark with Mark's Stick, but we always sounded like polar opposites of each other. I can see where this would be cool, as well, but it won't work for our past catalog.

So here's my dilemna I'm faced with: Do I send my SG12 back and have Emmett swap the P4 for the A2, or do I keep it the way it is? I was blown away with what the P4 could do, and I could use that Stick for all material henceforth that requires a wider range of tones, and I could just keep on using my A2-equipped Alto for the old stuff. Or I could swap the pickup and have the SG12 capable of doing all of our past work. This would solve the problem, but it would render my Alto retired; the SG12 would have eveything the Alto has plus two more strings and MIDI. The Alto would be a "backup" Stick at that point.

So that's my little scenario that I'm chewing on. What I probably need to do is just give it some time. I'm so accustomed to the sound of the ACTV2, and the jump to the P4 is a big thing to absorb and get used to. Whatever happens, I'm sure I'll wind up in a good spot with these two beautiful instruments!

Hey Matt,

I can definitely see how the PASV-4 wouldn't fit into your current catalog. When I read that you were going to be working Celtic rock into your next album I thought the P-4 would be perfect for that!

I love the A2 for classical music (which is why I chose it for the mirrored 4ths Grand I ordered) and I think the Stickup could fit that role too, but to me the P-4 is jazz/blues/rock.

So my vote is to keep it and work it into your future material!

- Dan

Greg,
You pretty much nailed in a few words what took me three paragraphs to describe. The P4 is VERY electric-sounding, and we have had the more acoustic, crystalline sound of the A2 drilled into our heads.

I run the Alto through a few pedals and into the Fishman SoloAmp. The bass side tone knob is always full up, the melody tone knob is turned down to about 8:00 to get rid of the ice-pick tone you get at the brightest setting. When I plugged in the SG, the gain was huge and made everything clip and distort. I had to back my gain way down on the amp.

Another thing I noticed was that the melody side was almost always louder than the bass side on the P4. I had to turn down the melody side to balance it out. is that normal? My SG has the older P4 module with the two filter knobs on the front face of the pickup (not sure why a new instrument got the old module, but it's not a big deal to me).