Valve Amplifiers - Instrument and Vocal Amplification

Instrument and Vocal Amplification

Valve amplifiers for guitars (and to a lesser degree vocals and other applications) have different purposes from those of hi-fi amplifiers. The purpose is not necessarily to reproduce sound as accurately as possible, but rather to fulfill the musician's concept of what the sound should be. For example, distortion is almost universally considered undesirable in hi-fi amplifiers but may be considered a desirable characteristic in performance.

Small signal circuits are often deliberately designed to have very high gain, driving the signal far outside the linear range of the tube circuit, to deliberately generate large amounts of harmonic distortion. The distortion and overdrive characteristics of valves are quite different from transistors (not least the amount of voltage headroom available in a typical circuit) and this results in a distinctive sound. Amplifiers for such performance applications typically retain tone and filter circuits that have largely disappeared from modern hi-fi products. Amplifiers for guitars in particular may also include a number of "effects" functions.