by Austin Vail

Created on: January 30, 2007   Last Updated: April 01, 2007

Portable amplification of a classical acoustic/electric (A/E) guitar was my problem. I had landed a street musician gig for a little tourist town nearby, ten bucks an hour and tips. Not a bad deal, but the streets are noisy. My classical A/E needed to be plugged in, but where? The streets had no power outlets and I didn't want to mooch juice from the shop owners, nor did I like the idea of running an extension chord for tourists to trip over and sue my tush. That sure would have killed profits.

My first solution was to get one of the famous Pignose 5-W amps that take six AA batteries. I could go for a couple of gigs before the batteries went funky, and so did the sound. The Pignose would take on a heavy metal character, which wasn't so bad to my ears, somewhat interesting for bluesy fingerpicking, but then the little amp would roll over and die in mid-tune, ending the gig until I could get more batteries. I started carrying spare AAs to the gigs and burned through them like eating chips and dip.

That winter I used money from a day job to bolster up my street gigging capability. A sealed rechargeable 12-volt battery, about the size of a thick paperback novel, provided the reliable power for gigs. A power inverter, the kind used to feed a laptop computer off a car battery, brought the voltage up to house current standards, 120 volts. A 9-volt Pignose wall adapter fed the amp. The power went round and round and it came out here, into the street loud enough to compete with Harleys and diesels.

My next experiment involved an inside bar gig and a 30-W acoustic amp powered from the 12-V to 120-V rig. The little battery held up for all four hours, and I didn't have to mess around with an extension chord. The bar owner thought it was downright neighborly of me not to punch up her electrical bill. Yeah, you're right, she was kidding, but it got me to thinking, how far can this go?

Say you're playing in a band and you use a big amp that draws 100 or more watts, how big of a battery would be needed? Could the little 12-V hold up over the typical gig? Could it keep a little PA system running? I have a 120-W PA left over from when I sang and just played accompaniment guitar, before the fingerpicking got too complex and I lost interest in lyrics. Sure enough, using the PA and battery rig at a subsequent bar gig worked!

Since these experimental times, I've never hauled an extension chord to a gig again. I've never had to search out a wall outlet, and in some joints you really don't want to find one anyway. I won't go into details, but let's just say it's sometimes not an appetizing experience. Also, I am free to select any spot to play within any particular venue.

I suppose that eventually the little 12-V battery will give up the ghost. Still, I've used it regularly during practice sessions and for many gigs over the past six years. When not in use, I keep it on the charger all the time, which I've heard is good for longevity. The inverter has been upgraded to a true sine wave type, which gives a cleaner sound from the amps, both the Pignose and 30-W acoustic. I've added one of those little preamps so I can contour the sound for particular tunes. What can I say, other than the Pignose has led the way into hog heaven.

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