Pickup (music) facts for kids
A pickup is a special part found on many electric musical instruments, like electric guitars, bass guitars, and electric violins. Its job is to listen to the tiny movements of the instrument's strings. Then, it turns these movements into an electrical signal. This signal can be made much louder using an amplifier or saved for later using recording equipment.
What is a Pickup?
Pickups are like microphones for your instrument's strings. They capture the vibrations that are too quiet for us to hear on their own. Without a pickup, an electric guitar would sound very soft, almost like an unplugged acoustic guitar.
How Do Pickups Work?
There are two main ways pickups turn string vibrations into electrical signals. Some instruments use one type, while others might even have both!
Types of Pickups
The two most common types of pickups are piezo pickups and magnetic pickups. You'll often find piezo pickups on acoustic guitars, while magnetic ones are usually on electric guitars.
Piezo Pickups
Piezo pickups use a special crystal. When this crystal is squeezed or vibrated, it creates a tiny electrical signal. So, when the strings of an instrument vibrate, they make the piezo crystal move, which then creates the sound signal.
Magnetic Pickups
Magnetic pickups work with metal strings. They have small magnets with very thin wire wrapped around them many times. When a metal string vibrates close to these magnets, it creates a small electrical current in the wire. This current is the sound signal that gets sent to an amplifier.
