Taylor 314ce Grand Auditorium Electro Acoustic

Taylor 314ce Grand Auditorium Electro Acoustic Overview

The Taylor 314ce Electro Acoustic Guitar has a Grand Auditorium body shape - the ultimate all-purpose shape that sustains louder strumming, a dominant bass dominance, and the size makes the guitar nice and easy to handle. It’s ideal for acoustic folk and blues as well as being a good writing tool for singer-songwriters.

The 314ce has a Sitka spruce top, which is the most common spruce wood in use today and provides lots of volume and crisp articulation. Sitka spruce ages nicely over the first four or five years of the guitar’s life, improving the sound with time.

The back and sides are made from Sapele, which is now commonly used as an alternative to mahogany and belongs to the same family. It is slightly darker in tone but has similar properties to mahogany. It sounds very sweet, a little quieter than spruce wood, responsive to a lighter touch and blends really well with other acoustic instruments.

Taylor has used various voicings based on the classic ‘X’ pattern embraced throughout the industry. The big breakthrough has been Andy Powers’ creation of the V-class bracing.

The V shape which is used on the Taylor 314ce channels the energy through the guitar in a way that holds the centre of the top more rigidly than the sides, which respond with a rocking motion (not actually visible to the eye, of course). The V Class bracing means more volume up the neck, better intonation, a noticeable change in the way notes blend further up the higher end of the fretboard.

The ES2 pickup is different from the standard under saddle piezo system which is under constant tension from the strings. This tension has a negative effect on tone, according to Taylor, and so they place their pickup on the side of the saddle, tensioned by 3 hex bolts which can be adjusted to calibrate the pickup response.

The Taylor 314ce is completed with a black pickguard, gloss finish, and comes with a Taylor Deluxe Hardshell Brown Case.

Fancy an upgrade? The 514ce is glossy with Tropical Mahogany back and sides, with a choice of either a Lutz spruce or Western Red Cedar top.