I am all over on this one, I've owned my Ovation acoustic about 3 years now, still has the original strings on it and sounds fine to me. However, just changed the strings on my LP Studio yesterday.
I have really dry hands. I cannot pick up a piece of paper or flip the page of a book without wetting my fingertips. So strings really last a long time for me.
I will admit that new strings sound much brighter than old strings. But I am a big string bender. I have always liked my strings to get old. They bend so much better. They just feel broken in. Often if I break a string I simply replace the broken string. I will go like this for months.
When I do change strings it is not really because I want bright new sounding strings. No, I change strings because I want to go over the entire guitar carefully and clean it. I can do this much better with the strings off. I like to clean the saddles and bridge and nut with Q Tips, alongside the frets, the tuner machines. So the strings need to be off. The guitar will almost look new when I'm finished. :D
I read years ago that Eric Clapton likes to keep strings on his guitars as long as possible for the same reasons I mentioned above. I don't do it to copy EC, I just have the same reason.
If you know something better than Rock and Roll, I'd like to hear it - Jerry Lee Lewis
I just changed my strings today. It has been about 6 or 8 months. I didn't know how dull sounding they were until I replaced them with new'uns. Plus the last time I changed them I put the high E string on backwards. Thats irritating when you tune it. If all goes well I won't wait 6 months this time.
My dad would always talk about retirement, and allude to the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. And I say all you've got at the end of the rainbow is death. You're riding the rainbow right now. - Mark Borchardt
