I’ve talked a lot about how well chorus works on different instruments in your mix like vocals or drums, but one of the most common applications of chorus is on guitar. Aside from being using to create the illusion of width by virtue of how chorus works, you can get that signature lush, evolving sound on the guitar via chorus. Let’s talk how to use chorus on guitar for that lushness that you’ve heard on commercial mixes in the past.
Chorus on Guitar
If you’re not familiar with the sound of chorus or just want an example of chorus on guitar, consider the opening and guitar on Crowded House’s 1986 biggest hit, “Don’t Dream It’s Over”:
The chorus effect gives the guitar a lot more width in the mix from the slow modulation of the pitch and timing of the guitar, creating the sound of authentic or unique duplicates in the stereo field.
Another famous example of chorus on guitar is on the main and opening riff on Nirvana’s “Come As You Are”:
Guitarist and singer Kurt Cobain actually used the Electro-Harmonix “Small Clone” chorus pedal all over the guitar throughout the song as Cobain transitions from the riff to chords.
The pedal is aptly named considering the effect that chorus creates to give the impression of near identical duplicates.
The main parameter on the chorus effect is the “Rate” which determines how quickly the pitch is shifted.
Pitch is shifted via an LFO, or low frequency oscillator. Essentially a very low frequency is applied to the frequencies of the guitar which causes it to shift ever so slightly and slowly. The higher the frequency of the LFO, the faster the shifting takes place.
Setting this at a lower rate below 1Hz results in a washier, more subtle sound. This is in contrast to pushing this closer to 20Hz to where it sounds choppy to where you can hear the jump between frequencies in the guitar, giving it a robotic phaser-like effect.
While you may want that choppy sound, the “classic” chorus sound involves a very slow frequency modulation for that pleasant lush, thick tone on the guitar.
Specifically, my favorite settings for chorus on guitar to get that trademark chorus sound (using the Jun-6 Chorus plugin from Arturia) is a rate of .4Hz and a depth of 4-5ms:
The “Depth” parameter here controls the range of frequency modulation, or how far off the normal tuning the duplicates will go. The name may be different on your chorus plugin of choice, but somewhere around the center works well for that range parameter.
While you can use chorus on guitar as a send (which you might do if you are applying the effect to a lot of guitar tracks), I like to drop this right on my guitar track in the mix and control the Wet/Dry blend with the onboard mix dial to taste.
You generally want to aim around or a little below 50% to get close to an equal blend of the lead signal and those duplicates to get that lush washy sweet spot.
That’s all you need to do; incidentally that’s the beauty of using chorus on guitar or any instrument for that matter.
The effect itself is modulation based, so it’s actively and palpably evolving in front of the listener at all times without your having to go into the timeline in the mix and actively automate anything yourself.
Your guitar instantly sounds thicker which is ideal when you only have one guitar in the mix and need it to take up more real estate.
The real payoff is that lush tone that you can only achieve through with some well blended chorus, so give it a try next time you find your guitar feels a bit too small or thin in the mix.
