D'Addario EJ40 Silk and Steel Folk Acoustic Guitar Strings - .011-.047 Light Reviews

These strings are the best in my opinion for acoustic guitar strings. They sound great and play great! I've tried a lot of different strings and these have met all my expectations.

These sound great on my Martin OOO-17, better to my ear than the Martin Retros that came on the guitar.

Back in March 2020, I bought a Gretsch boxcar from Sweetwater. I had been using the stock strings on it but I decided to try these ones. Huge improvement! You just can't go wrong with the strings! They sound great and they feel amazing! I highly recommend these strings. (P.S. they have a nice silver patina to them)

I love these strings so much. I play more of a finger style and these strings are so amazing. They produce a sweet warm tone that melts my heart. I've tried many guitar strings but these I'm sold on for life.

I bought these strings looking for a smooth, mellow tone for fingerstyle playing and found that they were a bit too warm for my preference. I play a lot of British-style fingerstyle folk and needed something that wasn't as piercingly bright and metallic sounding as a phosphor bronze, but these went too far. I could definitely see these strings sounding great on a brighter and/or smaller guitar, but for a large Martin-style dreadnought, they really deaden the guitar's natural tone. It's an otherwise good set of strings that plays very delicately and lasts a long time, just not the right fit for my playing style or guitar.

I bought these because my sweetwater rep recommended them to me. My left (chording) hand does not need such light strings, but my fingerpicking hand does. My fingernails seem to me to be pretty delicate, and if you rip or tear a fingernail you are out of luck playing this way. The sound is very good, no problem there. I have even played in drop tuning, and they are still not too loose. I also tried LaBella, which are heavier on the bottom, but I didnt see any noticeable advantage, so going back to EJ40.

I was just gifted a 1963 Guild F-20. Small guitar size is single 0 . These strings are perfect for the old neck and generally weaken state of this axe. I play professionally and I am a fingerpicker. Perfect tension and a classic tone with lost of mid-range. Very different than a bronze string but a very useable sound!! I think Im going to try them on my Martin 000-28...

I love the sound of silk and steel strings. I wanted to try these a few times but they always seemed to be out of stock. Just my bad timing I guess. I finally got a set and went from easy finger picking to some flat picking. They were easy on the fingers and had a really nice tone. I'm not a heavy flat picker or this light set (like any light set) wouldn't work. But if you want a nice mellow tone and easy on the fingers, this could be the set for you.

I've played D'Addario phosphor bronze on my acoustics for years (Incidentally I only use D'Addario strings for full disclosure on all my guitars). I had an archtop that the Phosphor bronze were just too chimey (i.e. pitchy and irritating) I decided to give the Silk and Steel a shot and can't be happier the high end pitchy ringing is goone and the G string now sounds correct (it never did before)the tension is less putting less pressure on the bridge, top, and neck, and they play great right out of the package. Noticeable improvement in tone and balance. Lets me again fall in love with a guitar I was considering selling.

I'm getting a bit long in the tooth. My hand strength is declining as the years tic by. These strings are a godsend. I have been tuning down to accommodate my increasingly weaker hands but now I'm back to standard pitch. Even with much lower tension these strings sound really good and loud. Now I just have to figure out what to do about my aging voice.

I'm really not sure why anyone uses phosphor bronze strings. I never liked how they played, and only liked the sound when they started to get old. These are warm and beautiful without the ching present in most acoustic guitar strings. Sure, they wear out/stretch out a little faster, but there's no going back after using these beauties.

As far as style goes, I do a combination of finger-piking and strumming (without a pick). They are a little more fragile; be careful you don't accidentally tune too high, or if you're removing a soundhole mute, remove on the low string side (I've broken a string that way, too).

I have always used D'Addario EJ16 and although they are also termed light the gauges seem to be a tiny bit heavier than the Silk and Steel. I don't know if it's the size difference or the Silk and Steel but my fingers feel so much better and I have been playing for 15 years. They are a bit mellower but my flatpicked songs sound just fine but where they really shine is fingerstyle. I no longer feel the need for any picks or fake nails. The bare flesh tone sounds beautiful to me.

Not only do they feel and play great, but they sound smooth and balanced. I love how they remove a lot of the tinniness that is normally present in acoustics.