What is Pau Ferro like to play?

[snorkie635]

Yep, got it on three of my basses and it looks/sounds/feels just fine to me.

[Misdee]

18 minutes ago, Beedster said:

 

Agreed, IME the variability in wood is far greater than the variability in lacquer. My preference on a fretless is lacquered maple, although I have an un-lacquered maple that is also nice. I used to be 100% into ebony but am increasingly finding it a little characterless/sterile, while I still find rosewood a bit tame. I must revisit Pau Ferro which I had on a mid 90's 'Ray FL and quite liked 

When it comes to fretless I'm looking for something that can withstand the abrasion of roundwound strings. My fretless Lakland has got a polyester-coated ebony board and I really love the sound and feel of it. Pau ferro is supposed to be pretty hard, but everything will wear out sooner or later if you use roundwounds, as I'm sure you are already well-aware.

[Chiliwailer]

20 hours ago, Beedster said:

 

 I must revisit Pau Ferro which I had on a mid 90's 'Ray FL and quite liked 

My mid 90s FL Ray put an end to my ignorant snobbery of PF - it's got more Mwah than a couple of posh birds air kissing. 

[Bagman]

On 18/10/2025 at 09:13, Misdee said:

When it comes to fretless I'm looking for something that can withstand the abrasion of roundwound strings. My fretless Lakland has got a polyester-coated ebony board and I really love the sound and feel of it. Pau ferro is supposed to be pretty hard, but everything will wear out sooner or later if you use roundwounds, as I'm sure you are already well-aware.

I have a Pau Ferro fretless but it's never had rounds on it , so I'm not much use there 

[pantherairsoft]

I had a custom Roscoe LG with a Pau Ferro board. I picked it over Rosewood as I thought the colour and subtle grain was gorgeous.

 

Performance wise, I didn’t find much in it next to rosewood boards that I had on similar instruments, but personally, I found the colour of it more pleasing to look at.

 

[Paddy777]

I’ve seen some lovely Pau Ferro boards - like the one on the ACG build on the first page of the thread, on some of the MIM Fenders (among others) it can look & feel a bit dry, I got some of the Montypresso relic wax which darkens the wood as well as conditioning it and it came up lovely for me, if you don’t want to darken it then just get the normal one. As for how it plays, I thought it was a bit snappier than rosewood if pushed for a difference but nowhere near the difference between something like maple and rosewood (and even then the differences are overstated a bit IMHO)