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Using Bose with upright bass...


bassmayhem
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I have been using a Bose L1 Model 2 system some years now. Mostly when I do chusch gigs, or more acoustic type of gigs. I have used the system with electric bass and my NS electric upright, but now I have started experimenting at home with my Bulgarian Kremona acoustic bass. The Kremona is a big animal, special built for its first owner, with a 3/4 body and full 4/4 scale. (110 cm)
I fell in love with this bass in five notes. It has a big full tone, but demands some power to play. It is not a bass for virtuoso playing - not by me anyhow - but more for digging in and making TONE.

The bass has a Realist pickup, the cupper one under the bass foot of the bridge. When I plugged it into my Bose ToneMatch mixer and set to the David Gage Realist patch it worked rather well, but the amplified tone was very bass heavy and there was a "ringing sensation of ongoing feedback" somewhere in the low mid register. Anyway, I started to tame the feedback beast. First roll down the low band eq 3-6 dB. Then chasing feedback with the parametric eq. First I boosted the eq 15 dB, wich is max on the tone match - volume off - and set the q value to very narrow: some 1/3 - 1/4 octave. Then up with the volume so the beast awkens, play the strings and sweep the frequency control from high to low, until the feedback starts. There is the problem frequency nailed! Down with the mid band gain to minus 9 - 12 dB.

Now the amplified tone is very similar to the acoustic tone. I can play really loud without feedback, standing just one meter from the Bose rig. Depending on local I have to readjust the "notch filter", but now I know it works. I will try using my Avalon U5 as preamp too, to get a better signal from the Realist into the mixer. Just another day...


This bass is built in 2012, but has already a tone big as life. Solid wood all around. A big guy; some 190 cm with endpin in. Nice even tone...


Simba the cat curled up in my rolled shoulder strap on the B1 subs. Cats love to lie in round things for some reason...
I used my Streamliner 900 as preamp for the electric basses, but now I've gotten an EBS ValveDrive DI to use with the Bose.
The Kremona and the NS EUB goes straight into the mixer.

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[quote name='ambient' timestamp='1428537036' post='2742310']
I think there's a guy who plays Chapman stick uses a similar Bose rig.

Sounds like a really nice set up.

:)
[/quote]
I started playing Stick again for a while, after some 27 years hiatus, and used my Bose rig. But - 27 years is a long time, so I sold the Stick...
:huh:

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I love the sound of my DB through my Bose L2 with B2 bass bin. I use AKG 411 contact mic and Kent Armstrong mag pickup. I too had to roll off some deep bass and chase out some feedback using the parametric on the ToneMatch, something I would have found extremely difficult without [url="http://studiosixdigital.com/audiotools-modules-2/"]AudioTools[/url] on my iPhone that enabled me to identify the feedback frequency and spread. The long-scale Kremona looks amazing.

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[quote name='timbass' timestamp='1428599548' post='2742908']The long-scale Kremona looks amazing.[/quote]
Thanks!
It is a very nice instrument. I once had a Wilfer bass; another one like my old was at the store too. When I played that bass, some £6000-ish, I thought: "It sounds like my old one. The things I didn't like is present in this one too". When I played the Kremona, that cost me some £3700, I thought: "Wow! If a bass that is two years old sound like this, how will it sound then, when it is 102...?" It got that Avishai Cohen kind of tone when you dig in... (NO! I don't compare myself with him; thats blasphemy...) :lol: :lol: :lol:



I've changed to Evah Pirazzi Weich on this bass. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...

Edited by bassmayhem
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