endorka

[quote name='Jigster' post='1065627' date='Dec 21 2010, 01:20 PM']It's a dreamscape for a world that seems to move far too fast. ..... Any feedback welcome[/quote] I'd say you've achieved the mood you are after. If I were to offer constructive criticism, I would prefer to hear the melody unharmonised and perhaps in a higher register; in my opinion, the bass chords sound quite cumbersome and are not really in keeping with the effect you are trying to achieve. Jennifer

Alex, One of my favourite jams in Glasgow is the Blues night at Samuel Dows in Nithsdale Road. The have a house band that plays some tunes, then various other musicians play for a few numbers, and so on. It is well run and the musicians are good and very welcoming. I've not been for a while - I think it used to be on a Thursday night, but it might be worth phoning them or looking in the gig guide to confirm. Jennifer

I use Nymans. I've had Pops, which I found ok, but the thing I liked most about the Pops I had was that it was really liquid at room temperature. It looks solid, but will actually flow over a period of several hours, if, for example, you leave the tub upside down in your bag. Bizarre! Jennifer

I have a Grind 6... in a studio shoot out a few months ago between that and 5 other basses, including a precision, the Grind was the one chosen to go on the track. It does sound different to a Precision or Jazz, but I think it gives a good alternative for people who would go for the "muso" tone, without actually sounding too much like the muso tone, which is not really to my taste. Jennifer

I can see both sides here Dood - there are aspects of the advert that I found inconsistent and incompatible with my own priorities, but decided to keep my counsel. On the other hand, I can also see that it is in some ways a fairly irresistible target for a bit of banter. I think we've all had a bit of joshing on these forums... and I would agree that we are all big enough to take it :-) Jennifer

For my audition piece I arranged a bunch of great movie themes/basslines/melodies into a medley and played them on a 6 string bass, accompanied by a drummer friend. It worked :-) I'm certainly no authority, but I would avoid all the usual suspects like the plague. Yes, that does include "Portrait of Tracy". They will have heard it a million times before. On that day. For the interview, the killer question for auditionees was, and I paraphrase: "You do of course realise that it is incredibly unlikely you will be able to make a living playing music, even if you get into this course and get the degree. What do you think of that?" Jennifer

[quote name='Doddy' post='1064351' date='Dec 20 2010, 10:39 AM']I partly agree with this. I've seen a load of bands where the bass player has camped out on the low B,and when the guitarist is soloing there is a sonic space of two or three octaves and the whole thing sounds really empty. I think the problem is that a lot of players don't really know how to use the added range. They play low all the time,thinking that it adds weight or makes it heavy,and many times it has the opposite effect[/quote] Indeed. In cases where one has limited instrumentation, such as no rhythm guitar, I find that it can pay to arrange parts in a similar method to that of a string quartet, which often presents similar challenges. In this case, think of the bass guitar as similar to a cello in terms of range; the lowest note would be the C on the A string. It's a proven method that has worked for centuries, and the Bartok string quartets are pretty damn heavy :-) Jennifer

[quote name='mcgraham' post='1064247' date='Dec 20 2010, 07:15 AM']Never? Really? I can see your reasoning and agree with most of it, but surely you don't mean 'never'... I don't generally use notes below my low E because I don't hear music that way. But there are some songs I that I can hear lower notes will fit better than notes just an octave below (even with just one guitar in standard tuning accompanying).[/quote] :-) Not quite never, for example, if the bass & drums are the only instruments playing at a certain point, there is no reason why you should not. Or maybe you want the bass line to sound detached. These are the aforementioned exceptions of "special effects", as my old orchestration tutor used to refer to them :-) He actually took this further, as he would only write basslines on the 'E' string, which he considered very low, if there was another instrument doubling the entire line an octave higher. Good examples of this are low hits & pedal notes in big swing band arrangements, with trombones and/or baritone sax doubling them an octave up. A great deal of music from the 60s/70s is like this - many of the basslines are in the mid register of the instrument. Notable example: "Son Of A Preacher Man" avoiding the low "E". An interesting aspect of this is that I arrived at this conclusion in practice before I was aware of any theory covering it. Because most bass amplification does not reproduce the fundamental frequency of notes on the E and B strings, most players are unaware of how deep these notes actually are, until they hear them played back through a really good sound system, at which point it becomes obvious why you shouldn't have used them. It happened to me... Jennifer

I may be barking up the wrong tree, but my initial thought is: in this case, it would be easiest to raise the pickup to meet the string, than lower the string to meet the pickup. Is it not possible to raise the pickup any higher? I've encountered this problem before, and fixed it by putting some additionaly padding below the foam under the pickup. Jennifer

From an arrangement / orchestration point of view, the answer is usually "no". The reason is that when playing notes that low, you usually need another instrument to be playing the same note an octave higher. This preserves the structure of the harmonic series in the voicing of the chord at that particular moment; if you don't, then the bass note can sound "detached", and as acidbass points out, this is quite noticeable. So, if you are playing only with a guitarist in standard tuning, you should never play anything below your E string, as it will definitely be more than an octave away from what the guitarist is playing. If there is a keyboard player then it may be possible - check the lowest note they are playing at that point and see. Of course there are exceptions to the above, but they tend to be for special effects. These notes really are incredibly low, but because they are not usually amplified properly most people do not realise just how low they are. The low B, when amplified properly, is similar to the low notes on the pedals of a church organ. Jennifer

[quote name='owen' post='1061011' date='Dec 16 2010, 09:22 PM']I am toying with the idea of a 5 string Jazz with a set of Aguilar pickups. If it was a 4 string I could buy the body off the shelf, but the lugs in the pickups are just too far apart, unless someone actually make J5 pickups with the lugs in the same place as those on J4 pickups. Any ideas?[/quote] I replaced the stock jazz pickups in my Squire 5 string recently with Seymour Duncans. The existing pickup cavities were too small and the lugs in the wrong place, so the tech that fitted them had to expand both. It actually looks really good, although it is more expensive than having the pickups fitted without this extra woodwork. Jennifer

[quote name='mcgraham' post='1058192' date='Dec 14 2010, 08:56 AM']To reach these sorts of levels of skill and to achieve it over multiple genres on one instrument takes a lot of time, but to achieve it on 2+ instruments regardless of their similarities (bass, guitar; electric bass, upright bass) is a mammoth task.[/quote] Yup. I'm starting to find that one way to realistically manage this is to focus extensively on the one or two genres/instruments that are a priority at a given time. While I am doing this the others will tend to slip, but it is possible to pick them up again at another time. Usually it takes a bit of work to get back up to speed again on these neglected areas, but on the upside there is often cross pollination from the other genres that gives a new & improved perspective on them. Jennifer

Great sound and playing, love it! Jennifer

[quote name='blackmn90' post='1058234' date='Dec 14 2010, 09:48 AM']funky_numba. There seems to be a lot of utter crap on this thread. Instead of blaming it on an amp, bass, pickups, set up whatever, it is in reality all about the technique. And by this i don't just mean right hand, the left hand is just as important. On the right hand you want to really push hard on the strings to make sure your pushing the strings for all that they can give, then your left hand needs to be firm to let the note ring out propperly.[/quote] In fairness, myself and several others have also written on the thread advocating this point of view. I'd be inclined to agree with you that playing the strings quite hard gives a good sound for this kind of music; in my opinion, a lightweight/low energy touch doesn't really cut it for the most part. The lightweight touch seems to push the bassline into a more muso/jazz fusion terroitory, which is really a different thing altogether. Jennifer

[quote name='Faithless' post='1056524' date='Dec 12 2010, 08:49 PM']I heard a few famous players saying, that they're [i]against [/i]this kind of thing, because, according to 'em, developing a voice on the instrument takes a lifetime, and you can't just do it on few different instruments (in this case it's electric and double bass..)[/quote] It is of course hard to be your own judge, but I think I've managed to develop a voice on both instruments. I do find that my ability to express that voice varies, the main factor being how much I am playing a particular instrument at a given time. For the last few months I was heavily focussed on the bass guitar, and developed technique and musically quite substantially; however, my fluency & intonation on the double bass took a hit. A few days double bass practice has made a big difference, I'm hoping that after a week I'll be back up to speed. Other times it is the context that throws me off; I usually play jazz gigs on double bass, but had to play a couple on bass guitar recently due to the terrible weather, and I found the experience slightly odd. In truth, my main concern is not doubling of instruments, which I find a reasonable proposition, but doubling (or more!) of styles. I love classical music, jazz, rock, sould, pop, reggae, funk, latin, you name it. I was at a folk session today and it was great. But you could easily spend a lifetime dedicated to just one of these styles! How to be able to play them all to the level the deserve is a continuing puzzle. Jennifer

I tried various types of strings on my NS Design WAV and can confirm that the differences were notable, in the ways you would intuitively expect. Jennifer

[quote name='Mike' post='1053834' date='Dec 10 2010, 10:54 AM']Interesting. I would probably want to stand as I'm planning on playing jazz.[/quote] Students have said this to me before, and I find it puzzling. Why is it thought necessary to stand to play jazz? Standing does not give any playing advantage when doing so. My main concern with the students who mentioned this was that they liked the "image" involved with standing to play jazz, rather than being focused on the practicalities of playing the instrument. I'm trying not to be pernickity/patronising about this, but it is something both myself and my bass tutor have come across, and neither of us can understand it :-) Jennifer

[quote name='BassBus' post='1053702' date='Dec 10 2010, 08:47 AM']I can only speak from my own experience, and I bow to Jenifer's greater experience, but I play both sitting and standing. It all depends on how fit my back is feeling. If your arms and hands have learnt muscle memory once they can learn it twice. That is surely part of playing any instrument, keep learning. Once we stop allowing our ability to evolve we might as well give up.I wouldn't say my thumb takes a lot of the preasure of holding the instrument up as the body is resting against my body about waist level.[/quote] I wouldn't say I have greater experience at all, only different experience, and I like to hear about other people's. I'm all for keeping learning, something I both preach and practice, but being a parsimonious sort I'd prefer to only learn something once if possible :-) Jennifer

[quote name='Mike' post='1053342' date='Dec 9 2010, 09:03 PM'][quote] Do you sit to play arco and stand for other gigs?[/quote] Hi Jennifer, that is the initial plan. Saying that, I'm quite enjoying sitting so perhaps I'll be one of those guys. Not sure yet really. Will update when I have more experience! [/quote] Interesting - this is something I would always advise against. When standing, the bass will be in a different position to than when you are seated, and consequently the left hand muscle memory you've developed in one position will not apply to the other. It is difficult enough to acquire good intonation without having to do all the work twice. Because of this I suggest that people choose either seated or standing and stick to it. My own preference is for sitting, primarily because you can use your body to support the weight of the instrument; when standing, it is very easy to become dependent on the thumb of the left hand to prop the instrument up, not a good thing. Even those with really good standing technique seem to do this to some extent, and so there are devices like the "eggpin" that try to minimise this. Jennifer

[quote name='fatback' post='1051148' date='Dec 7 2010, 11:22 PM']I'm wondering (now I get the tin hat on again) whether the position way of learning isn't best suited to reading written lines rather than improvising over chords. Do tell me I'm wrong.[/quote] I'd say you are partly wrong :-) Classical music contains many technically demanding parts, and many more variations than just about any other music. One aspect of the way classical string players negotiate these difficulties is to work out fingerings for the passages, that they will play *exactly* the same way every time they play a piece. Nor for them starting a phrase with the index finger one day and the pinky the next! It is hard enough to play a passage one way without having to learn how to do it two or more different ways. Always playing the passage the same way will improve "muscle memory" and intonation more quickly, and will allow you to get to the development of the actual music sooner. I see the Simandl position system as a component of achieving this. As you become more familiar with the instrument, you become quicker/better at identifying the most efficient fingerings for a given passage, to the point where you can quite often do it on the fly while sight reading. So in this sense, it would probably be correct to say that the genesis of position based playing comes from the classical/reading tradition. However! As you become more used to thinking in terms of positions, it becomes part of your improvising as well. I understand that it seems odd that a system that seems to involve a considerable amount of planning ahead could do so, but it does. I'm afraid I can't describe how this happens; all I remember is that at one point I thought the way you did, then sometime later after considerable practice the position/improvising dichotomy resolved itself and became integrated. Jennifer

Some more thoughts: Don't worry about having a dot maker or whatever on the side of the neck of the double bass. In my experience, most people have some visual reference to at least get them started in tune. I don't have any markers, but what I do have is a small dent on the side of the neck more or less where the G on the E string is. There is also a small smudge of glue around A on the E string. I use these in exactly the same way as a dot marker, and I suspect most double bass players have similar visual markings, be it a certain grain in the wood, or some other artifact. I have taken two aspects to intonation training on the double bass. The first was advised by my teacher who recommended playing scales into a tuner as a starting point to [b]train your ears to hear the intervals properly[/b], because what many people think of as a certain interval is not quite accurate. This is a useful exercise up to a point, but as others have stated, you can't spend a whole gig staring at a tuner to check you are in tune. To my mind, the next thing is to set up a solid reference point. Put the tuner away, and put some very slow scales into a sequencer using a sound that does not have any vibrato, and try to play along with them using the bow on the double bass. The tuning of your initital efforts will probably shock you, but it does get better. This again is useful up to a point, but the rigidity imposed by it can be limiting. The next thing I did was to put a chord played on piano into the sequencer, e.g. C major triad, then play the C major scale along to it. This gives you more freedom, but still provides a strong reference point for developing tuning. It is possible to do a similar exercise using a drone of one note, but I find this very forgiving in terms of the tuning of intervals, and it can quiet easily lead to you playing in "just" intonation rather than even tempered tuning. This may or may not be a bad thing, depending on what kind of other musicians you regularly play with. Jennifer

[quote name='fatback' post='1050005' date='Dec 6 2010, 11:04 PM']1. Alright, bowing reveals the note better, but it doesn't tell you how right it is. So I get to hear my poor intonation, if that's what it is, more clearly. Is this helpful?[/quote] Ultimately I think it is. As you have no doubt observed, pizzicato double bass can hide a multitude of tuning problems, far more so than pizzicato on the fretless bass guitar. Bowing is, in effect, a sharper tool at defining pitch, therefore it will ultimately help you develop better intonation. Also, the envelope of a pizzicato note starts sharp and decays to a flatter pitch. At which point in the envelope do you decide it is in tune? A well bowed note has a constant pitch. Jennifer

[quote name='bootleg' post='1049781' date='Dec 6 2010, 08:05 PM']Besides losing all feeling in my fingers, is my amp going to keep working, what are the risks, will condensation just blow the thing up?[/quote] I played one on Saturday, it was pretty good actually :-) I used the DI option. Never mind the bass though - you'll need fingerless gloves, many layers of clothing, and a silly but warm hat! Jennifer

I had thought my slap days were long gone, but a month or so ago in rehearsal the singer suggested I play slap bass on a song, so I did... and I think the results are good. I take a fairly minimal approach though, for the most part I am using the slap to create a different type of sound, rather than as a technique in itself. To complicate matters, the song is in F minor - not your typical slap key! Playing it live was interesting as the sound was louder than my usual plucked tone, so I had to employ a compressor to prevent the slap sound being too overpowering onstage. I have to admit I really enjoyed the experience :-) Jennifer

I've had a listen to your clips on Youtube through a decent set of speakers. Assuming that the recording is a reasonable representation of your sound, I would say the following: The bass tone on "Poker Face" and "You Really Got Me" is wooly and indistinct. If I were in your shoes, I would roll of some bass and bring your treble setting to the neutral position, and take it from there. Too much bass will tend to give you a wooly bloomy boomy sound, especially in clubs/pubs, and parodoxically will make it more difficult for your bass presence to be felt. Jennifer