Cheapest and easiest way to amplify a Double bass

[fatgoogle]

Just wondering whats the easiest way to amplify a double bass in most situations.

My DB came with a fishman pickup on it which is a bit raspy but would still do the job.

So whats the cheapest and easiest way that youve found? There will most likely be monitors on the stages etc etc and the amps and pa's will be of varying quality, but one of the groups im in feels it would suit the whole vibe a lot better so im happy to go with it.

Cheers

Sam H

[Clarky]

Cheapest way is just to DI, which is what BC'er BurritoBass does. You will need some sort of preamp for control of sound and feedback, eg a Fishman Plat Pro. If you want to monitor yourself or cannot DI, any small combo with the Plat Pro or similar preamp (eg LR Baggs) in front will do although the cleaner the sound of the combo, the more faithful to a DB tone it will be. Another alternative is preamp into separate head plus cab. The Genz MB200 is small and cheap as a head and you could buy an Eden 1 x10 cab quite cheaply. A 1x10 or 1x12 would work best (not a 1x15). Clearly second hand on BassChat gets you a much bigger bargain.

It may be worth replacing your pickup with say a second hand BassMax of which several are FS on BC right now (roughly £80) as this will improve the sound coming out of your DB and possibly make more difference than your choice of amplification, especially if coupled with a decent preamp.

Edited October 19, 2011 by Clarky

[thisnameistaken]

I would highly recommend providing your own monitoring.

[fatback]

[quote name='thisnameistaken' timestamp='1319011072' post='1408752']
I would highly recommend providing your own monitoring.
[/quote]


+1

Having your own monitoring means you can position the speaker to avoid feedback, as well as the other advantages. Try out any old cheap bass combo you can beg borrow or steal, before you buy anything. It might even work without a preamp (some combinations of pickup and amp don't need one)..

If you do need one and can't stretch to the pricy Fishman's, a cheap but good quality preamp/DI is the DHA DI/EQ (you might get a discount if you pm Dave through BC.).

Just as an example, as an experiment I tried a bassmax pickup through my very old Trace elliot combo without a preamp and it worked ok.

Edited October 19, 2011 by fatback

[thisnameistaken]

Yeah some amps don't need a preamp necessarily (although the Fishman is handy for its feedback-battling features) but it's a matter of trying it and seeing what it sounds like. My Bassmax through my Hartke head sounds horrifically thin, presumably due to the Hartke preamp not being designed to deal with the high impedance of the piezo pickup. Stick the Fishman preamp inbetween and it all works.

Edited October 19, 2011 by thisnameistaken

[marvin spangles]

Hi You don't say what specific pu you are using. Nor the type of music you want to play. The volume needed , the type of sound you are after etc.
All that aside I still don't think there is a cheap way to amplify the DB. Depends what you mean by cheap of course. Personally I am always chasing after a sound that I'm happy with. If you don't like your sound you can't expect others to like it . To answer your question. The best pu you can afford, a good clean amp\speaker combo that doesn't colour your sound. Some players get good results using full range PA speakers. eg EV or even the Yamaha stage pas. At present I'm using AI gear and am very happy . It is expensive but then I don't think about gear and I just concentrate on playing and practice. Good luck

[tinyd]

[quote name='thisnameistaken' timestamp='1319016159' post='1408827']
Yeah some amps don't need a preamp necessarily (although the Fishman is handy for its feedback-battling features) but it's a matter of trying it and seeing what it sounds like. My Bassmax through my Hartke head sounds horrifically thin, presumably due to the Hartke preamp not being designed to deal with the high impedance of the piezo pickup. Stick the Fishman preamp inbetween and it all works.
[/quote]

+1 to this - I did the same, BassMax through Roland Cube and 'horrifically thin' is exactly the right description. Then I got a Fishman and it made a huge difference.

[fatgoogle]

Its the Bp-100 pickup i have on there but i reckon its pretty old now. Also im using a harkte lh500 through a 1x15 so maybe thats half the problem.

Im going to be playing in a folky mellow style group and using pizz and bowing.

AI gear is way to expensive, but would a preamp into my hartke into some kind of small amp possible do the job?

[marvin spangles]

The Bp 100 seems to work fine for a lot of basses. Experiment with position and EQ to get the best sound. A preamp would certainly help. You're going to have possible feedback issues at medium to high volumes so speaker placement needs a lot of consideration. The double bass is pretty cumbersome to lug around so I'd be loathe to lug around a 15' speaker too. Do you need a 15' for EB ? If not consider swapping for a lighter cab.
I'm not familiar with the Harkte head although I know that it is popular amongst EB players. Try setting everything flat. You may have to roll a lot of the bass frequencies off. Try pizz and bow. You'll probably have to re eq when alternating between bow and pizz or maybe you can find a compromise eq setting that will work for both.
Another possiblity is to DI to the pa and have a monitor . The downside is that you have little control over the sound during the gig.
What's the on stage volume of the band like. Perhaps a mic would work for you.

[thisnameistaken]

My head is an LH500 and it definitely didn't work with my piezo without a preamp to bring the impedance down to somewhere closer to a bass guitar. It works fine with the Fishman preamp to sort out the input signal, but be aware that the LH500 has quite a pronounced mid scoop with the EQ controls set 'flat', so you'll probably want to roll off quite a lot of the bass and treble knobs as well as increasing the mid to get a more natural sound.

I would definitely try a preamp before you think about replacing the pickup. The pickup might sound good but it'll be impossible to tell until you put it into an amplifier that can cope with it.

Edited October 19, 2011 by thisnameistaken

[TheRev]

As others have said, I'd start with a preamp like the Fishman and go directly into the PA and see how you get on with the stage monitors. There's a good chance you'll have feedback issues with wedge monitors, especially if the onstage volume is loud, in which case you might also need to get a small combo (something like the Ibanez Promethean) that you can raise up to head height and get as much bass volume as possible.

[geoffbassist]

A 2nd hand GKMB150 combo gets good results and are widely used.