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Fretless bass

dmccombe7

By dmccombe7,
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dmccombe7 Grand Master

dmccombe7

Posted
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Posted (edited)

Quite a few of my bass heroes in one place. Cant be bad.

I've registered for it. 6pm our time on 29th April

Dave

Edited by dmccombe7
Mickeyboro Grand Master

Mickeyboro

Posted
Posted
2 minutes ago, dmccombe7 said:

Quite a few of my bass heroes in one place. Cant be bad.

I've registered for it. 6am our time on 29th April

Dave

6pm I hope!😬

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dmccombe7 Grand Master

dmccombe7

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Posted
16 minutes ago, Mickeyboro said:

Forgot to thank you for the heads up, I have registered.👍

You could have been sitting up at 6am waiting for 12 hrs. That would have been a fun day.😂

Dave

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dave moffat Grand Master

dave moffat

Posted
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Perfect timing, my most recent bass purchase should be arriving late that morning after being away at the luthier's for over a year having it's frets removed.

I will either draw inspiration or become depressed and chop my fingers off.

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Hellzero Grand Master

Hellzero

Posted
Posted

8 excellent fretless players, I just hope it won't turn into a mwah battle and an out of tune mess. That said Alain Caron and Michael Manring are great at teaching and explaining their approach and can play complex chords faster than a top notch jazz guitar player. Steve DiGiorgio may be heard, for once, as he is a terrific fretless player, but in a genre where they seem to have forgotten the low frequencies. Percy Jones has always impressed Jaco Pastorius himself. Mark Egan is a hell of a melodist. Garry Willis will get you lost in timing and odd measures. Tony Franklin can play some extraordinary lines that are so groovy. And Bakithi Kumalo has that special touch and huge tone that we all loved on Graceland, but not only.

Let's hear if they will all tune to the A at 440 Hz... which will be the challenge.

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jazzyvee Mentor

jazzyvee

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I watched some of that last night and I don't even play fretless electric bass as I thought it might give me some ideas that would translate to my learning double bass. I posted a link to the Slominsky's pdf book on the chat last night. I found it really informative and differing approaches to the instrument.

bartelby Grand Master

bartelby

Posted
Posted
7 hours ago, tauzero said:

Well, that was good. Some very interesting stuff, and a book to download and look at:

https://ia803000.us.archive.org/24/items/nicolasslonimskythesaurusofscalesandmelodicpatterns/Nicolas Slonimsky - Thesaurus OfScales And Melodic Patterns.pdf 

 

Quote

 

Page not found

We’re sorry, the page you have requested is not available.

 

:(

 

It was good to know they all struggled with intonation for a while. It was also pretty interesting that nearly all used roundwounds on at least one fretless...

Bakithi Kumalo was definitely the most interesting one to listen to.

EMG456 Rising Star

EMG456

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Agreed this was quite a good listen - thanks to the OP for the heads up.

The roundwounds thing was interesting to me as well but only in as much as every bass I have has roundwounds on - I changed from flats in the mid 70s and have never really understood the current fashion for flats again. My oldest fretless I've had since 78 and it has a laquered fingerboard which has been dressed a couple of times and eventually re done a few years back- as they all pretty much agreed, it's the sound that counts. Just deal with the wear as it comes up.

I'm sure they were recording this one but not sure if it will all be available to listen back or not.

Finally, as usual, all these luminaries came across as really good guys -friendly, helpful and approachable plus Nick Beggs was in the audience with us!

Great stuff.

dave moffat Grand Master

dave moffat

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Found it really worthwhile as much for their outlook/attitudes as anything else what a wonderful bunch of people. Agree the round/flat consensus took me a little by surprise.

My fingers are safe for now. Todays practice session will be to try and get my fretless to talk nicely to the amp. Failing that I'll be in the market for a new amp.

tauzero Grand Master

tauzero

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4 hours ago, bartelby said:

:(

It was good to know they all struggled with intonation for a while. It was also pretty interesting that nearly all used roundwounds on at least one fretless...

Bakithi Kumalo was definitely the most interesting one to listen to.

Not sure how I managed to break that URL, paul_5 has posted the correct version of it.

I think all the ones who mentioned acoustic bass said they used flats on them. I may get some flats for the acoustic bass I never use. Also, Steve Bailey made the point that none of them mentioned damage to fretboards as anything to do with their decision of which string to use.

If anyone tells me my playing is out, I'll just tell them it's village tuning.

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EMG456 Rising Star

EMG456

Posted
Posted
34 minutes ago, tauzero said:

Not sure how I managed to break that URL, paul_5 has posted the correct version of it.

I think all the ones who mentioned acoustic bass said they used flats on them. I may get some flats for the acoustic bass I never use. Also, Steve Bailey made the point that none of them mentioned damage to fretboards as anything to do with their decision of which string to use.

If anyone tells me my playing is out, I'll just tell them it's village tuning.

I popped it into the chat but I think it was Jaco who mentioned it at the time in some interview or another - you need to look at the fingerboard as just another consumable like strings, batteries etc. Most fingerboards have plenty of meat in them to be able to stand a few cycles of wear and re-flattening before they might need to be replaced.

I think a lot of folks panic because the wire wrap in roundwound strings marks the fingerboard very quickly but after that initial rush, they wear very slowly. New fretless learners also have a tendency to make it worse by applying sideways vibrato a-la guitar or fretted bass rather than lengthwise like violin, cello or double bass. This makes the scratching much worse and also more visible. You quickly learn!

+ 1 on the village tuning - Manring was in stitches!

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Hellzero Grand Master

Hellzero

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, EMG456 said:

New fretless learners also have a tendency to make it worse by applying sideways vibrato a-la guitar or fretted bass rather than lengthwise like violin, cello or double bass.

Not only new learners... That's why I now almost refuse anyone playing my fretless basses (mainly all my basses) : I'm fed up by this non sense crazy guitar vibrato bending on a fretless when all you have to do is just slightly and gently move your finger back and forth to get that fretless vibrato. I'm a fretless player for more than 3 decades and only had to do fingerboard dressing a very few times as I don't wear the fingerboard that much with roundwounds strings that I'm using since the first day, thanks to my left hand technique. And it was often on second hand basses...

And I don't need mandolin frets on a fretted bass to make it sound like a fretless (especially for @tauzero comment elsewhere :biggrin: ).

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