Another pre am and amp question

[Frank Blank]

On 02/12/2024 at 14:32, Kmamac said:

I'm a new double bass player wanting to play jazz with fellow amateur musicians. What are my options for amplification for rehearsals and small gigs in say a pub. 

 

I play a fretless acoustic bass but had similar requirements as you. I try to get the fretless sounding as much like a double bass as possible.

 

On 02/12/2024 at 14:32, Kmamac said:

I have a j tone piezo electric pick up fitted and understand this has a very high impedance (mega ohm) and will need amplifying before a bass amp can do anything useful with its signal.

 

Both my fretted and fretless basses have piezo pickups so, again, I was in a very similar position to you.

 

On 02/12/2024 at 14:32, Kmamac said:

Looking at previous posts the Fishman platinum pro (£250+)  seems a popular option but does it have more than I need?

 

This depends on how much tone shaping you require. I have owned the Fishman Platinum Pro twice, it was lovely. The on-board compressor was particularly useful. If you want a cheap, reasonable pre then the Fishman PP is a good choice.

 

On 02/12/2024 at 14:32, Kmamac said:

I also read of the Fishman platinum stage EQ which seems to have less features but is about £160.

 

Noticeably inferior unit to the Fishman PP IMHO

 

On 02/12/2024 at 14:32, Kmamac said:

Am I right in saying that with any of the above I can now plug into any s/h bass amp and get something approaching an accurate sound?

All in (pre and amp) I don't really want to go over £400.

 

I used the Fishman with several types of amp and it was fine with all of them. Unfortunately I was trying to avoid the baked in 'colour' of the amps EQ. In the end I went for a QSC K12.2, an FRFR powered speaker cabinet which was perfect for me. The last trad amp I used before going FRFR was an AER Basic Performer. I've just seen one on reverb for £599, I know it's a bit above your budget but if you can find one and afford it, it's the perfect set up. Once I bought one I noticed loads of double bassists using them at small and large gigs.

 

Both the QSC and the AER coped with the piezo basses going straight in without a pre.

 

I would say the advantage of an FRFR powered speaker is that you don't need a pre. Playing a double bass through any amp will colour the sound so you never really know what the uncoloured sound of the bass really is. When I plugged my fretless acoustic into the QSC at the shop to try out I was blown away. The QSC has a 'bass amp' EQ preset but I just leave it on 'Default'. If I had to play just plugged into the QSC I'd be perfectly happy, in all honesty I just go through a Grace Design Felix because I'm a tart.

Edited December 4 by Frank Blank

[Beer of the Bass]

I had the J-Tone black rubber covered single wing pickup for several years, I'd say that as piezos go, it's one of the less fussy about running into ultra-high impedance. Straight into the 1Mohm input of a GK amp or most buffered tuner pedals was fine. Yes, an HPF, phase switch etc can help if you really need to push the volume and control any resulting feedback, but the pickup is fairly usable with most typical bass amps as-is.

[Burns-bass]

21 hours ago, NickA said:

I've played a double bass through MarkBass and PJB kit recently and frankly it's hard to get a fag paper between them.  Despite totally different tech (PJB has 4x 5" speakers and no tweeter . MB has 1x 12" and a tweeter) they both do the job really well.

 

My amp is a PJB flightcase (BG-150). Not very loud so plumbed into a PB300 powered cab for bigger gigs.  Both of them have PJB's (discontinued)  "neo-power" drivers which are very "HiFi" and a bit soft; nice for jazz on a DB but a bit short of thwack, thump and sparkle (to use tech terms!).

 

The MB combo is Martin Spencer's (our local Bass pro) and I think is a CMD 121P.  Bit bigger than my BG-150 but  louder and a bit brigher when all that "VLF VPF" nonsense is turned off.  He has a micro-mark I've used too; also OK but limited in controls and volume..

 

If you're buying new then I guess it's between the PJB BG-450 and the Markbass MB58R Mini 121; both of these have bigger amps than the internal drivers so can power a passive external cab..  I've not tried a DB through either, but I did try my fretless electric through a BG-400 in bass direct. BG400 and BG450 have PJB's newer (and heavier)  "piranha" drivers and sound a bit brigher than the neo-power PJB kit. 

 

As I say .. probably makes no odds which you go for.  I can vouch for the PJB stuff (if you can find one!) but the MB stuff also sounds good.  Here's Martin playing live through his Markbass 121:  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks for this. Looks like it will be the Mark Bass. 

[Kmamac]

Thank you to every one who contributed to my question. After your contributions I purchased a prodipe BL21 microphone and tried the ART preamp I found second hand. Fortunately I know a composer (not clued up on DB presamps though!) and after fiddling at his studio decided the ART was not so good with the mic. I then bit the bullet and purchased the Fishman platinum pro EQ . We recorded with his fancy thousand pound mic and compared it with the Prodipe. He was very impressed with how the prodipe picked up the double bass and felt it was not far off his stupidly expensive studio mic (clearly the Prodipe is only designed to work at the low end though) . I did need phantom power for the mic (which the Fishman does not provide) so purchased a cheap (Ish) Makie M48 phantom power supply (battery and separate plug in power supply).  We needed  a little bit of low cut with the HP filter and knocked off a little bit off the treble. Some compression was also used. Bottom line is I now have a great set up up to the pre amp stage. I'm holding off purchasing amplification for a couple of months but have found a place that stocks quite a few active speakers and is happy for me to plug in my setup and see which one does the best job. Thanks again for all your input.