I've been playing since about 1970-'71.

Main bass is a '69 Fender Jazz I traded for when I started playing.
Beater bass is a '78 Fender Jazz I bought and refurb'ed in '84.

Play blues, rock, honkytonk, Gospel, and jazz.

I guess it's just something I'll do until I take my last breath.



'69


'78


playing thru the Tweed Faux Ten stack

__________________
Professional Trainer

I'm a beginner at bass. Took a few lessons...now just play for my own enjoyment, when I have time. I have a Mexi Fender Jazz and a Squier P-Bass "Special" Standard. The Squier has P and J pickups and a thin neck like the Fender Jazz. My goal is to someday be good enough to play with other people.

__________________
'Merica!

I've played since about '70 myself. Traveled for awhile & then marriage put a damper on that. I haven't played in some time because of illness, but now that I can use my left arm somewhat I've been trying to remember some stuff. It's hard because I still remember what I used to be able to do so easily & it's do difficult to do now. Oh well. Here's a pic of two of my workhorses, both Carvin. The red one is fretless. They are both six strings.

__________________
Lounge Lizard Extraordinaire

Nice Jazz basses, Doc. I'm actually a guitarist, since around 1975 ... lead, and fingerpicker, but I do play some bass also. A few years back I decided to pick up a decent bass, for writing or recording purposes when needed. I think most guitar players have a bass hiding under the bed somewhere, even though many just pluck root notes with a pick. I did take the time to learn some proper techniques ... some slap, and some finger plucking techniques.

This is my aluminum necked 1978 Kramer DMZ-5000. It sounds and plays great. It has low end and sustain forever, and I love the look of the stacked walnut & maple that the body consists of.

JT

[IMG][/IMG]

I kept looking at the title of this thread (never opened it) and thought, "How would one play a fish?", the musical instrument angle never crossed my mind. Funny how one gets an idea in their head and never thinks of the alternatives.

__________________
Minimize the variables

I've been playing electric bass since 1988. I've never toured or played professionally, but I do play every weekend. I've owned several instruments over the years, but currently own a Rickenbacker, a Carvin BB75 and this one:


I made it myself and really like it.

__________________
Freedom isn't free.

Ted Williams keeps watch.

__________________
Professional Trainer

I just got one for Father's Day, so obviously I'm not even a beginner yet. So far I've been noodling along with some songs I know, just to get a feel for it. I got my brother's Gibson Ripper when he passed away several years ago, but never really warmed up to it, it's HUGE. But my son found a good deal on a new Ibanez Mikro, and I absolutely LOVE it.

Anyone have any recommendations on good tutorials for beginners? I wanna learn how to play this cute little thing!

I'm a guitar player/collector but can fake thru playing bass (you know, as long as everyone is drunk or otherwise not paying attention).

I've had some nice basses over the years. Notably...

A '63 pre-CBS "P" bass in Shoreline Gold with the painted headstock and original brown tolex case. Traded it for a '65 "natural" Gibson ES 175 and a '59 Gretsch Cadillac Green Double Anniversary. All were in VG condition.

I bought a early '60's Hofner Bass (a correct Beatle bass according to my vintage guitar geek) at GC a few years ago and was followed out to the parking by a guy who gave me $420 more than I paid for it 15 minutes earlier! Couldn't accurately date it because they were imported without a serial # and it was before the US distributor added them here.

I had a '73 Ricky 4001 that I bought in HS. I recently sold it to buddy "who just hadda have it". He does it justice so I'm good with it.

Now I have a 4003 Rickenbacker, a short-scale Fender acoustic and an American Std. P bass (all pretty recent).

Attached Images

DSC_8510.JPG (195.9 KB, 10 views)

__________________
paws for friendship

Congrats!
To get groove and feel, start with Willie Dixon on THIS particular album.
Buy it/download it and ingrain these basic, repetitive patterns deep in your brain. Regardless of what genre you ultimately want to play, Jimmy Reeds blues grooves will give you a SOLID foundation (and they're easy to learn...the FEELING of them is not so easy, but it's essential).

Good luck and have fun!
Jimmy Reed at Carnegie Hall - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

__________________
Professional Trainer

No worries: I knew that it was probably about guitars, but decided to say that I've played some bass, but far prefer to "play" trout. They taste better, too.

Seriously, to "play" the fish is an angling term referring to the art of managing the fish in the water and bringing it to net or gaff. Unless you catch, "River Monsters". Sometimes, those fish seem to be playing poor Jeremy Wade.

Playing bass is one hobby that I dropped after college. I regret it to this day. Someday I will get back into it and try to catch up. I always just played for the personal entertainment of it.

__________________
SWCA 1646

I've been playing bass since the early 90's. I started on '76 Musicman Stingray but these days it's just too heavy. Right now my main bass is '65 Jazz Bass that has the best neck I've played. I had a Precision Bass that had a '65 neck on an early '70's body in my favorite Fender custom color, sea foam green. Unfortunately it was stolen when my house was broken into last year. Since I can't afford a vintage Fender I'm looking at Bill Nash P-basses as a replacement.

And speaking of vintage Fender basses, I was in a local guitar shop in Conyers, GA and he has a near mint '66 P-bass hanging on the wall. Both covers and not a scratch on it. As close to brand new as I've ever seen. I think it even has the original strap and cable that came with it. $6499 if anyone is interested.

And papajohn, regarding learning to play bass I always give these same suggestions to new players:

1. hand and finger position is very important....it'll seem awkward and hurt at first, but it sure makes things a LOT easier later

2. learn your scales....it's the drudge work of learning how to play, but if you master major and minor scales...the rest will fall into place

3. Finally, play along with the music you like, but start SIMPLE. With your fingers positioned correctly and with some scale knowledge, you'll be jamming along in no time.

Enjoy the journey!

__________________
Professional Trainer

started in high school with an old aria violin bass,then stopped for about 25 years(life got in the way)then got a good deal on a rickenbacker 4001,tried to pick what i had learned and did make some progress,then had to sell it,fast forward 11 years and now i have a mex fender jazz

I started in high school but didn't stick with it, which I regret. Such a cool instrument. I took up the bagpipes though about 7 years ago, which is cool. When I get back to a normal sized town, maybe I can take it up.

__________________
Cheers, Charles
SWCA #2442

Nothing fancy here. Just my old standby...my Fender Precision Bass. Great bass, great balance, and the traditional bass sound.

__________________
Pack light and cinch tight.

Nothing fancy, but it was good enough for James Jamerson and Duck Dunn!

__________________
Professional Trainer

Yup! Like I said, the ol' standby.

__________________
Pack light and cinch tight.

Not a guitar player, but I started out on piano, switched to alto saxophone in the school band. A several years ago I got interested again, got it out and started practicing. Switched to tenor sax, played that a while. It's been a couple years since I really practiced it much. I ought to start back up again.

__________________
Common sense isn't so common.

Anybody got samples on Youtube?

My dad was a music teacher, grew up with it. Now (solos), Rock Pentatonic, Dorian Mode and Diminished 1/2 step up.

I'm both a guitarist and a bass player. I'm playing a 1996 Gretsch Eldorado 18 inch archtop made by the Heritage Company. I also play a 1939 D'Angelico Excel. My basses are a 1960 Fender Jazz Bass Reissue and an original 1965 Hofner violin bass. I generally play traditional jazz.

__________________
S&W Model 15-3

This is the some of the best advice ever given on ANY instrument.

Now, on number 2...once you do them going tonic to tonic, move to extended range, and then when you master THAT in all majors and at least harmonic minor...then go through the scale patterns that take you through ALL the modes associated with each particular key signature.

A musician who can't read notation fluently and knows at least the majors and harmonic minor scales...is like an architect who can't read a blueprint. Or an illiterate novelist.

ENJOY playing. I'm not a bassist...I'm a WW player. Strings are my nemesis. I spent some time with a cannonball soprano this morning, and yesterday holed up with an oboe. Tomorrow who knows.

__________________
Soli Deo Gloria

Howdy,
Here is a buddy I have not seen for a while. We keep in touch via e-mail.
I always kid him with the old joke "How do you get a bass player off your front porch?" You pay him for the pizza.
Steve is good company. He is a past Masters Sportsman class winner and all around talented shooter too.

Depends on one's goals and genre.

I guess I'm an illiterate novelist because I can't read notation but can play "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed" and "Hot Lanta" in my sleep.

__________________
Professional Trainer

My boy is a pretty good guitarist and has promised to make up some charts for me so I can learn my scales. Many thanks for all the good advice on how to learn. I hope to learn to finally read music as well, something I've been putting off for 40+ years. As for Hot 'Lanta and IMOER, those are two of my favorites! Maybe someday........

My band's page

Not a bass player here; guitar, keys, sax, percussion, vocals and sound engineer.

Main guitar is a Dean Razorback Transblack #56 of 100. A dream machine - best action of any guitar I have played. And that's an acoustic bass on the left for tinkering.

Attached Images

Razorback56of100.jpg (59.9 KB, 410 views)

How can you play a bass if you can't tuna fish?


I'm sorry. Sometimes I can't help myself.

It's always a good thing to learn to read music, but this is arrogant snobery:
Jimmi Hendrix never learned to read music. Some thought he was a decent guitarist.

__________________
Freedom isn't free.

I get your points...but holy cow...imagine how much more could have been there on top of the natural talent (or deal with the devil, if you believe the legends and lore) had they dedicated some time to at least a little formal study is what I wonder. It was a broad generality is what it was. Savants, even idiot savants (that's the actual real term), are anomalies to that generality. Most of us have about the same amount of talent, myself included, and have to work hard just to attain mediocrity (myself included)

I don't think it's arrogant snobbery--it is not intended that way. No one espouses musical pluralism like I do...the more I know, the more different things I like. On the contrary...I have found that those who don't know more than one arena, no matter how good in that one niche, are the ones who are prone to close themselves off to other musical experiences. (again, a generality as I know not everyone is like this, this is a forum especially of open minded individual) snobbery has no place in what I do and why I do it.

I have thought long on this and maybe it will be my next research project...maybe a dissertation...is it fear or insecurity on their parts or is it like that linguistic barriers that sets in if you don't learn another language by about 9 or so...is there something similar in music? Or what could it be? These things that keep me up at night! LOL

I'm not discounting a strong ear, or oral or aural traditions...I'd love a stronger ear...but...if a contractor can't read the plans, he's not working on my house. Somebody has to write those things in the oral traditions down. So much of music is lost from ages back because no one could write it down...so, so much lost.

__________________
Soli Deo Gloria

can't read music

Carlos Santana Presents Blues At Montreux Clarence Gatemouth Brown 2004 - YouTube

drivin' Gate's Coupe de Ville

__________________
Professional Trainer

Cap, I didn't take your observations the way some did, apparently. As a former musician, I was asked many times the question "do you sight read?". A lot of times it mattered enough that if you couldn't read music, the job went to someone else. I didn't start out to be a studio musician;at first, I was just having fun. Later on, when I was proficient on the bass and I was being asked to do studio work, the fact that I didn't sight read cost me a lot of work. I always had "big ears" as the saying goes, & sometimes that was enough to get me by. I still can't help but wonder, though, what I might have accomplished if I had learned to sight read.

__________________
Lounge Lizard Extraordinaire

That is EXACTLY what I am getting at.

__________________
Soli Deo Gloria

I've been a gigging bassist for 36 years.

Edited to add: Didn't realize this was my first post, Hi ya'll!

To the OP: I did not mean to get your thread hijacked....very sorry.

I admire anybody who can play stuff with strings. Stringed instruments were the time I was banned from practicing at home.

__________________
Soli Deo Gloria

You guys are WAY ahead of me. I picked up a Mexican P-bass last year as an experiment. I'm trying to get some music into my life in retirement, and I thought the bass might be simpler to get good on than some of the other instruments I acquired (Gretsch six string, Yamaha piano, a couple of decent Fender amps). So far I'm still awful, but at least now I am awful in innovative rather than pedestrian ways.

Hope springs eternal.

__________________
David Wilson

I took music theory in high school and though I can't sight read it's served me well. Most of my friends don't know what I've forgotten. Yet they have more time for jamming. Sometimes I'm pretty good at sorting things out for them.

Now, If anyone has a cure for busted up arthritic hands please tell me what to do. Plus (and you bass players have to know) A good axe gets heavy after a while. (mucked up cervical #7)

__________________
Dum vivo cano

That's one of the reasons I like my Carvin basses so much;the lack of weight. I have considered though that if I ever do start playing again, I'll have a bar stool on stage so I don't have to stand all the time.

__________________
Lounge Lizard Extraordinaire

This guy, Trip Wamsley, is a friend of mine and a world class bassist.

He does things on bass that I never imagined possible.

Check this out: (hang with him to about 3:20 then hold onto your hat!)
Kossuth House Concert- Trip Wamsley 01.27.07 - YouTube

and on his custom, Alembic eight string "Ocean Blue"
Trip Wamsley - Huevos Con Dios excerpt - YouTube

It's kind of like if Les Claypool found Jesus.

__________________
Professional Trainer

Look, just like anything else, more knowledge is better. Being able to sight read definitely gives any musician a leg up. However, it's obviously doesn't make a musician useless if they don't and that's what you said.

__________________
Freedom isn't free.

Wow! That's impressive, to say the least. I think he dug Jaco quite a bit(as did I!)from the way he phrases. Is he using an Eventide Harmonizer to do the loops he plays over? And that eight string? That really blows my mind. Do you happen to know how he tunes it?

__________________
Lounge Lizard Extraordinaire

One string at a time!

__________________
paws for friendship

Throughout my 45 years of playing, I've heard a bunch of guys who've said, "I don't (meaning "can't) read because it would affect my playing."

If he/she was a jerk about it, I'd answer, "Yeah, that's why I never learned to read English. Didn't want it to affect my speaking."

That is what you interpreted. But most others here understood what I mean....It limits them.


Also...the "Les CLaypool finding Jesus" remark was fantastic. It totally made my day!

__________________
Soli Deo Gloria

Been playing since the 70's. Done everything except national touring over those years. I play 5 string, fretted & fretless basses made by Chris Benavente (Benavente Guitars & Basses). Play a lot of contemporary Christian today and I fill in with local cover bands, teach some and enjoy all kinds of music!

For some great online learning, check out Paul Wolfe (First Bass And Beyond) or Norm Stockton's series "The Art of Groove" (Norm Stockton | Bass Player, Instructor, Solo Artist).

This is a song from the last show I did with a local cover band: Whiskey Fingers - Crazy Little Thing - YouTube

I am not kidding you....during his solo shows he tunes his basses to several different tunings, even the 8 string.
He might used a half dozen different tunings.

Trip is, indeed, a trip!

__________________
Professional Trainer

Trip is indeed awesome. I'd love to attend one of his performances.

Jaco's influence was absolutely profound but the evolution of bass is still on-going. There is so much happening in the realm of bass and many amazing players. Anthony Jackson and Michael Manring are early pioneers of "extended-range bass" who have been pushing the bounderies for a long time. Jean Baudin, Jeff Schmit, Yves Carbonne to name a just few others that are redefining the role and scope of the instrument in that context.

Bass is an amazingly versatile instrument that can range from it's concise, traditional role to "sky's-the-limit" experimentation. Like any instrument it is limited only by the mind of the player.

Trip and Michael Manring are good bud's and do shows together.

Trip lives in Lake Charles, La., and when I needed help setting up my system, he drove over, set up his state-of-the-art system and showed me how to get mine as close as it was gonna get.

Another friend built this "Faux Ten Tweed Stack". It's more of a state monitor than anything. Great tone, but it won't get loud and push a lot of air.

When I need big boom, I just run from the line out of the RBI Tech21 and into the house system.



Highs and mids thru the top cab, lows through the bottom. Neo 15's in both.

__________________
Professional Trainer

Trip is a trip! Nice looking cab! I bet it sounds good.

We had a clinic a number of years ago at Guitar-X in Denver, and lots of the extended range players came and played. I tried playing a fretless 8 string and just got a bit lost!! I used to play a MTD 635 6 string, but my rheumatoid arthritis has limited my playing to just 5 strings, and I'm OK with that. At the end of the day, they're all just tools for us to make some music, drive some rhythm and 'say something' musically.

That reminds me: I've got a Tara Labs RSC Prime 500 speaker cable that I need to unload. It's about 5', speakon on both ends. PM me if anyone's interested.

Doc, that's a nice looking rig, & since you posted pics of yours, I decided to follow suit. First, my rack:



At the top is a Furmen Power conditioner. It has these cool little lights on tubes that slide out & come in real handy on a dark stage. Next is an Alembic pre-amp that I've been playing through for twenty five years or so. A Korg tuner is under that, then a Loft Flanger/Delay Line. Two Furmen semi parametric equalizers are next, then a Furmen stereo crossover, & finally the Crown power amp.

My top cabinet is a Carvin 410 which contains...four ten inch speakers. What a surprise, right? It also has a piezo tweeter on a passive crossover.



The bottom end is handled by a Carvin 118 cabinet.



It's been a good rig over the years.

__________________
Lounge Lizard Extraordinaire