Ya, I saw him on SNL, and he's cool, writes some good basslines, but I couldn't tell if he was plucking with his thumb or if he using a pick. I myself do not use a pick cuz I don't think a bass is meant to be played that way, but if your good at it, by all means use a pick.

Sting's been using a modified classical guitar right hand technique for a while. It was mentioned in Bass Player magazine when he had the cover story. It seems to be a right-hand plucking tecnique without the right palm muting.
I saw Sting use a pick live in the 80's during his Police days.

oops! I meant"right thumb plucking technique w/o the palm mute"!

Sting used a pick in the Police days. There's no way he could have produced lines like the one on "Shadows in the Rain" or "Driven to Tears" with his fingers--the attack is all wrong.

Yeah. In his Police days he did use a pick a lot. But now he mostly uses his thumb like Tony said. Very smart bassist I must add.

sting's major bass is his vintage telecaster style bass. Tony476 is right, ESPECIALLY WITH HIS BABY, his uses the classical right thump style. in his recent year i have seen him occasionaly pull a pick out but that was always on a different bass.

I like Sting a lot, unfortunately I haven't had to time to buy one of his albums, but I will. I am getting a bit tired of the Desert Rose song though, it's on like VH1 and the radio ALL the time.......

hmmmm...I wonder how Sting held up in that chess game against Garry Kasparov??? but, yeah...he's come around....he no longer uses a plectrum....a strange right hand technique he's adopted, I must say though...

I just found the 4 disc Police collection cd set at a pawnshop last week for $20. Sweet.

I saw that SNL performance. He used nothing BUT his thumb. He was using all four strings, walking with his thumb.

-MCE

If you listen to the "Message in a Box" Police compilation, you'll hear him play with a pick a lot on the earlier material. "Dead End Job" and "Masoko Tanga" have some nifty plectrum work by Sting.

McCartney uses a pick don't he?

Originally posted by in_exile
I saw that SNL performance. He used nothing BUT his thumb. He was using all four strings, walking with his thumb.

-MCE
That is the way that Monk Montgomery used to play.If you don't know who he is,He was one of the very first guys who actually performed with a fender bass in 1951. he is also Wes Montgomery's brother, a guitar player who also played with his thumb.

Wasn't the electric bass intended to be played with your thumb? Isn't that why Fender put those worthless finger rests underneath the g string on old p and j basses?