Wondering if anyone knows whether Epiphone ever made a fully carved bass. I've never heard of such a thing, but someone told me they saw one being worked on. The instrument in question apparently dates from around 1940.
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Mark Bryan
DB player in Billings, MT
There were 5 models of basses that Epiphone introduced in '41 (as a response to competitor Gibson's expanding instrument line): the B-1 through B-5. All were laminate.
In 1939 Gibson (a huge rival to Epiphone) introduced a family of violin instruments which included upright bass to which Epiphone only responded with an upright bass of their own. Epiphone introduced for the first time a line of five upright bass models in their January 1941 catalog of instruments. I have found examples of print advertisement from a 1940 Metronome magazine that shows the new Epiphone bass. These early print ads were before the complete B-1 through B-5 line up was established.
If there is an example of an Epiphone bass with a carved top I would like to know about it. To my knowledge there are no known examples of an Epiphone upright bass with a carved top.
I have seen one Kay five string bass that had a carved top but later came to find out the original top had been damaged and the owner paid to have the bass re-built with a custom carved top…very unusual, but I did see it with my own eyes. This bass is at Harry & Jennie West music store in Statesville, NC.
If you can confirm an Epiphone bass with a carved top exist let me know. I am interested in the oddities as well as the normal production basses.
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Tejano Bass - "Never pick a fight with an old Tejano! If he's too old to fight, he'll just shoot ya!" That's (Tay-hah'-no) . . . if you don't savvy Tex-Mex.
with carved top neither being factory original. Both of these project basses were restored with carved tops.
