playing with a 7 string guitarist

[uethanian]

i'm contemplating starting a band this upcoming summer, and i'm a little undecided how i want to string my bass. see, the instruments are microtonal, so however i fret it, thats how the tuning has to stay. i know the guitar has to be A D a d a' d' (the lowest A being a step down from a low B on a 7 string set). for bass, i essentially have the choice of D A d a (D a step down from low E) or A D a d (A a step down from low B).

sorry if that seems a bit confusing. really the question is, when playing with a 7 string guitarist, is it better to string the bass EADG or BEAD? i'm a bit worried about the guitar getting into the bassist's territory.

[Lokire]

Depends on the songs you'll be playing I guess. Maybe tuning to drop D (DADG) would be good, since then you've got the open D and open A, like the guitarist has. I'm guessing you'd be playing a lot of songs in those two keys

The low A your guitarist tunes to would be the same pitch as your standard open A. That would make for some pretty thick sounds. Maybe he can play the basslines and you can play up an octave

[crazyguy832]

imo, if you can swing it, go ADAD. Really, try both tunings out. I play with two different guitarists at the moment; for one I tuned DGCFBb, for the other I tune AEADG, both with standard guage strings (top 5 of a 6 string set).

Yeah, when you tune down 3.5 steps on a string, it gets REALLY loose, but if you have a half-decent bass and your strings aren't dead, you can at least try it out.

Also, guitar doesn't have to be ADada'd' (that doesn't make total sense, to be honest... that's kinda weird). Standard 7-string tuning is BEADGBe. Standard Drop-A tuning is AEADGBe.

[uethanian]

i meant using a BEAD set to tune down to ADad. if you saw the fret layout, you'd see that its necessary to tune ADada'd'. dont really like it, but i'm not gonna be the one playing guitar.

its kind of a dilemma...cause it would be really cool to have a similar range in the bass and guitar to have a sort of counterpoint going...but on the other hand i think it would be hard to distinguish between the two instruments. i have some thinking to do i guess.

[JAUQO III-X]

The guitarist that plays with me in my trio plays a 9 string guitar and when I'm not playing my sub contra bass(Low C# F# B E)I'm playing a standard tuned 4, 5 or 6 string bass.

You just have to use your imagination.

[uethanian]

yea having a 5 or 6 string bass would be nice for this, not for playability but just for range. i've been looking around at SX stuff. anyone know where that $129.99 6 string went to? for the time being tho i think i'll revamp the bass i have (squire affinity p).

[JehuJava]

For the record, I love the guitar tuned DADGAD! I kept standard tuning when my guitarist used DADGAD...it makes it a little tough when looking at the guitarists fingerings though.

Alan

[knuckle_head]

FWIW - Meshuggah has their bassist tuned in unison at F. That is where their 8 string guitarists tune and they muddle through quite nicely.

Personally I like the octave down relationship, but it isn't necessary.

[uethanian]

Originally Posted by Lokire

The low A your guitarist tunes to would be the same pitch as your standard open A. That would make for some pretty thick sounds. Maybe he can play the basslines and you can play up an octave

wait...someone clear this up for me. i thought that the fundamental of whatever you play on bass is an octave lower than what you read on the page...so wouldn't a standard A on bass be an octave lower than a low A on guitar? its hard to believe otherwise, considering that the 7th string on a guitar is nowhere near the size of a bass guitar A, and that a guitar has a shorter scale length.

[crazyguy832]

Guitar is exactly the same: what you play is an octave lower than what is written.

The 2nd E on a standard 4-stringer (2nd fret of the "D" string) is the exact same as the guitarist's low E.

Timber and overtones still make the bass sound deeper, however, the fundamental is the same.

(I think...? may be wrong, but I think I'm right)

Just to add my two cents to what's been said, when I've played bass with some low tuned guitarists, they couldn't quit whining about my lack of a low string. When I play 7 string guitar with a bassist, I actually prefer when the bassist plays in standard. Each situation will be different, as has been said.

[Lokire]

Originally Posted by uethanian

wait...someone clear this up for me. i thought that the fundamental of whatever you play on bass is an octave lower than what you read on the page...so wouldn't a standard A on bass be an octave lower than a low A on guitar? its hard to believe otherwise, considering that the 7th string on a guitar is nowhere near the size of a bass guitar A, and that a guitar has a shorter scale length.

The standard bass EADG strings are an octave lower than the standard EADG(be) guitar strings. But your guitarist tunes his 7-string starting on a low A, so his low A would be an octave lower than the standard guitar (e)A(dgbe). So his low A is the same as your standard open A on a bass.

Did that make any sense?

[JustOpenYourMind]

Originally Posted by uethanian

i'm contemplating starting a band this upcoming summer, and i'm a little undecided how i want to string my bass. see, the instruments are microtonal, so however i fret it, thats how the tuning has to stay. i know the guitar has to be A D a d a' d' (the lowest A being a step down from a low B on a 7 string set). for bass, i essentially have the choice of D A d a (D a step down from low E) or A D a d (A a step down from low B).

sorry if that seems a bit confusing. really the question is, when playing with a 7 string guitarist, is it better to string the bass EADG or BEAD? i'm a bit worried about the guitar getting into the bassist's territory.

Well, I think that your going to have a big problem, if he plays a microtonal guitar and you play a squire P-bass or any other regularly fretted bass for that matter, you won't be able to play all the notes he plays, unless he stays within the standard western notes, in that case, I don't understand why he would play a microtonal instrument.

Sorry if you already know that, but a microtonal guitar means that he has notes in between the notes you normally have on a standard guitar or bass, if he plays those notes you won,t be able to play anything that harmonizes with him. So, you will need to use a fretless bass or a bass with a microtonal fretting.

Edit:

Sorry If your Squire is already defretted but you didn't mention it in your posts.

[Illbay]

Originally Posted by uethanian

i'm contemplating starting a band this upcoming summer, and i'm a little undecided how i want to string my bass. see, the instruments are microtonal, so however i fret it, thats how the tuning has to stay. i know the guitar has to be A D a d a' d' (the lowest A being a step down from a low B on a 7 string set). for bass, i essentially have the choice of D A d a (D a step down from low E) or A D a d (A a step down from low B).

sorry if that seems a bit confusing. really the question is, when playing with a 7 string guitarist, is it better to string the bass EADG or BEAD? i'm a bit worried about the guitar getting into the bassist's territory.

As soon as the guitarist plays in the lowest octave of his instrument, he's already "in your territory." There's ONLY one octave in the bass that is "proprietary," out of a total range of, what, three octaves?

[Mayers]

The low E of a guitar is the same note as the E on the 12th fret on E string of a bass on paper. But in reallity you are much lower.

So I don,t see the problem , the guitar won't eat your frequencies.

[Illbay]

Originally Posted by Mayers

The low E of a guitar is the same note as the E on the 12th fret on E string of a bass on paper. But in reallity you are much lower.

Need that one explained to me. (N.B. the open-E on the guitar is ALSO the same note as the second fret of the D-string on the bass. One little octave ain't really all that much.

Maybe by "in reality you are much lower" has to do with characteristic frequencies, I dunno. That one went *whoosh* right over my head.

[crazyguy832]

It's the same note, the tonality and overtones are different, however, which still makes our note seem lower, even if it's technically the same.

[uethanian]

Originally Posted by JustOpenYourMind

Well, I think that your going to have a big problem, if he plays a microtonal guitar and you play a squire P-bass or any other regularly fretted bass for that matter, you won't be able to play all the notes he plays, unless he stays within the standard western notes, in that case, I don't understand why he would play a microtonal instrument.

Sorry if you already know that, but a microtonal guitar means that he has notes in between the notes you normally have on a standard guitar or bass, if he plays those notes you won,t be able to play anything that harmonizes with him. So, you will need to use a fretless bass or a bass with a microtonal fretting.

Edit:

Sorry If your Squire is already defretted but you didn't mention it in your posts.

yea my squire is refretted, although i'm going to redo it eventually (add a few more notes). the guitar and bass will both be tuned to D's and A's and will have an equivalent fret layout.

but aside from that.

it REALLY does not make sense. look at a low B guitar string, and then an A bass string...the bass string has significantly more mass than the guitar string, yet supposedly they sound the same pitch?

but in terms of mathematics, it works out. a bass low E is 41 hertz and a guitar low E is 82. so an octave apart.

so really, i guess i better tune to that low A on bass, just to preserve the octave gap between the two instruments. that being said, i dont expect that the guitarist will physically be able to play chords across all strings (bar chords are a no no) so the sound wont get too thick.

[Illbay]

Originally Posted by uethanian

...the guitar and bass will both be tuned to D's and A's and will have an equivalent fret layout.
..

[uethanian]

haha

hey same thing follows in the 12ET world. bass and guitar are definitely related...just in a hillbilly cousin kind of way.