would never be able to play a 5 string and when they did it was perfect and everything just fall into place? i love it...i didn't think i would but wow!! now i want a six...a cirrus..or a grind how are the grinds? thanks steve
i pretty much had the same experience, till i switched back to the 4 for a gig. my world got a little topsy turvy and i had axe the 5. too much thinking for me. i'm a purist when it comes to this stuff though. anything jt can do on 32 strings, i can do on 4. just like the way that sounds, however untrue it is.
Yep. I bought a five back in the late 80's, had a Warwick like baseball bat neck, that was also really wide. Had a small body, and tremendous neck dive. Worse than a Thumb. It nearly ruined my left hand. I got to the point where I was in pain pretty much all the time from playing it. Finally sold it to a pawn shop. I decided that I was a four stringer, and always would be. Fast forward 6 years, Guitar Center had a Ibanez 6 for $699, which was an unheard of price for any six in those days. Pulled it off the wall, played it, and fell in love. It was so comfortable! Bought it and gigged with it the same week! Anybody can play a five, six or whatever. You just have to find the right one. I now play 4, 5, 6 and 12 stringers.
I never really understood it, steve. I've offered my fivers to very proficient 4-stringers who said, "Oh no, I just don't think I'd know how." Maybe I just have tunnel-vision because I've been playing for so long, I just see the extra strings as offering 5-note choices you didn't have before. The key, for me anyway, has been knowing how to use the B string sparingly for max emotional impact. I think those intimidated by the "extra" strings are looking at the instrument as an entirely "new" instrument instead of looking at it as just the traditional 4-stringer with a very few additional possibilities. Actually, I think more strings can allow one more freedom of expresssion. Then again, a 4-string is only "confining" if the player doesn't have imagination.
I wanna go to a 5 but I dont know if I'd like it much since I havent yet found a 5 with comfortable string spacing (Washburns are too tight, as was the OLP 5er I tried.) are 6es generally better or worse when it comes to string spacing?
You might try a Lakland Skyline. I can slap my 55-02 silly.....and I don't consider myself a very good slapper compared to the competition at all.
The number of strings on an instrument never really gave me problems. Far more important to me is the feel of the neck. I've played some 6-strings that felt more comfortable to me than some 4-strings. (I don't like chunky baseball-bat-like necks.)
