Base player...

[Lowner]

My friend's son who is a bass player told me this story. He made several bass T-shirts in a class he took in high school. One of then says "Bass God" on it and has a bass clef. he went out someplace with wearing the shirt. Some one said to him.." Oh so your are quite a fisherman." And he said to this lady " what I dont fish?" " Well your shirt says you fish." No. No I play bass guitar. In this case, B-a-s-s is prounounced bass." Why dont they spell it b-a-s-e then? " the lady gave him a strange look and said b-a-s-s is a fish to me not a kind of guitar. I would not wear that shirt anymore unless you want everyone to think you are a fisherman."

I laughed. But then this story is kind of sad that there are some people who do not even know what a bass guitar is or how to pronounce the word. Like Metallica says..Its Sad but True.

 

[txbasschik]

My friend's son who is a bass player told me this story. He made several bass T-shirts in a class he took in high school. One of then says "Bass God" on it and has a bass clef. he went out someplace with wearing the shirt. Some one said to him.." Oh so your are quite a fisherman." And he said to this lady " what I dont fish?" " Well your shirt says you fish." No. No I play bass guitar. In this case, B-a-s-s is prounounced bass." Why dont they spell it b-a-s-e then? " the lady gave him a strange look and said b-a-s-s is a fish to me not a kind of guitar. I would not wear that shirt anymore unless you want everyone to think you are a fisherman."

I laughed. But then this story is kind of sad that there are some people who do not even know what a bass guitar is or how to pronounce the word. Like Metallica says..Its Sad but True.

Some people are just so ignorant, I often wonder how they are able to function in daily life.

She needs to go back to school!

Cherie...Base players don't often catch flies.

 

[superbassman2000]

lol
not many people know what a bass guitar is, other than the really big guitar with only 4 strings

 

[DougP]

my reply would have been along the lines of "I'm also a librarian and i spell fish F-I-C-H-E."

 

[Sonic_Death]

I would never call a person ignorant because they do not know what bass guitar is. I mean look where we are, this is a bass forum. Of course we are all great enthusiasts of it, but I don't expect some people to know what bass guitar is, and I do not blame them. For whatever reason, maybe they just don't listen to music much. I do feel they are greatly missing out but, it's their choice not to indulge or this great part of life.

 

[Introvox]

Interestingly...the old Lakland Bass Ads in Bass Guitar Mag used the catch phrase "Every great rhythm deserves a Bassline"

They went as far as putting the line above the "a" (in bassline)

Like this
_
a

This forces the "a" to use it's "AY" sound

Oddly enough I also teach Piano so I use the word Bass everyday...and it's surprising how many people don't even realize their "Stereo" has a Bass and Treble knob...

go figure

 

[tZer]

My coworker popped by the desk the other day and out of the blue asked, "So, are you a fisherman?"

I was puzzled until I realized that my email inbox was open and there were a lot of 'Talkbass' messages there...

I just looked at him and said, "No". He walked away confused.

 

[vinny]

I'm a bass player & bass fisherman. On all other boards beside this'un my namy is vinnybass...I still gotta think which board I'm on to pronounce it correctly. I'm thinking of a GOT BASS? sticker for my truck with a clef at one end & a largemouth at the other. That'll get'em thinking. Any other bass fishers on here?

 

[Incognitus]

My girlfriend one made the mistake of mispronouncing bass. I reminded her that I don't play a fish. She's never made that mistake again.

 

[DubDubs]

Interestingly...the old Lakland Bass Ads in Bass Guitar Mag used the catch phrase "Every great rhythm deserves a Bassline"

They went as far as putting the line above the "a" (in bassline)

Like this
_
a

The macron (line) in the ad was probably an allusion to their logo, which uses it above the first a in Lākland. I doubt they put it there to educate the readers of their ads who are most likely already bass players on how to say the name of their instrument. But it also seems likely that they use it in their name in the first place so people pronounce it "lake-land" not "lack-land".

 

[Kelly Lee]

I would never call a person ignorant because they do not know what bass guitar is.

Sorry, but that is the definition of ignorance. If someone does not know what something is, they are ignorant about it.

Now the story about the lady above is totally different. She is stupid. Why? She was informed of the difference yet buried her head in symbolic sand being either not capable or just refusing to accept the knowledge. Yep, not ignorant. Just stupid!

 

[s.m.80808]

Search engines are ignorant too then because they can't differentiate bass and bass.

How many people on this forum don't know a half diminished chord from a fully diminished chord? They must be stupid too, right?

 

[lemur821]

Search engines are ignorant too then because they can't differentiate bass and bass.

How many people on this forum don't know a half diminished chord from a fully diminished chord? They must be stupid too, right?

Search engines are ignorant. They don't know the difference, therefore they are ignorant. That's what the word means.

If you explain the difference between those chords to someone and they understand it but tell you not to talk about them anyway because the difference is too confusing, then yes, they're pretty dumb.

 

[babs1234]

lol, how dumb can people get

 

[Skeletomania]

There's a difference between ignorant and people that truly doesn't know the difference. People are only ignorant if they choose not to care. In honesty not many people know the difference between bass and guitar. For me, the easiest way to explain bass guitar to someone is to show him a double bass, and tell them the bass guitar is a derivative from double bass.

 

[Diggler]

Without context, i.e. the bass clef on the OP's shirt, bass (as in fish) would be the assumed pronunciation of the word for me, based on phonetics. However, if there's a musical discussion going on, it's obvious what the word should be.

 

[s.m.80808]

Search engines are ignorant. They don't know the difference, therefore they are ignorant. That's what the word means.

If you explain the difference between those chords to someone and they understand it but tell you not to talk about them anyway because the difference is too confusing, then yes, they're pretty dumb.

Right...

Isn't that kind of a judgemental position to take about something that is kind of trivial?

 

[Geoff St. Germaine]

A few people I know who grew up in other countries pronounce the bass in bass guitar like the fish, with a short a sound. I think that it should be pronounced that way. As far as languages go I find English to be irritating with it's lack of hard rules.

 

[morf]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but if anything, shouldn't english natives pronounce bass "bayss"? The letter "a" in english is pronounced "ay" (like in yay, or hay) so you would think more people would mistake the fish for the bass, and not the bass for the fish...

 

[s.m.80808]

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but if anything, shouldn't english natives pronounce bass "bayss"? The letter "a" in english is pronounced "ay" (like in yay, or hay) so you would think more people would mistake the fish for the bass, and not the bass for the fish...

OK, you're wrong.

I can see your point. English is a confusing language.