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Double Bass Bass repair book?

#21
I'm no luthier, just a player.I had the pleasure of meeting Mr Traeger and having him work on my bass.He told me about his book project and that it's taking him much longer than he expected.I just wanted to say I hope his book is affordable cause he sure knws his stuff!The man's a bass treasure,I could listen to him reminisce forever.
 
#25
Originally posted by wellspal
So how much is pricey? Tens, Hundreds, Thousands? Could you guys give us uninformed any more backround on Mr. Traeger? Gossip if you must!
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It would be pure speculation on how much the upcoming Charles Traeger book will cost. Since it will be a limited edition, I would guess that it will probably be in the same price range as the Hans Weishaar book. That book goes for about $300.00.

Up until his retirement in the 1980's, Charles Traeger owned and operated one of the premier bass shops in the country. It was located in Manhattan. His list of clients was the who's who of the bass world. David Gage learned the trade while working at the Traeger shop. When Traeger retired, he sold the shop to Bill Merchant, who still operates a shop in New York. Mr. Traeger was a founding member of the Catgut Acoustical Society, and has written many articles about basses in the CAS Journal.

I became interested in Traeger's work while attending a joint meeting of the Michigan Violin Makers Assn. and the Catgut Acoustical Society in 1996. His paper titled The Setup and Repair of the Bass Violin for Optimum Sound was one of the highlites of the meetings. This article was later published in the CAS Journal. As Fred W said, "he sure know his stuff".
 
#27
I have also heard that the Traeger book is coming out soon. Bill Merchant mentioned to me that he had been reviewing and making some contributions to it.

The big question is how does on find out about the book? If it is going to be a limited edition and you want one, it would be sad to only find out about it after they are all sold.

Trager's "Optimum sound" paper is indeed very interesting. The only thing is that there are a bunch of things in there that are a lot of work and it's not clear if the improvement in sound would be worth all that work. But then again if you've got the time and/or money...

Adrian
 
#28
Adrian [/B][/QUOTE]Traeger's 1996 paper was not directed at novices. It was presented to a conference of violin family luthiers and the complete title of the paper is The Setup and Repair of the Bass Violin for Optimum Sound. Mr. Traeger was talking about doing what it takes to get the most out of a bass, not doing a cost/benefit analysis. There are a lot of things we do as luthiers that are a lot of work. It goes with the territory. I prefer to rephrase you last statement as: What are you willing to pay to get the best possible sound out of your instrument?

BTW - I'm sure that Bill Merchant will have copies of the book for sale when it comes out. I'll try post a review when I get my copy. You should be aware that this book will being directed specifically to luthiers and probably won't be written like a DIY manual.
 
#30
I just received word from my good friend, violin maker and luthier book publisher Henry Strobel that the Traeger book is going to be published by him and it should be available in March 2005. This is really good news since all of Henry's books are soft cover and are very reasonably priced. The full title of the book will be "Setup and Repair of the Double Bass" by Chuck Traeger with David Brownell and Bill Merchant. For those of you who do not know the other two authors, David Brownell is a well know Michigan violin family luthier and is the editor of the Michigan Violin Makers Assn. Journal. Bill Merchant has a bass shop in NYC and was a partner in Traeger's NYC shop prior to Traeger's retirement. I've been promised one of the first copies off the press, so I'll try to give a quick book review once I get it.
 
#38
Matthew Tucker said:
I think, if you can't afford $85 for the book, you can't afford to restore an old bass.
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"Die Kunst des Geigenbaues" (= "The Art of violin making") of Otto Möckel has recently been available for 10 € at Link Removed, but you need to know German to understand the book, of course :hmm:
 

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