Buying violinist girlfriend a bass

Hey everyone, I've been thinking of helping my girlfriend buy a new bass for herself. She's been a violinist for over 25 years and has been a bassist for maybe 15 years or so. While a fantastic violin player, she'll be the first to admit she's a terrible bass player.

I was giving her a little mandolin lesson last night when she told me that the hardest part for her about playing bass was the tuning, plus the sheer physicality of it. She currently owns a 64 P bass that's being loaned to me.

Unfortunately she doesn't know jack about G.A.S. and her only experience with another bass was a jazz bass she borrowed briefly in 1998. Luckily for her, she got to play a bunch of my basses and now wants something more aligned with her needs as a player as she gets back into playing bass.

Basses she liked:
-Medium scale P for the neck
-Fretless G&L1000 for the lack of frets
-Musicman Stingray for the pickup
-Passive G&L L1500 for the pickup

Given these things I'm guessing she wants a medium to short scale fretless bass with a music man pickup in the bridge. Does anyone make something like this off the rack? Any basses I should look out for?

Used or new. I'm trying to find something under $750. Any help?

 

I have no problems with alternate tunings and different instruments. I switch between upright and electric bass, mandolin, banjo, uke, and guitar.

She only picked up bass because she fell in love with punk music as a teenager and that is pretty much her skill set. She hasn't really played bass in a long time because of her career. As she's grown older her musical tastes have expanded and she wants to play more than root 8ths and play other kinds of music.

She's never particularly liked having a full scale bass and I'm sure the 1.75" nut width hasn't helped matters much.

Given her new interest in mandolin, and how quickly she's picked it up, I'll be looking into strings more suited for a bass tuned in perfect 5ths. First step is a bass that better suits her.

 

I remember seeing fretless Douglas violin bass copies and I think I've played a bunch of the cheap fretted copies. Even the solo bridge pickup isn't particularly bright or aggressive which were the qualities she liked in a bridge position humbucker.

 

Err... A bass tuned in perfect 5ths isn't anything new. Most instruments in the violin family are tuned in 5ths. My upright bass is in 5ths which is a little uncommon but not unheard of. However mandolin, banjo and a whole host of other instruments are tuned in 5ths.

For some instruments that aren't normally tuned in 5ths, like uke, you can buy strings designed to do it. Unfortunately most electric bass players only play in 4ths so I'll probably be buying a bunch of single strings to get something workable.

For me, mandolin was my second instrument after electric bass and 5ths tuning makes a lot of sense to me despite it being a difficult initial transition. I can sympathize with her in learning an entirely new approach to music, especially when all she wanted to do was play in punk bands. FYI almost every instrument I own is tuned in fifths except for electric bass and some of my guitars.

You can also thank these lengthy responses for me not having anything better to do at work.

Worst comes to worst I can always buy a fretted bass and defret it. I've done it twice before now. Just trying to find something off the shelf to put in her hands.

A squier bronco is pretty cheap and I can always replace the stock pickup with a single coil precision pickup and yank out the frets as well.

 

I'd love to but aren't viola da gambas tuned in 4ths? But what kind of mando we talking about?