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Can't play 4-string anymore!!

#61
I started with a 5 and I'll stick with a 5. The only disadvantage I experience is trying out any 4 in a music store and all that muscle memory gets disoriented and confused.

Both of my favorite independent music stores are owned and operated by lifelong 4 string bass players and their ratio of 4's to 5's in stock is about 20:1.
 
#63
I regularly play a 5 string and a 4 string during the same gig, so I have no problem skipping back and forth between them. I have a 6 as well but only really use it for noodling with at home. I have gigged with the 6 but found that I didn't really use the C string except for playing some songs with fewer position shifts, but I also found the C string to sound a bit thin, so less useful than I thought it would be.
 
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#64
My first bass was a korean Washburn XB600, then i had a luthier build me a 5 string P-bass, now i'm going for a 4 string JB and a 30' 4 string custom build. My tastes are shrinking!
I like all kinds of basses. After those are done I'll go for a piezo fretless. 4 string, maybe 5 with a high C. Not sure yet!
 
#66
OP: Yessir, I hear you.
I still have my stable of "historic and/or vintage" Fenders that I did One Million Gigs on back in the day (I'm Olde); but since moving to 5 string for a recording project I got hired for back in the mid 80's, my 4 string time pretty rapidly declined to nothing.
I really enjoy all the alternate fingerings 5 string provides, and, the ability to play the same line on either lighter or heavier gauges at points as a tone shaping thing.

I should probably sell all my Olde Stuff; but I just can't seem to.
(que Streisand "Memories")
 
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#67
I have no experience on anything but a 4-string bass, despite being a bass player for ~30 years. I've always thought if I was going to make the jump I would skip the 5-string and go straight to a 6-string. Is that misguided thinking? Would the string spacing blow my mind too much for me to be able to play reasonably well? Interested to hear the thoughts of other seasoned players who did make the jump to either a 5, a 6, or both.
 
#68
"5 or go straight to 6?"

My answer to that is "I have no need for all those high notes."
Perhaps with the work you do; you would have more need of the additional higher register.
I don't :D
ymmv....etc, blahblah.........
 
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#69
Yep, now it's 5-string basses for me, too. I have an awesome 4-banger but it hasn't been out of the house since the fall of 2011. I play it at home about once per week to keep my head wrapped around the 4-string concept but that's about as much love as it gets. Sometimes I think about selling it but have learned that by ignoring the issue that feeling always passes.

M. M. :)
 
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#70
mikeyjm2 said:
I have no experience on anything but a 4-string bass, despite being a bass player for ~30 years. I've always thought if I was going to make the jump I would skip the 5-string and go straight to a 6-string. Is that misguided thinking? Would the string spacing blow my mind too much for me to be able to play reasonably well? Interested to hear the thoughts of other seasoned players who did make the jump to either a 5, a 6, or both.
Click to expand...
I tried 6 but for me the neck is just too wide and my hands are maybe a little bigger than average so it's not a small hand issue. Chugging on the B and E string gets uncomfortable (wrist) to me. YMMV.
 
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#71
I started on a five in 1998. I now own 7 basses. One is six. two are five, and the rest are four.

I usually gig with the fiver and, yeah, I get so used to using the B sring (fretted E!) that It takes a bit to get used to the four.

But this week I subbed for a week long revival at a local church using a four. It's like riding a bike. The experience has given me the confidence to use the four more at my main band's gigs. Next one is tonight...

BTW, three takeaways involving the use of the MIM Fender Jazz I used this week:
1. It was a very beautiful high gloss natural wood finish with tortoise pickguard.
2. The flat wound strings were very nice except the G was as dead as an upright.
3. It felt like a short scale, but wasn't. It just didn't feel like a "real" bass.
4. It did not play as well as ANY of my basses I got at RondoMusic. I've learned to really appreciate those SX and Brice basses.

To the OP: Don't worry. It's like riding a bike. When I got into low B territory on the four I had to adjust and sometimes use open strings when I normally fret. It means re-learning some parts but it came quick.

I'm actually excited to start using the 4's again, especially since my band plays mainly 50's and early 60's rock. :)
 
#72
Started with 5-string basses after getting back into playing from a several year long break. Never really liked the extra tension in the other strings in 35" scale and thought the B sounded poorly defined in most 34". Happy that I'm back to the regular 'ol four bangers.
 
#73
I don't know...for me it's not that big a deal to switch from one to the other. I use a different flavour of the floating thumb technique - I put the side of my thumb against the strings I want to mute, vs resting the tip of the thumb right on the string - so I guess that's why my right hand doesn't feel too out-of-place when picking up a four-stringer.

I like the extended range the 5-string provides for some gigs, but I still find the 4-string to be a lot of fun to play. Personally I want both in my stable.
 
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#74
Frank77 said:
I don't know...for me it's not that big a deal to switch from one to the other. I use a different flavour of the floating thumb technique - I put the side of my thumb against the strings I want to mute, vs resting the tip of the thumb right on the string - so I guess that's why my right hand doesn't feel too out-of-place when picking up a four-stringer.

I like the extended range the 5-string provides for some gigs, but I still find the 4-string to be a lot of fun to play. Personally I want both in my stable.
Click to expand...
For me it's a problem if I've not been playing the 4 for a while. If I've been playing a song in E on the fiver and then switch to the four, it's almost like a new song. And it means retraining your hand. Many notes that were fretted are now open. Your hand does exactly the opposite of what it used to.

Another example is walking from G to D. on a fiver I would walk down from G to F, E and low D. With a four, I was naturally walking UP to D, but after playing around with it I started walking down to E, then just replacing the low D with the higher D. I had to do that to match what the guitar player was doing. It doesn't sound right when one of us walks up and one walks down, though I'd prefer he stop filling in the bass part on his acoustic guitar. It's a habit he picked up playing in a band without a bass player.
 
#75
Robroy said:
I'm actually excited to start using the 4's again, especially since my band plays mainly 50's and early 60's rock. :)
Click to expand...

No one that matters will notice you playing a 5 unless it's some freakish looking thing.

062after_zpsaffc7657.jpg
 
#79
I've actually gone the opposite way.

I started on a four (well I started on the upright in middle school) when I was 14 and the next year jumped directly to a sixer (a Carvin LB76) and playing six string basses for the better part of a decade. Then I moved primarily to fives but over the last few years have moved more and more to four string basses.

In fact, when my two new ones are finished (next week it seems) I'll probably sell off my only remaining five string and be back to playing fours exclusively.

My current five string:
IMG_3690_zps9b9e4d8c.jpg


And it's four string replacements in the works:

ODB%20J1_zpsjupx0whz.jpg

ODB%20P1_zpspfxw5qvn.jpg
 

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