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From Guitar To Bass

#21
Since I can remember: vocal, starting with Sunday School;
April 1970: started six years of piano lessons;
Fall 1972: started trumpet in 5th grade school band, switching to sousaphone in high school;
April 1975: first guitar, Sears & Roebuck electric, still have it (among many others);
June 1976: borrowed the high school's bass guitar to learn bass in the regional university's summer junior high band camp, jazz band section, and never looked back. I keep up the other instruments so I am never without a gig when I want one.
 
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#23
What a fascinating thread! I started on bass about ten years ago, and then tried to learn guitar. I have been able to play rhythm ok enough for leading our worship time at church, and have liked it for playing at home, but everytime I force myself to concentrate on guitar for 8-10 months at a time to get better I have a hard time doing so and get back to bass. What has actually been more eye opening has been trying to go from bass to Puerto Rican cuatro. The Puerto Rican cuatro is tuned like a standard BEADG 5 string bass, and yet it is a melodic instrument, and it has been really, really hard, to go from thinking rhymically to thinking melodically.
 
#24
I love playing both. The thing that drew me to music was songwriting and they're both essential tools for me. I started taking guitar seriously when I was 13. I got my first bass in my late teens for playing on my own recordings. At first it had a purely sonic role for me, just playing along with whatever the guitar was doing. I started to get more interested in its potential in my 20s, started playing bass in bands, started caring more about bass tone, etc. My guitar background definitely informs my bass playing and the sounds I like to try for, but I take each instrument on its own terms. I wouldn't be happy choosing one over the other. I also do vocals (mostly harsh metal stuff), play a tiny bit of drums, do some pretty in-depth drum programming, enjoy messing around with absolutely no skill on keyboards, and identify as a failed grade-school trumpet and clarinet player.
 
#25
thabassmon said:
Yes. I started on guitar, bass wasn't long after.

I actually wanted to play bass first (and really only), but because I didn't have an instrument, I asked my friend if he had a spare instrument for me to learn on. It was a lefty classical. I learnt to play on that, lefty, then upside righty, then I strung up my dad's guitar (righty) and played righty then I got a bass (righty) as a gift.

I spent the last couple of decades playing them both, I prefer bass because to me it's more fun. I like that it (electric bass) has a relatively short history, which means there's more to explore.

Over the last year or so I have been tuning my guitars to match the tuning of my six string bass, my guitars are tuned to all fourths E2, A2, D3, G3, C4, F4
with the exception of one flat-top acoustic guitar that is tuned E3, A3, D4, G4, C4, F4 like nashville tuning but to match my all fourths tuning.
Click to expand...

All-fourths tuning is a lot of fun, especially when it comes to playing lead parts for me. I'd still have my guitars in all fourths if one of my bands wasn't dead set on E standard.
 
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#26
I think a lot of TB members came to bass from guitar (and as with the predominance of rockers here, I don't think that's necessarily representative of working bass players at large). There's a cliche in rock 'n' roll that people play bass because they failed at guitar, with the corollary that bass is easier. Of course there is more or less truth to this depending on genre.

I play in genres without guitar, and where bass is a central instrument in the mix. I think most Latin and jazz bassists come to the instrument from a place of wanting to play that central role in bridging the rhythm and harmony and melody as opposed to "I tried a different instrument, but settled for the easier one to play." Bass may or may not be easier to play than other instruments in a Latin or jazz ensemble, but if you eff it up, everybody will notice.
 
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#27
Bought a cruddy Hondo guitar from a kid at school freshman year, learned how to take it apart and put it back together. Before the end of the year had saved and bought a bass. Have been a bassist since, but still love guitar.
 
#28
I have a very strange background on all of this...aside from singing in school and that sort of stuff, I had no particular calling toward an instrument. I liked listening of course, but but oddly enough, I was never goaded into piano lessons like a lot of kids do, because my dad was a child prodigy violinist, and you know what happens with that; he was full of sour grapes and actually steered me away from any musical pursuits. At summer camp, I needed to have one more activity, so I went with folk guitar, cause, y’know, everyone was doing it. I couldn’t even manage/fathom chords, so I couldn’t even get far enough along to even fail. I did figure out the intro to “Secret Agent Man” on the nylon B and E strings, but those broke as the guitar just bounced around my room after that summer. But I was drawn to thumping on the lower wound strings, and after a half-assed stab at drums, and once I figured out what a bass guitar was, much to my dad’s dismay I jumped on that while in Junior High. Now, at that time, the big thing was songs constructed from blues-derived riffs, and not so much melodic, chord progression oriented material. Nobody I knew wanted to play Beatles songs, it was all Cream, Hendrix, Beck, Steppenwolf, Mountain, etc., so I missed out on understanding the concept of bass runs mirroring/supporting chord changes. Eventually, I realized that to progress as a bassist, I needed to know at least some chord fundamentals and some theory, so I borrowed a friend’s Harmony Soverign, and got to work on a Led Zep and Cat Stevens song book. Ironically, I learned more about song structure in the punk/power pop/new wave days. In the ensuing decades, I’ve become a pretty fair guitarist, and found that facility on one instrument enhances that of the other. I’m better at certain things than the guitarist I play with is(but I don’t rub it in his face). So, I don’t understand this reluctance/phobia/refusal of bassists to know/play guitar, or anything else for that matter. My initial inspirations, Bruce, Entwistle, JPJ, were all adept at a variety of other instruments. Why be do self-limiting?
It doesn’t advance your bass playing by default, and probably hinders it.
 
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#29
As David Gilmour would say: I'm very bad in lot of instruments. Bass was one of them, but only till March this year.
I've been presented with a bass guitar that blew me away. I sold my old bass and got that new one. I've discovered that the bass is a missing link I've searched in a guitar for almost three decades. I simply discovered a new world. Withing a few weeks I even composed a whole album for bass (and drums) only. Finally everything came to it's own place.
Or so I thought!
Few days ago I got my self a fretless bass - now I found a new religion for that my new world!

So I guess, you never know. But it's important to explore! Cheers!
 
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#30
BassAdder27 said:
How many have gone from playing guitar to Bass ?

Since my younger years of band playing i started on bass

Then after a gap tried so hard to get good on the guitar and i made a few covers bands but struggled with good lead work

Now ive returned to the Bass at the age of 60 and feel its more in my comfort zone
1: I can play the bass better than lead guitar
2: I enjoy the feel and sound of bass lines
3: Always felt bass was something you only played if in a band ?
4: Taken me too many years of wasted effort and expensive on guitar with numerous amps etc etc
5: Playing Bass just seems to fit me and look right

Have you guys gone through similar experiences ?
Click to expand...

I started on guitar and I prefer the bass ... There are a few guitars in my house ... they are pretty and they hang on the wall as art
 
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#33
Seashore said:
All-fourths tuning is a lot of fun, especially when it comes to playing lead parts for me. I'd still have my guitars in all fourths if one of my bands wasn't dead set on E standard.
Click to expand...

Yes all fourths is fun, it also makes the fretboard really logical. That's why my guitar and bass are tuned the same.

I find it super easy in that tuning for chords and single note lines, I like it so much that all my guitars are E-F. I don't think I'll be going back to E standard anytime soon, unless for a short period if there was material that required it. But as soon as that was over back to all fourths we go.

I have been mostly getting away with even when the others play E standard.
 
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#34
I started teaching myself to play piano along with Bill Evans when I was 4. I moved to trumpet, bass trombone, and tuba in high school. I ventured into guitar in college, but eventually found my way to bass. I guess now that I look back on it all...I was listening primarily to the bass lines all along. Even when I was 4.
 
#37
I received my first guitar,a sunburst Hondo I believe( but not sure) in 1968 at 10 years old. Unfortunately ADD was a problem that then was unknown and didn’t take it seriously ,but picked up it again in 8th grade because chicks dug it. I kept playing when I moved to Colorado in 1982 and played in a band 4 or 5 nights a week during ski season and did pretty well. You could make decent money back then. Great times, ski all day and rock all night. But in 1992 I knocked up my then girlfriend and got a real job. Fast forward to 2008, my daughter is almost grown and I got the bug again but soon realized that there were way more guitarists that were better, but a good bassist was hard to find. So I bought a bass rig and realized I really dug it. Getting in a groove with a good drummer is awesome. Next thing you know I’m a semi pro playing some really good gigs. Now I’m retired and practicing every day for about 4 hours a day and rehearsing with a great crew that wants to try and make a go at making a living playing music. We have some great original material and want to hit it hard when the damdemic is behind us. I REALLY want to play in front of an audience again, there is no better high than that!!!
 
#38
I started on guitar and cello at 8 third grade, guess I had aptitude. Orchestra class at school and free folk guitar lessons at church later augmented by Spanish guitar lessons that I bartered by cleaning the teaching studio. I learned pop songs off the radio, usually the bass line too and had started to sing and play at church coffee houses that were popular after a year or so.
Sixth grade I got caught entertaining the class by playing bass lines to pop songs and having the class guess the song when the new instructor walks in. He was happy to see a bass player, I said no I play cello, but this orchestra needs a bass so please continue. Damn.
I continued to play string bass in school, but outside it was guitar. While my peers were playing in bands with their friends I was playing in bands with adults learning much faster and far different lessons. But those are stories for my book being written.
 
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#39
thabassmon said:
Yes all fourths is fun, it also makes the fretboard really logical. That's why my guitar and bass are tuned the same.

I find it super easy in that tuning for chords and single note lines, I like it so much that all my guitars are E-F. I don't think I'll be going back to E standard anytime soon, unless for a short period if there was material that required it. But as soon as that was over back to all fourths we go.

I have been mostly getting away with even when the others play E standard.
Click to expand...

Yeah, you can't beat having chord shapes and scales be consistent across the fretboard. I've sung the praises of all fourths to the other guitarist in the band, and he's a pretty open minded guy, so maybe it's something I can get everyone on board with in the future. Both of the other writers in this group use the open strings on top frequently enough that it would be a hassle if I was in a different tuning.
 
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