Papageno, don't your doubts above fly in the face of conventional wisdom about a new instrument developing more tone and less stiffness with time? Or even an older instrument after fitting with big patches or a new bass bar? IME a bass can be "woken up" by bowing heavily the notes played chromatically up and down the E string that is directly over the bass bar and produces the most powerful vibrations throughout the instrument. Loudness is a different matter. Through its design, materials and construction a new instrument either starts its life being powerful or (to some degree) not, and will not produce more power as it matures. Of course a good set-up is necessary for best efficiency.
Incidently one of my most memorable quotes from a Gary Karr masterclass years ago is that "basses are often lazy instruments played by lazy people."
David, you're bringing up a very interesting point.
I am a scientist and it is part of my job to question, try to understand, and sometimes challenge things that are considered "conventional wisdom".
In a scientist's eyes, the double bass is a very complex mechanical device, made out of some extremely complex materials (wood), and played and listened to by some even more complex systems (human beings). Our perception of the quality of an instrument is the result of an intricate mix of all these consitutents. Among those, while we have some reasonably good knowledge of the acoustics of a double, and (to a lesser extent) of the structure and properties of wood(s), I think that one can safely claim that the least well understood elements of the chain is the human brain.
The
quality of instrument is something that is very difficult to define quatitatively, to the point we cannot devise and construct an apparatus that would reliably determine which instruments are
excellent and which ones are
merely good (really bad instruments can be identified quite easily though). This suggests that a very significant part what makes us telling whether an instrument is good or remarkable is actually going on in our brain.
There is a rather wide consensus (which I share) that (some) old instruments are a among the finests, and also, as you point out, that new instruments "wake up" in their early life. Now, I don't see any scientific evidence for any explaination more than another.
Concerning the fact that ancient instruments are "better" than modern ones, it seems to me that in all times bass makers have constructed instruments of variable quality, ranging from mediocre to stellar. I find it not surprising that the ones that have survived to our time are the best ones, as they were the most valued, most expensive, and most properly maintained. Another aspect concerns the mechanical properties of the woods. Wood, as a biological material, is highly complex, and naturally evolves with time, and it is very plausible, that this plays an important role in the high quality of ancient instruments. But we have no means to say that this because this instruments have been played, and played well.
Concerning new instruments, I find it very plausible that what we perceive as "waking up" is due in part to the natural evolution of the wood on one hand, and to the musician becoming more familiar with the instrument on the other hand. From what I know for the materials science of wood, I agree that subjecting to bass and the wood to acoustic vibrations may contribute to things settling to their optimal place, but the idea that the bass has to be played in tune, or chomatically, for this purpose, is simply not really plausible.
So for me, many of the things that belong to "conventional wisdom" concerning the quality of music instruments are actually pure speculations biased by subjective emotional considerations.
But none very important anyhow, since we are not playing music for our scientific enlightment, but for the emotions we convey in that way.
