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Double Bass How did you get your first double bass?

#41
When I was 20 I bought a Kay from a keyboard player. It had only two strings on it and was "decorating" his living room. This was the early 80's so he wanted to sell it to buy some new synth module. My good fortune, paid 400 bucks, had David Gage put on a new fingerboard later, and I've had it ever since. Also own a Juzek but the Kay gets most of the work these days.
 
#42
During my National Service in the Greek Air Force they refused to use my engineering skills and employed me in the most lethal weapon's departement: a bouzouki and "Zorbas the Greek" orchestra. I got hooked by the bassist's Strunal, he taught me the first lessons and finally i bought it. So the DB venture started, long time ago.
Now the Strunal is in my seaside house's living room. Every August i play in the Gala of the nearby Air Base. My former commander, now a retired general, opens the Gala dancing "Autumn Leaves", the first properly learned song in DB by me. Times seems stopped ...etc
 
#43
While I was at school in the UK my friends told me about a double bass in the technical drawing room's storeroom. The room was permanently locked, but you could just make out the neck of the bass if you looked through the keyhole.

A few months after I left school, I went back in to talk to the music teacher, and he had no idea the school owned a bass! A key was found, and we eventually agreed that the bass would be mine for less than fifteen pounds. The bass had no strings, the varnish was in terrible shape, the tailpiece and bridge were loose in a plastic bag, and the neck had been held on with two huge nails...

My Dad and I took the neck off, and scraped off the remains of the varnish, and started to sand the wood smooth. It was starting to look quite promising, but then I was persuaded to sell the bass in that condition for 35 pounds. I was young and stupid, and needed the money! So, I never got to play it. The friend played it for a few years, and then sold it on.

Now that I know a bit more about basses, I realise I'd stumbled upon an old german carved bass with hatpeg tuners. Do you have any idea how much it still hurts me, nearly thirty years later, to have had such a quality instrument in my hands and to have given the thing away? I could weep, I really could!

Cheers,

Tony
 
#44
My dad bought my first bass for me in a rent-to-own program. It was a brand-new Engelhardt (we had to wait for them to finish building it). Right after we started, my dad lost his job. He fought like hell to make the payments and somehow managed to pull it off. It got me through middle school, high school, college, and a few years of gigging.

I saved all of my gigging income after college and bought the Shen. Kept my "bass fund" going even after I bought the Shen, which helped pay for my wedding/honeymoon. I had enough leftover to nab my newest/oldest bass (although I have to sell some equipment to fund the repairs..).

bassstash5.jpg

bass3.gif
 
#45
My DB was GIVEN to me by my high school orchestra director, Mrs. Haas. It's a carved instrument from 'West Germany'. I was the only kid in the orchestra for some years that could play a D major scale well enough in tune for two octaves, so she gave me the instrument.

It needed about 1K dollars worth of repairs, but has been appraised for about 10K.

I'm forever indebted to her.
 
#46
My Engel C1 (exactly like Chris has in the pic above) was found on craigslist for $600. I traded my slab and $250 for it, and did a bunch of setup work myself to get her playable. That was about 2 years ago and I haven't gone a single day without playing her.

Just landed my first upright gig, in a classic Honky Tonk and Western Swing band recently, and have been gigging and practicing alot. I am having the time of my life right now, and getting better so much faster than I ever could have imagined.

Life is good. ;)
 
#47
Bought mine from Rumano Solano, it is an old Czech ply that he did a neck replacement on. He is a consummate salesman - when I called him to ask about his inventory he asked some questions, thought a minute, says (Cuban accent) "I got jus de bass for you, mahn. You gonna like dees bass, it got a big fat GROWL. I bring it to you to try it out." "Umm, ok Rumano, when do you want to bring it?" "I bring it RIGHT NOW."

Which of course he did and I was totally hooked. I've played that bass for about 15 yrs while the slab has sat in the corner getting dusty.
 
#48
In the mid-70's, my roommate was a bass student at Julliard. I was a guitarist at the time. Between him and his brother, who dabbled on the bass, they had seven instruments. My roomate kept one at our apartment standing in the corner of our session room. He came home one afternoon in a panic. He and his fiancee had just spent every penny they had buying a house. Crashing into the session room where I was practicing, he blurted out, "Hey man, hey man, I need to buy a refrigerator for the new crib. We're clean out of bread." Looking around the room, he then pointed to the bass in the corner and said, "I'll sell you that bass for whatever a new refrigerator costs. Whuddya say, you cool wiith that?"

Out of friendship, I took him up on his offer. I eventually graduated to the UB and played that early 1900's German axe for over 30 years.
 
#50
A guy from my high school heard I was looking for an URB. So he broke into the local Catholic school, and popped over to my apartment with a bass. My Mom coughed up some cash, but she was suspicious, especially when she saw an article the next morning about a bass theft in our local newspaper. That day she brought a detective home from work with her to check it out (she worked at city hall in the legal department, upstairs from the police headquarters). The detective immediately recognized that the property was the stolen bass in question. For me to get off the hook, I had to go through the typical interrogation scene and give up the name of the dude that hoisted the bass. They already knew who did it, but they had to hear me say it. Was I involved? You'll never know...:D
 
#51
arnoldschnitzer said:
A guy from my high school heard I was looking for an URB. So he broke into the local Catholic school, and popped over to my apartment with a bass. My Mom coughed up some cash, but she was suspicious, especially when she saw an article the next morning about a bass theft in our local newspaper. That day she brought a detective home from work with her to check it out (she worked at city hall in the legal department, upstairs from the police headquarters). The detective immediately recognized that the property was the stolen bass in question. For me to get off the hook, I had to go through the typical interrogation scene and give up the name of the dude that hoisted the bass. They already knew who did it, but they had to hear me say it. Was I involved? You'll never know...:D
Click to expand...

Nice story Arnold.

ps -- Mikey's doing well by your work on my "Schroetter"
 
#52
arnoldschnitzer said:
A guy from my high school heard I was looking for an URB. So he broke into the local Catholic school, and popped over to my apartment with a bass. My Mom coughed up some cash, but she was suspicious, especially when she saw an article the next morning about a bass theft in our local newspaper. That day she brought a detective home from work with her to check it out (she worked at city hall in the legal department, upstairs from the police headquarters). The detective immediately recognized that the property was the stolen bass in question. For me to get off the hook, I had to go through the typical interrogation scene and give up the name of the dude that hoisted the bass. They already knew who did it, but they had to hear me say it. Was I involved? You'll never know...:D
Click to expand...


LOL! Great story! :D
 
#54
So, I'd been playing rentals most of the way through high school, and at one stage the family went on a big road trip holiday over the summer. So, we were up in Auckland and just happened to go into a music store... and there was this bass. It was pretty clear I needed a bass, and there it was. Only thing was, they wanted some phenomenal amount of money for it... I think the bass cost more than the van we were driving around the country in. In any case, my folks bought it, for what I think was $3200 in 1987. It's worth something like $18k now. It was a good investment, though, because that bass pretty much paid for my university education.
 
#56
Bought it about a year and a half ago from Craigslist, for half the price of a new one of the same model. It was decorating a living room; parents bought it for their kid, who played it in the school orchestra for a season and lost interest. Had the luthier do some setup-type work on it shortly after, and think I'll do a follow-up visit here after we finish up our near-term slate of acoustic gigs.
 
#58
1973, Humboldt County, CA. I joined a Blue Grass band. The tiny town in the area I lived had a music store. A Kay was for sale for $250. It was in excellent condition. Two years later I bought another from the same store for $300. They were very easy to find back then.

But with that in mind, and how the earth turns, the Shen SB90 I bought all set up for $1400 doesn't seem all that much more all things considered and the SB90 is actually a nicer instrument with a real quality ebony board, nut, etc. and very well made. I also own a SB180, and a Juzek. A guy has to treat himself well while he can. Life is short.


1973
 

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