This might be the ticket. My problem with guitar has always been the string spacing. Not that my fingers are fat I just like bass string spacing better
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I have a perverse desire for a 6 string piccolo bass
- Thread starter summerson1
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That's understandable, since it allows for (or perhaps demands) different playing techniques. I shouldn't joke, though, considering I had the Warwick Custom Shop make me a shortscale fretless which I use in cello tuning, CGDA, and I have seriously considered buying a 7-string guitar and only using the 1,3,5,7 strings.
Six strings and an octave up from bass? Yup, it's called a guitar. They can be tuned just about however you want. Strings come in a wide variety of gauges. You can find guitars with necks up to 2 inches wide...how much more do you need?
No it's not a guitar, it's a 6 string bass with thin strings, different scale length, string spacing and tone. A very different instrument.
If people were satisfied with a guitar they wouldn't be thinking about using a restrung 6 string bass. The first post makes this clear.
Ridiculing "just play a guitar" posts are unoriginal, narrow minded and tiresome.
If people were satisfied with a guitar they wouldn't be thinking about using a restrung 6 string bass. The first post makes this clear.
Ridiculing "just play a guitar" posts are unoriginal, narrow minded and tiresome.
Quite! Guitars actually sound decent and have a broad range of applications, unlike the bizarre one-trick novelty instruments that are the talking point of this thread.
Find me a piccolo bass that serves much purpose other than to serve the showboating egomania of the player. Youtube is awash with guys noodling away for ever, with pretty much the same plinky, gutless tone. At best they sound a bit like the neck pickup of a Jazzbox guitar, but they are harder to play and have far fewer uses beyond endless, indulgent soloing designed to test the patience of us mere musical mortals. If want to go down that route then buy an ES-135, get a pick and put some proper fluidity into your playing rather than trying to port a snappy fingerstyle approach into an other instrument.
If an instrument has fundamentally failed to mature beyond the 'huh, cool I guess' tier since the 1980s then perhaps its existence is due a small amount of ridicule, once in a while.
When you think about it.
Isn't any bass played above the E at the seventh fret A string automatically a"Piccolo"bass.?
Especially a six string bass?
Isn't any bass played above the E at the seventh fret A string automatically a"Piccolo"bass.?
Especially a six string bass?
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Maybe the point of this would be to find an instrument I'm more comfortable with than a conventional electric guitar? I prefer bass because the string spacing Quite! Guitars actually sound decent and have a broad range of applications, unlike the bizarre one-trick novelty instruments that are the talking point of this thread.
Find me a piccolo bass that serves much purpose other than to serve the showboating egomania of the player. Youtube is awash with guys noodling away for ever, with pretty much the same plinky, gutless tone. At best they sound a bit like the neck pickup of a Jazzbox guitar, but they are harder to play and have far fewer uses beyond endless, indulgent soloing designed to test the patience of us mere musical mortals. If want to go down that route then buy an ES-135, get a pick and put some proper fluidity into your playing rather than trying to port a snappy fingerstyle approach into an other instrument.
If an instrument has fundamentally failed to mature beyond the 'huh, cool I guess' tier since the 1980s then perhaps its existence is due a small amount of ridicule, once in a while.
Any instrument that inspires you to create music is a good thing. It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks.
I like this concept specifically because of how it differs from a standard guitar. Comparatively, I've been looking for a *guitar* that has a longer scale and a little bit wider spacing. While I love short scale basses, I've been playing bass so long that standard guitars are too small and fiddly for my hands to find comfort in anymore, so I'd be looking for like a 27-28" scale standard-pitch guitar with heavier strings, and I don't even know if such a beast exists. It wouldn't be *too* far off what the OP wants, either.
True, but not seeing value in an instrument != narrow mindedness.
But I think arguing it does.
Here's some of the value in my designs. I wanted something I could practice with quietly without having to deal with an amp and cord. Acoustic basses don't have enough volume, are uncomfortable, and are designed like steel string guitars. But a piccolo bass would be easier to get some volume from in an electric bass form that is kind of acoustic. So I'm building something I can noodle with on the couch with enough volume to hear without playing hard but not too loud that it bothers others. I also didn't want a guitar as I've been playing bass for decades so I wanted something more comfortable for me. It may not be the best choice for covering Tom Petty and the Stones but I'm cool with that.
If you don't need a guitar with a magnetic pickup, you could also consider a classical (nylon string) guitar, as they have wider string spacing than standard acoustic or electric guitars.
One added benefit of playing a piccolo bass instead of a guitar:Maybe the point of this would be to find an instrument I'm more comfortable with than a conventional electric guitar? I prefer bass because the string spacing
Some of us have odd finger tips.
Meaning that there is not much protrusion of flesh sticking out from under the fingernail.
So that thin guitar strings tend to indent into the fingertips and the nail touches the fret board.
No matter how short I file them(Guitar fretting is done on the finger tips)
Whereas thicker bass strings make the finger stand higher and the fingernail doesn't touch the fret board.(Bass fretting is done with the pads of the fingers)
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Find a 6 string bass with a wide neck for your spacing.
Buy individual strings to make a custom set an octave above a bass.
Get a new nut to accommodate the smaller strings.
Play away.
If you want to "dabble in the guitar octave" and would like a wider neck than what is found on the more common steel string acoustic, maybe try a nylon string "classical" guitar. Nice wide neck. Fun to play. Great for finger style - which is familiar to many bassists. And a decent classical guitar is cheap, under $150. We use these in our guitar class in high school.
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/C40--yamaha-c40ii-full-scale-classical-natural
Buy individual strings to make a custom set an octave above a bass.
Get a new nut to accommodate the smaller strings.
Play away.
If you want to "dabble in the guitar octave" and would like a wider neck than what is found on the more common steel string acoustic, maybe try a nylon string "classical" guitar. Nice wide neck. Fun to play. Great for finger style - which is familiar to many bassists. And a decent classical guitar is cheap, under $150. We use these in our guitar class in high school.
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/C40--yamaha-c40ii-full-scale-classical-natural
Well, what do you know? I could have sworn that was a six. I must have been mesmerized by his playing...sorry.
