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Is electric bass a guitar ?

Electric bass is a guitar ?

  • Yes

    Votes: 275 79.9%

  • No

    Votes: 69 20.1%
  • Total voters
    344
#43
Do I play guitar? No! And I never learned how to play guitar.
I am not a guitarplayer. I am a bassplayer!
(electric, 4- and 5string, fretted and fretless basses, to be exact)

Does my bass sound like a guitar, when a guitarist plays it?
Will it sound like a piano, when a keyboarder plays it?
Does my bass look like a guitar? Maybe yes :(

To folks who don 't know the difference
between orange juice and carrot juice! :D


May the bass be with you (to hell with guitar)

Wise(b)ass (not guitar)
 
#45
It's a bass guitar. Same as a bass recorder or a bass drum. "Bass" is a describing word of the tonal range of an instrument. If you played in an orchestra and you said you play bass, I'd ask "bass what?". The bass guitar is a guitar in the bass range.... Same applies to baritones and tenors.

All that said, I call it a bass because it pretty obvious in most cases.
 
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#52
Bassbeater said:
Unless you want to start calling guitars "Trebles", it is in fact a bass guitar.
Click to expand...
A guitar is to a bass, as a cigarette is to a cigar.
Smaller versions of an item sometimes have an ette extension in their name.
The bass should be a guitar and that shorter, smaller thing should be a guitarette. :smug:
The only downside is that the guitarette player might have to compensate with an even louder amp. :bassist:
 
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#54
I started on upright. It was sometimes referred to as a Bass Viol, which I believe was an older, historic term.
It is not a violin, but belonged to the violin family. (a group of instruments that are primarily bowed)

Leo Fender was a very practical fellow. When he developed the Precision bass, it wasn't only to free up the upright bass players, he wanted to make it easy for guitar players to switch back and forth for one reason; more gigs, more money.
I personally never preferred the term "Bass Guitar" for various reasons, but would sometimes use the term for the benefit of others to distinguish the two.
The upright bass is not a violin, and the "electric" bass is not an electric guitar - but it is part of the guitar family, or more historically accurate, (especially if you're Richie Blackmore ;)), part of the Lute family.
Next up; did man evolve from apes, and would Koko the ape make a better guitar player or bass player?
 
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#58
funny thing about playing guitar and bass, if you can play one you can figure out how to play the other. Sure, there's a difference in approach - one finger per fret is mostly just a hand stretching exercise for us, we play rhythmically and harmonically rather than melodically, etc... - but this is at a hair-splitting level, here. Both instruments are stringed lute-ish instruments with necks that are normally fretted, the strings are stimulated either by the fingers or a plectrum, and depressed onto the "fingerboard" via the fingers of the opposite hands.

Consider birds - chickens and pigeons are both birds - they both have beaks, feathers, reproduce through laying eggs etc... The main differences are limited to colour, size, and which one you'd rather deep fry.

So, is a bass a guitar? well, if it's not, it's certainly not far off, and you wouldn't be wrong in saying that it falls under the same umbrella. It still feels a bit wrong to me, too, though.
 
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