Is electric bass a guitar ?

[Old Garage-Bander]

The Op mentioned a double bass, It's also referred to as a Bass Violin. Tuned and played completely different from a violin. I'd have a harder time calling a bass violin a violin, than calling an electric bass a guitar, so from now on I'll just call them Bob.

Bob is an excellant choice.
And you have a much higher percentage of spelling it correctly when compared to other words.

 

[Member8675309]

I have an opinion on the matter.

 

[Drgonzonm]

Is Cello a Violin?
Is Double Bass a Viola?

yes, no, respectively.

Imnsho if you had the option of arcoing then the bg we play would not be a guitar.
The DB has it's roots, in the voil. The bg has it's roots in the guitar. Both the cello and viola have there roots in the violin.
We could also discuss, why a fretless bg is not a precision. But let's leave that can of worms for fishing.

 

[TheReceder]

I think I better nix the Bob thing.... I think that's how carrots got started....

 

[Doctor Intrepid]

I would say it is a bass and not a guitar. The set of facts I rely on for this nomenclature is the distinct lineage/history of the electric bass when compared to the guitar. Recent iterations of the bass have involved adopting some traits of the guitar, but that doesn't make it a guitar. The bass has evolved over time, and adopting some aspects of a guitar is just one part of the evolution of the bass.

 

[MattZilla]

Depends on its use. Some food is just food, some food is a meal, some food is snack, and some food is an experience.

Geddy Lee, Justin Chancellor, and Dixie Dave play bass guitar.

Nate Mendel, LaMarquis Jefferson, and Jamareo Artis play bass.

Les Claypool plays in a sandbox full of strings.

 

[Matthew_84]

I used to be adamant about saying "electric bass" or just "bass" to separate the association with guitars, but frankly, I couldn't care less now.

At the end of the day, most non-bassists somewhat look down on bass guitar players anyway...

If I mention "bass guitar", and they don't hear it properly or don't understand, they may say "You play guitar?!" with excitement, but when I reiterate the bass part, they usually just go "oh"...

If I just say "bass" they sometimes say "like the big upright bass?!" with excitement, but when I replay with "bass guitar", they usually just go "oh".

I just shrug my shoulders. Everyone is ignorant these days. If I corrected every idiot I ran across I wouldn't have time to eat.

 

[Kukulkan61]

Are carrots orange or did they just stay too long in the tanning booth..

 

[Drgonzonm]

My carrots are purple, don't let my carrots around coppertone.

 

[BassUrges]

I started on upright. It was sometimes referred to as a Bass Viol, which I believe was an older, historic term.

Historically, the viol family was distinct from the violin family, featuring, interestingly, frets. Also typically 6 strings tuned in fourths and flat backs. So the DB, with a bass bar and soundpost and 4 strings and no frets, is itself a weird hybrid of viol and violin.

 

[bassliner50]

Bass has a very definite different musical role than a guitar. Is an upright a big (low register) violin? Yes, I think so. Is a bass synth a bass or a synth? I would say it could be considered as both. So is a bass a guitar? I prefer to think of it as an extension of the guitar with its own history and purpose.

 

[James Collins]

A bass guitar is as similar to an upright bass as it is to a U-Bass or a contrabanjo. Just because it plays the same notes and has strings does not make it the same. The precision bass was literally invented to make it easier for guitar players to play the bass line and is designed based on electric guitars.

 

[tpaul]

There are 6 string basses. But there are no 4 string guitars.

Ergo, a guitar is a soprano bass.

Discuss.

 

[Sgtpepper89]

Its a part of the string instrument family just like I separate electric guitars, acoustic guitars and ukuleles etc. I concider it its own instrument even tho I suppose its some kind of merger of a double bass+electric guitar.

 

[knight of ni]

I understand that if it looks like a guitar, it's made by guitar makers, well it's a guitar. No problem about that. I just wonder if the bass is not a platypus : it looks like a guitar but it lays eggs like a double bass. As for the duck bill, I'm sure some headstock designs fit (the bill ?).

Fender built so much like a guitar that the first ones had a finger rest that changed in a thumb rest because players were not using it like a guitar. The most influential bass player, James Jamerson, that arguably sets the foundations of bass playing, is a DB player "converted" to bass. When a guitar player plays bass we get McCartney (I can hear the various sounds of weapons being drawn/loaded : no disrespect meant here, but I wouldn't put Mc Cartney on the list of revolutionary bass players). Slap got invented quite early, before the bass was in its twenties and it's a (almost) bass-only technique.

First response to Fender P bass was 6 strings baryton guitar which makes me think some people at the time had a poor grasp of what bass was about or, to be fair, what it could be. And using the term "bass guitar" just propagates this misconception nowadays.
French Wikipedia guitar page doesn't even have a bass section although the bass is mentioned here and then in the strings or double neck guitars. English wikipedia does state bass guitar in a few lines.

My point is that the term "bass guitar" although probably accurate, carries a misconception which restricts the view and opinion other instrument players and public in general on what bass is about. I would even go to the length os saying the the term bass guitar is detrimental (heck it has two string less and no chords, must be easy to play. Besides no one hears you and even if one does, no one cares).

Here at TB everyone knows what a bass and what you can do with it (well I hope so) so this semantics question is not really a problem. But when confronted to the 'outer' world I realize that there are misconceptions e.g. with traditional orchestras. My son brought my Ray34 to a small orchestra rehearsal (you know wind instruments, saxs that kind of orchestra). The plethora of treble emanating from an instrument traditionally know for its deaf sound perplexed the conductor. 'Basses are not supposed to sound like that". He know sticks to his JB although I suppose even that is a long stretch from a muffled P.

 

[Bflat]

Whats a banjo????

 

[Steven Ayres]

There's no such thing as a "bass guitar."

 

[knight of ni]

I used to be adamant about saying "electric bass" or just "bass" to separate the association with guitars, but frankly, I couldn't care less now.
[...]
I just shrug my shoulders. Everyone is ignorant these days. If I corrected every idiot I ran across I wouldn't have time to eat.

I've not yet attained this level of wisdom. I guess I just have to accept it !

 

[aesopslyre]

Yes, it is a guitar, of the bass variety.

You make a lot of interesting points, and I see that you are trying to make a strong argument to differentiate the two. You could make an argument that all stringed instruments are different and deserve their own category just as well as you could argue that they are all similar.

An electric bass guitar is pretty much an electric guitar with a longer neck designed to handle the lower strings. I understand how it has four strings and handles the lower registers, just like a double bass, but it is ultimately a guitar designed to do so. The frets make it a guitar. Electric bass guitars were designed to have frets, and be strapped on your shoulder, and to be picked...like electric guitars.

Your point about fretless bass guitars is really where you can start building a case that it is actually a bass. If guitars have frets, by definition, then you can argue that fretless bass guitars are technically no longer guitars.

It would be really great to hear some other opinions on this.

The double bass's antecedent, the Gamba, or Viol, had gut frets on a portion of the neck. But since you can't bow an e-bass, it seems as if it is "really" a type of guitar

 

[seamus bass]

i look at the acoustic traditional versions of the instrument, nope,it is its own instrument. a trumpet is not a trombone but they look similar.