Roger's take, in a nutshell

[Sadowsky]

Nothing personal - note I put the blindfold challenge out to everyone.


WRONG!!!! If tone wood is such a "contributing factor" to the tone of the instrument, it should not matter which bass/configuration!...

WRM....First of all, it is not this dominant a factor. I am talking about building thousands of very similar basses. As soon as you significantly change the bass/configuration, you are talking apples and oranges, not apples and apples, and the conversation is moot.

Second, as I mentioned, a listening test is not the point. The point is that even if the listener cannot hear the difference, the player can.....and that affects everything about how he interacts with his bass and the tone he produces.

I just don't understand why sharing my experience is so controversial. This is my experience. If yours is different, build 8000 basses, and let me hear your impressions.

Roger

 

[WRM]

WRM....First of all, it is not this dominant a factor. I am talking about building thousands of very similar basses. As soon as you significantly change the bass/configuration, you are talking apples and oranges, not apples and apples, and the conversation is moot.

Second, as I mentioned, a listening test is not the point. The point is that even if the listener cannot hear the difference, the player can.....and that affects everything about how he interacts with his bass and the tone he produces.

I just don't understand why sharing my experience is so controversial. This is my experience. If yours is different, build 8000 basses, and let me hear your impressions.

Roger

I guess "it depends".

Thanks,

 

[deepestend]

Sure, there are going to be some differences from bass to bass that have the same wood.

Working in the Sadowsky shop for a few years— and I’m not there day to day currently— my personal experience is that there are tonal commonalities with different wood combinations. I would go in the showroom and play the basses most days for a few years during lunchtime. It was a real apples to apples situation where I could compare a 4-21 maple/ash to a 4-21 Pau ferro/alder to a 4-21 ebony okoume.

It was a very unique situation and privilege to have regular access to all of these wood combinations over the years. I went on my own personal tone quest and went from tone wood skeptic to believer to skeptic and back around again. But in the end, my personal experience is that the different combinations sound more alike than not.

My real tone test was going from maple/ash and rosewood/alder combos to maple alder. Get used to the first two and then throw that variable in and you can really hear the difference.

Will they sound that way to the audience? Debatable, especially in the mix. But as a player, I can tell the difference, and that changes how I approach and interact with the instrument.

 

[TyBo]

WRM....First of all, it is not this dominant a factor. I am talking about building thousands of very similar basses. As soon as you significantly change the bass/configuration, you are talking apples and oranges, not apples and apples, and the conversation is moot.

Second, as I mentioned, a listening test is not the point. The point is that even if the listener cannot hear the difference, the player can.....and that affects everything about how he interacts with his bass and the tone he produces.

I just don't understand why sharing my experience is so controversial. This is my experience. If yours is different, build 8000 basses, and let me hear your impressions.

Roger

EXACTLY. I can't like this enough times. Pretty well sums it up.

 

[Turnaround]

have you ever tried the same model in front of you, one with maple one with rosewood? how many times? how much time?

Better yet, I changed the fretboard on one of my basses from Rosewood to Ebony. No other change. I heard and felt the difference.

There is scientific evidence that the substrate a vibrating string is connected to affects the way the string vibrates. So it’s not much of a stretch to say that different species of wood will affect the string vibration differently. That’s not conjecture. What Roger brings to the equation is a qualitative description based on a vast experience. We are talking qualitative analysis when terms like “warmer”, “snappier” are used.

The question is not if there is a difference, it’s how much. Is it enough to notice? In my case yes. And I have no commercial advantage either way.

 

[HaphAsSard]

 

[retslock]

Of all the opinions I've ever heard on the matter, that's one of them....

 

[scuzzy]

I love this forum for this reason. @Sadowsky jumps in with his perspective. Not many places you can get that.

I don't understand why folks get so venomous about this subject. We are talking repetition, experience, and a lot of subjectivity. This will never be solved with an Excel spreadsheet of data points and numerical measurements. Renowned luthiers with extensive experience carry as much or more weight than anything in this discussion. Folks can disagree all they want, but neither side has "science" to back their assertions. But some have a helluva lot of experience.

Back to my cognac.

 

[bass12]

We disagree about the folly of it. The artistry of a builder like Sadowsky lies partly in having sorted through many of the variables over many, many years, building many, many, many instruments. I'm ready to listen to what he's learned in his journey.

I found his take interesting, that fingerboard material tends to be the most significant factor with wood types. Fits with my own experience, such that is (10 years building, 60 years playing). He's a thoughtful and insightful guy.

Exactly. Builders like Roger have narrowed down the variables considerably. If you look at what Sadowsky NYC has been producing over the past three decades you can see that there’s not that much variety in terms of designs, components and wood. I’m guessing that Jazz basses have made up the majority of Sadowsky NYC builds and, barring major changes in preamp design (have there been any besides the addition of the VTC? I’m not sure) and pickup maker or specs (SC vs hum-cancelling aside), you’re not looking at that many variables. Does that mean that a prediction can be made with 100% certainty about how the bass will sound upon completion? No. But someone in Roger’s position isn’t coming at the build blindly. Predicting the sonic qualities of a bass may still be a game of chance in some respects but the experience of top builders stacks the deck in the customer’s favour.

I know it’s human nature to make judgments based on very limited experience (we all do this from time to time), but it’s a bit hard to listen to people who obviously have such little experience attempting to shoot down people who have made a life’s work out of the task in question (meticulously building basses and observing their sonic tendencies).

 

[lowfreqgeek]

Feel free to think different, but don't question my experience.

Questioning the experience of career industry professionals is a pillar of Talkbass. The only unbiased, and therefore, valid truth is the myopic opinion of inexperienced lay people.

 

[GreyBeard]

Having owned basses with all 3 different fingerboards, I can say that I totally agree with Roger. At this point in time all of my basses, with the acceptation of my Fender Player Plus V which is pau ferro, have Maple FBs. Back in the 90s I had an Ibanez Musician 4 string neck thru with an ebony FB. I still have sellers remorse for letting that one go. To this day I still try to find out whatever happened to it. I have to say though that I prefer the tone of a Maple FB over all others.

 

[Artman]

That said, given how much variance there can be between two identical Fender P basses, I've got to think that wood does matter. I've played numerous basses, be they Js or Ps, that were in every outwardly way identical, but some sounded/felt better than others. If not the wood, what was the difference?

Two Fender pickups of the same model and year can have quite a lot of variance, as can two CTS pots of the exact same part number, as can the amount of torque on the neck screws, bridge mounting screws, tuner screws, and the "freshness" of strings on two otherwise identical Fender P-basses.
So, who can ever really know?

One thing is for sure, some particular instruments just have more soul than others, and whether it's the wood, or something else, I don't care. Those are the ones I end up keeping.

 

[Aussie Player]

I have been an Alembic player since 1981, owning 4 models over that time. Thinking about basses and tones in general, it occured to me that the concept of similarly designed and made neck thru designs, really only differed in the body shape and wood selected as add ons to that neck base, plus the headstock of course.

Sure, electronics change from model to model but there are also variations in timber selected within each of those same models.

The uniformity between them was a sandwich laminated neck and a full quarter inch slab of ebony for the fretboard. This results in a trademark stiffness managed by dual truss rods which results in a sameness for uniqueness in tones and overall sound. Regardless of model, they had a unique sound different from the market.

My point is that I agree with Roger that the neck is the influencing factor in tone and I also believe, the stiffness is the big contributor to sustain.

 

[Aussie Player]

Two Fender pickups of the same model and year can have quite a lot of variance, as can two CTS pots of the exact same part number, as can the amount of torque on the neck screws, bridge mounting screws, tuner screws, and the "freshness" of strings on two otherwise identical Fender P-basses.
So, who can ever really know?

You have to average out the sameness as much as the differences.
I have 3 Jazz basses. All different sounding, not even close but the sameness is in the feel which is still a difference. Its hard to find the perfect bass no matter how much you spend or how hard you look.

 

[Artman]

You have to average out the sameness as much as the differences.
I have 3 Jazz basses. All different sounding, not even close but the sameness is in the feel which is still a difference. Its hard to find the perfect bass no matter how much you spend or how hard you look.

One player's perfect bass is another player's "meh", and the inverse also applies.

 

[Jack Butler]

But they’d all have the same conflict of interest saying that. If a respected luthier said “based on my 20 years of experience, a Squier Affinity body really sounds about the same as the most expensive tonewoods I’ve made bodies out of” it kinda doesn’t help his business much.

I don't think I have ever met or read about a luthier that has ever said that the wood doesn't matter. It's not only him.

 

[Joebone]

Roger’s last point is one that is, I think, too rarely discussed. I often hear people say things like, “The audience can’t hear the difference between x and y basses” and I always think, “Probably not, but I can hear the difference - and that affects how I interact with my bass (and how much enjoyment I get from playing it)”.

TRUTH! It's hearing, and also the tactile sense under your fingers, which may help to bring what you're hoping to hear.

 

[Lava]

I agree. I’ve owned/played so many different basses of different body wood and the biggest noticeable differences I heard in tone usually came down to maple vs. rosewood vs. ebony fingerboards. (My opinion)

 

[Jack Butler]

He simply can’t be objective on the subject, even if he believes in his heart what he’s saying. It would be akin to me deciding what my pay raise should be this year. I work hard and smart and think I deserve more than jim in the next office, but it doesn’t work that way for a reason. My boss may or may not be able to be objective about my raise, but I definitely can’t be.

I see more than just "skepticism" in the comment in question - saying that Sadowsy says what he does "largely for profit" actually is impugning his character. Especially since there's no way in which his opinions can reasonably be take to favor options which make him more money ... I mean, rosewood or maple, not a lot of difference in profit either way.

I get that you wanted to work "well designed study" into your post , but that kind of misses the point of the comment to which you're objecting.

 

[Mike Vee]

Absolutely not objective, and I agree. I'd like to see him identify fretboard woods by playing them blindfolded. Basses that he is not familiar with/played before, P's/J's/PJs/, using a statistical representative sample (20+).

It doesn't have to be Roger, I'd like to see anyone ID tonewoods blindfolded (hint) - "Show me".

That’s not the point though. It’s more about the differences between two examples of the same model. A personal experience for the owner. It may not come through the speakers with a full band in that much detail but it makes a difference to the player of that instrument. It shapes the vibe of the bass in a big way. Let somebody have a year with a rosewood board and then suddenly replace it with the same bass except maple, and they would notice a stark difference in the sound, guaranteed.

The differences between my maple and rosewood P bass are plenty large enough to warrant owning both, especially with a string choice that complements either tone.