Double Bass Small, fractional,and travel doublebass thread

[peterpalmieri]

A [Invalid or Expired Link Removed] with a 41" scale length.

Got mine back in May 2011, not the removable neck and some things have been improved on since but I couldn't be happier. Best of luck with yours.

 

[VictorW126]

A number of people on the site are using smaller scale basses to transition from bass guitar, which is what a part of the discussion here has been about.

It's good! Now anyone can immediately see who the double bass player is, and who is the bass-guitar player with a double bass! The less you know how, the smaller your size.

You need to tell people: When changing from a bass guitar - choose the size 1/4. After a year of training and the ability to use the bow and thumb position, you can go to size 1/2. After college or experience more than 10 years it's time to play at full size!
(Joke!)

 

[peterpalmieri]

A [Invalid or Expired Link Removed] with a 41" scale length.

Chris hope all is well curious if you received your bass yet?

 

[Chris Fitzgerald]

Chris hope all is well curious if you received your bass yet?

Not yet. The next batch that was made after I ordered were non-removable neck models, and the batch of removable neck models will be completed in a month or so. I'm curious to get to play it, but no big hurry.

 

[flatback]

Does anybody use a laborie or bent endpin with their Kolstein Busetto? I have been using an egg pin with my similar bass and I think I am ready to have it drilled but just curious if anyone has done it?

 

[damonsmith]

Does anybody use a laborie or bent endpin with their Kolstein Busetto? I have been using an egg pin with my similar bass and I think I am ready to have it drilled but just curious if anyone has done it?

The point of a travel bass is not "settling" for a different set up. If that is what you are doing I'd go for it!

 

[Eric Hochberg]

Does anybody use a laborie or bent endpin with their Kolstein Busetto? I have been using an egg pin with my similar bass and I think I am ready to have it drilled but just curious if anyone has done it?

After spending a few months with a Kolstein TB, I think I would want to try an eggpin first, to see how it goes, before drilling. I'm thinking with the small upper bouts the balance could be harder to figure out for the correct angle of the pin. Straight back may not work so well...

 

[flatback]

You are so right. I am thinking of getting the eggpin modified (a longer small pin) because right now I have it attached to an end pin that has to be out some to make it work. The thing is I really really dig the bent endpin for arco but for jazz pizz it forces me to change the angle of my right hand which is...doable but not as comfortable. I really like how my lower back feels when I am standing straight and not holding up the bass. With the Contrabassetto (similar to Kolstein) the bass feels really good balanced on the eggpin and I can easily reach the entire extended fingerboard. It just feels right. They way i have the eggpin right now it can shift as the endpin slips in the socket. Maybe I'll just modify the eggpin...

 

[Eric Hochberg]

Yes, I agree on your pizz comment. I feel a marked difference with the Laborie on my bass. I feel like my fingers skate a little more over the strings than with a straight pin where the feeling is a little more digging in and getting more "pull".

 

[damonsmith]

I use my straight pin all the way out and lean it back to me. I use the same playing ideas as those for the bent pin. If you are not sold on the bent pin, then that might be a thing to try. Otherwise, yeah, and eggpin or an old style bent pin might be the way to go. Either way, make sure you have your set up with you.
I "made do" with the thin flimsy pin that came with my Chadwick for too long - now it is a whole different bass. Having the right endpin is as important as any other important factor like a good set up.

You are so right. I am thinking of getting the eggpin modified (a longer small pin) because right now I have it attached to an end pin that has to be out some to make it work. The thing is I really really dig the bent endpin for arco but for jazz pizz it forces me to change the angle of my right hand which is...doable but not as comfortable. I really like how my lower back feels when I am standing straight and not holding up the bass. With the Contrabassetto (similar to Kolstein) the bass feels really good balanced on the eggpin and I can easily reach the entire extended fingerboard. It just feels right. They way i have the eggpin right now it can shift as the endpin slips in the socket. Maybe I'll just modify the eggpin...

 

[flatback]

Thanks D, Yes I have tried it way out and truth is with an adequate rug and it works (like all drummers cart around) or my favorite, spiking the floor...except every floor I have ever been on... someone would scream if you spiked. But that also INCREASES the weight of the bass on your hand or some other part of your body. But still it works well I think...Everything can be made to work depending on the compromises.
Anyway I went down to the Bolinas Hardware store,... recently bought out by helpfully hip hipsters, ...and although the store didn't sell the rod he had one out back in his welding shop that was the right gauge and hard enough steel. Anyway at this length it rakes the bass out pretty much like Rabbath, which is pretty much farther out then I have ever had it (I have used it in the past on other basses at less of an angle) BUT damn, that is super nice. At that angle, all ergonomic aspects of technique are optimized: weightlessness, yet your left hand seats on the board with more force, easier by far to play arps and scales across the strings, getting to the far reaches of the extended fingerboard is suddenly not a far reach but a natural arcs of the arm. Arco just kills it, I still gotta find the right angle to pizz.
There is some little bounce in it that I don't like (I think I may have the downward piece manufactured at a machine shop to hold a tube endpin.) but not like the early bent steel endpins that bounced too much. The hipster dude at the hardware store said he would weld the crutch tip knob on there too.

 

[flatback]

Actually D I really like that with the pin all the way out...super strong position if it does not slip.

 

[freshbass]

View attachment 2840556 Hello, fellow TB'rs. I would like to start a thread which will provide a safe haven for those of us who have an interest in smaller basses. I notice that people looking for info RE adults seeking info about fractional sized and smaller basses are often greeted with derision and condescension from the avowed "3/4 size and up " contingent. In the age of amplification, it seems unecessary to require the large sounding body of the typical 3/4 size and larger bass, if one is not doing orchestral work... and even there, there are many who favor a smaller instrument, for solo work. Gary Karr maintained that a smaller bass projected better than the 7/8 behemoths sought after by orchestral players. Those of us who are aware of the lineage of the double bass are aware that its likely ancestors were smaller instruments, more similar to a 1/2 or 1/4 size bass , than those which have become standard in modern orchestral settings. So let's begin.....I have owned several smaller basses, as a musician who lives in NYC, and travels via Public transportation. I have a Chennell Arco, as well as a fully-carved five-string 1/2 sized bass which I commissioned recently from a luthier I located on Facebook, Bango Istvan. I also have owned a 1/4 size ply, as well as 3/4 Juzek and German Ply basses. I would say that as far as DB goes, I primarily focus on Jazz, and Afro-Cuban idioms, but employ classical literature as a learning tool, and to facilitate bowing. By the way, I'm about 6'2" in height, and have spent most of my professional career performing on E-bass. My search for an acceptable smaller acoustic bass instrument has led me down many paths, and I think I've located some good alternatives to trudging about with a 3/4 or better instrument.

I use a shen sb300 5/8 that sounds enormous. 39" mensure w/ a large 3/4 size body. Thomastik Spiro Weich strings.