Wishes, fairy dust, Unicorn farts? How does that go again?
@damonsmith I’m not arguing with you and don’t expect in a million years we will agree. All things equal, sure I want every serious student to have a carved bass, but things are never equal. I would never recommend a family buy a carved bass with problems such as a warped neck, overly thin fingerboard, neck joint glued with epoxy. I also don’t want them to buy a bass from a music store that doesn’t know how to set up basses. Just today, I had a nice Shen Willow on the bench to fit an extension. The bass came from a music store which won the school bid. The soundpost was dangerously tight, fingerboard never dressed, and the bridge was cut down with almost no arch. Killed the day. And this is a quality bass. Imagine what some of that music store’s cheap basses are like? I recently did a neck reset on a low end carved bass and there was at least a half inch air gap at the cheeks. The damage blew out the rib and a good portion of the upper back. The hot melt glue was a mess to deal with as well. We’re talking a $4,000 bass here. And yea, I had a customer bring one in to compare to a Shen laminate. Player, parent, teacher and me all thought the Shen sounded better. The teacher has been a high school orchestra teacher and private teacher for over twenty years. We’re not talking Bluegrass thumper here. The Middle School kid will have a well made instrument to drag around, maybe abuse and enjoy for many years. As he advances, he can either keep the ply or have some trade value toward a good carved instrument.