Double Bass ToneRite

[s van order]

If we are in tune with other instruments, the bass sounds "opened up". Being in tune is a great way to open up the sound.

LOL! Cuts to the point, doesn’t it?

 

[robobass]

“yeah, but is there anything I can buy that might have a similar effect?” /s

How about making a recording of scales played on a keyboard instrument and playing it through your amp with it sitting right in front of your bridge?

 

[JBarz]

How about making a recording of scales played on a keyboard instrument and playing it through your amp with it sitting right in front of your bridge?

I’ve set my bass in front of my big ole Magnepan speakers before with Moore/Rufus’ “Doublebass Delights” cranked up on repeat for several days. I found that not only was the intonation improved, but the bass was more melodic and deliberate with its lines and time-feel after that (just kidding, just kidding!)...

 

[longfinger]

“yeah, but is there anything I can buy that might have a similar effect?” /s

Since you already have the fish pump... lol. (I did that too)

There actually are bluetooth contact speakers that use the surface of a desk to get a bigger sound. You could get one of those and place it on the bridge, so when you are productively working on the computer to create posts on Talkbass, you can have your background music playing from your computer to the speaker and through your bass.

Do a search using the keyword "bone conduction bluetooth speaker"

They don't have a lot of power, but through the body of an upright bass it could likely get some vibrations happening and deliver a nice sound.

 

[SAlcott]

Practicing doesn't cost anything.

 

[Bruce Calin]

I wrote in another post about weird supposedly effective "musical aids" that could be seen at the NAMM show. Could this be another example?

 

[robobass]

I’ve set my bass in front of my big ole Magnepan speakers before with Moore/Rufus’ “Doublebass Delights” cranked up on repeat for several days. I found that not only was the intonation improved, but the bass was more melodic and deliberate with its lines and time-feel after that (just kidding, just kidding!)...

All kidding aside, I think that when you play G and D scales in tune when warming up you sort of align the bass by exciting it's natural harmonics, and make it more resonant on those notes. If you played a recording of these scales with a simple sound like say a bass clarinet through a speaker, would it not also produce a positive effect? To get anything like the energy you send to the top by bowing the strings though, the amp would have to be pretty loud!

 

[DoubleMIDI]

The top treatment by air vibration does not move the top wide enough to have a noticeable effect. Just try, touch the bridge (which moves as much as the top at that point) and compare the vibration excited by a speaker and excited by a plucked or bowed string.

The only excitation by an amp that does shake the bridge enough is a contact shaking speaker. The kind you can mount to a surface that gets excited to radiate sound by that “speaker”. But it needs to be mounted so that the vibration is perpendicular to the top and this is not the way that is easy to mount on the bridge. So the shaker needs to be placed parallel to the top but on the bridge. And even this will make a lot of noise.

I remember that this was done in a sound isolated cellar room by the inventor of that kind of treatment, because it was very loud over several days.

The idea is to make the top at the highest bending points of the modal patterns of well tuned pitches less stiff to support the resonance of these notes. That needs to excite the top at least as much as by playing loud notes on the instrument. And on all notes of the instrument. That is the reason why it takes so long.