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Why do you play bass ??

#161
Originally i played classical violin, but i sucked so hard at reading sheetmusic that i had too listen to all the pieces and learn them after my ear which on the other hand is very good.

A couple of friends was starting a band and needed a bassplayer and someone said i should become a bassplayer because of my ability too play after my ear, since then its been only bass for me and never looked back. :) Pluss when i was 14 and my dad showed me a slap solo of Abe Laboriel on one of the tracks on a koinonia album I really knew that bass was what I had too get good at
 
#165
I started guitar in 4th grade. After a while it seemed like something I wouldn't keep up with.
When I was sixteen I wanted to take guitar back up,but it seemed like everyone I knew had an uncle,brother,cousin,etc that was apparently a guitar god. After a while I got tired of hearing of all these unseen guitar gods with their supernatural abilities and thought,"Hey I'll try bass."
 
#167
I played guitar for ten years and was never around a bass player. Then I joined a duo and we decided to recruit a bass player (this was 33 years ago and we still get together to play). Anyway, I saw how much bass added to our guitars and harp (I switched back & forth) and some songs came along that the bass player wanted to play guitar on, so I started picking it up.

Along the way I added Dobro to my repertory and joined another band where the bass player and I regularly traded off on instruments. Then, a little over ten years ago when I was heavily into recording, I recorded a CD for a local lady. She wanted bass on some of the songs (it was a folkie album) so I tracked some bass. A friend of hers called her and asked if she knew a bass player, and he gave him my phone number. He and another guy had a gig coming up in a week, opening for a guy having a CD release party, so I learned 16 songs in seven days (the first time I played the material without the lead sheets was at the gig). Finally, we started a serious gigging band with me on bass, and I pretty much have devoted myself to the bass ever since (I played harp in the orchestra pit for a State U production of Big River).

Currently I play bass in a combo with two harmony singers, a guitarist and a percussionist, and I couldn't be happier. I get to throw in a few fills and intros and so on, and we have a groove that makes us smile when we play. Playing guitar is one thing, but interacting with a really good guitarist and percussionist is heaven. :D
 
#169
Was a child (8or9) when used to sneaked-in to a six members local band rehearsal,
and sit on the guitar and bass players speaker cabs back-n'-forth... the guitarist was amazing,
and used to watch him with mouth wide open, but couldn't feel the tingles in my ba... (between my legs)
that used to feel when I sat down on the bass player cab... so, then I told myself... -whatever that is, I will
learn to play it-, 40 years later, am still learning, and love it...
 
#171
At school all the kids who were interested in starting a band had guitars, cheap Spanish, acoustic, electric, there were droves of them. Except for the rich kid who had a drum kit, and me who had neither a guitar nor any money. They needed a bass player and I was the obvious choice because non of them wanted to be "demoted" from guitar.

I had a word with the woodwork teacher (very strict but also very fair) about building a bass, expecting it to be refused but he was all for it. Between us we cobbled together a design for a bass starting from a set of plans for an acoustic guitar in a woodworking magazine (1967 so no internet!) - Short scale, SG shape, all oak, weighed a ton, but it was good enough to start to learn to play on so I am very grateful to him.

I always had a desire to play guitar so acquired an my old electric guitar (and put a lot of woodshed time in) and finally got the chance in the 80s. Played lead for about 12 years until our bass player quit and I took his place. I now have absolutely no desire to go back on guitar.
 
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#175
I started off on the piano, then moved to keyboard. I always had a liking for bass though. And as I was at a school who had an orchestra I thought I go for the Double Bass. Was told I was to small, which was weird because I was one of the tallest learn at my school even though I was in a low grade. I got stuck with the violin... I accepted that bitterly. When I got to high school. I was a rock fanatic... And my friends where musicians too. So my forcefully suppress love for the bass was brought back to the surface... Finally managed to twist my mom's arm to get a new instrument...

Hoping it would be a bass... Got an acoustic guitar instead. It wasn't until last year that I managed to buy myself my first baby, a SX bass. And I don't regret getting her for one bit...
 
#176
fatt matt said:
Why do you play bass ?
Click to expand...

Because I love to play bass. It makes me happy.
Bass is silent commander in a band. What chord being played can be dictated by bass.
I was keyboard player in my first band (although before that I had short experience as my elementary school ensemble & choir -double-bassist),..
First time I (really) be the bass player in my band (untill now), I feel joyous...I'm proud to be a bass player.
 
#177
I started playing guitar because my cousin did in a popular rock cover band that played at school dances and stuff. (Yes, schools used to have real bands play at dances.)

Anyway, he let me use one if his guitars but I found myself playing bass parts on the lower 4 strings.

I eventually got a bass and the rest is history.
 
#178
I started playing the bass because I was the smallest runt amongst my cousins when we formed a band (I was 11, and we had this idea of forming a group but hadn't yet picked our instruments). I invariably got the last choice available which was the bass. Everyone else wanted the drums or guitar.
I showed them later on when I got the biggest amplifier and sought out to drown out everyone else every chance I got. Sweet justice. lol
 
#179
Like thousands of other bass players I started playing guitar in the mid-60s and when my first opportunity to join a band came along in 1967 they needed a bass player. I was it. Still play guitar but the bass and I are joined at the hip, fingers and ears.
 

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