“It’s gotten to be an epidemic on Bass Forums. Someone posts a picture of a 6, 7, 10 or more string bass. Someone else posts, “Get a harp! What is that, a skateboard? That’s not a real bass!” I have little to no patience with this.
When I started playing Electric Bass and even attempting to play Jazz on it there was a large population of fellow Musicians and Educators that told me in all sincerity that the Electric Bass wasn’t a real instrument and that I should play the “Real Bass”-i.e. a String Bass. Currently, I direct one of the preeminent Electric Bass programs in a smaller Music School (Belmont University’s Wilson School of Music) and it’s one of the few places in the United States (along with most notably Berklee School of Music under the direction of my friend and colleague Steve Bailey and Cal Arts and USC under the direction of Alphonso Johnson) where you can focus on the Electric Bass. 40 years after I was told the Electric “Fender” Bass was not a “Real Bass” I can still count the Schools of Music that allow an Electric Bass Principal on both hands.Of course, you can tune into Youtube and Spotify and Bass on the Broadband and hear players like Jeff Berlin, Stanley Clarke, Steve Swallow, Hadrien Feraud, Victor Wooten, Anthony Jackson, John Pattitucci and Jaco Pastorius playing Electric Bass in Jazz
In 1983 I bought my first 6 string electric bass, a Modulus Quantum 6 followed quickly by two 5 strings. I had recording engineers tell me in all earnest that it was unusable, that the B string wouldn’t be reproduced, that an electric bass should only go to a low E. This seems ludicrous in light of how many sessions I’ve done in the past 30 years on 5 and 6 string basses. It’s amazing to think that ONE additional string was too much and TWO was bordering on blasphemy. I discovered over the 31 years I’ve played More Than Four String Basses that what matters is not the Tool but the Music you make with it. One of my longest tenures on any gig was 7 1/2 years with the legendary Engelbert Humperdinck. I toured the world and recorded with him on 6 and 7 string basses. Trust me, you can play “Please Release Me” and “Spanish Eyes” on a Conklin 7 String!
It strikes me that what has happened is that we’ve forgotten that our instrument is still not regarded as a “legit” Musical Instrument in many circles. For there to be self-appointed Guardians of Bass Purity making sure that we are all dutifully playing Fender 4 string basses (hopefully strung with flatwound strings) as God and Leo Fender intended strikes me as ludicrous in the extreme. I chose to stop at 7 strings. Many of my friends like Stew McKinsey, Edo Castro, and Scott Fernandez play many more strings than I do. I look at what they are doing and say to myself, “That’s cool! It’s not for me, but it’s cool!” I do have a Chapman Stick if I wish to venture beyond 7 strings, but I will leave these gentlemen to their multi-string Monsters with the acceptance that “it’s not for me, but it’s cool.”
I would invite the Multi-String Bass Police to consider this. Bass is a function, and the Electric Bass, the String Bass, Organ Pedals, Synth Bass the Bass Voice and the Sousaphone and Tuba all are Instruments. Don’t confuse one with the other. You can play (or sing) Bass on any of the Instruments. The Tool is not the Music.
In conclusion, my belief is that the best Instrument a Musician can possess is an Open Mind.”
#nailed. Thank you Roy for sharing this piece! I’m lucky to have met a good share of open-minded musicians who embraced what I could do on my instrument. And I’ve encountered hate because some people are obsessed with SEEING the string count versus HEARING the music one makes.