unusual string configuration

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unusual string configuration

Postby drakula63 » Fri Jan 18, 2019 11:39 am

I'll confess that this is something I've never seen before...

Has this bass player got his bass strung the opposite way round? Thick strings at the bottom, thin at the top? As I say, never seen that done before.

Go to 18 mins 22 sec.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Hq-6K8YYJY
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby rogera » Fri Jan 18, 2019 11:47 am

We have a guitarist at our club that plays left handed with his strings upside down and this is just the same but with a bass.

A very confusing concept!
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby drakula63 » Fri Jan 18, 2019 11:59 am

...Yeah.

My Sherlock Holmes-like powers of deduction tell me that he is left-handed and probably taught himself to play the bass on a right-handed bass, held upside down! Now whilst that may not present problems as such - if that's the way he's taught himself - surely this makes his way of playing quite unique and surely it must also be impossible for him to follow conventional tablature, music notation and exercises, etc? This would also be true of the guitarist you speak of. And surely if they tried to learn by watching other guitarists fingers on the fretboard, it would be all wrong?!!!

I just find it intriguing. Actually, my brain hurts now. :?
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby Jay Bass » Fri Jan 18, 2019 2:07 pm

If you look at Dick Dale playing he also has the guitar strung with the bass strings on the bottom
its basicly a right handed guitar played upside down by a left handed guitarist.

regards
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby JimN » Fri Jan 18, 2019 4:05 pm

Over the years (decades) I have met several guitarists and bassists who play with the bass strings "at the bottom". If I recall correctly, wasn't the bass player of the Bay City Rollers a LH player who played a RH-strung Jazz bass?
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby RayL » Sat Jan 19, 2019 9:34 am

Err, Chris, do you spend ALL your time looking at Youtube videos?
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby George Geddes » Sat Jan 19, 2019 10:16 am

Jim

Yes, Alan Longmuir played that way. Could probably have afforded a custom bass in later years...

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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby drakula63 » Sat Jan 19, 2019 12:23 pm

RayL wrote:Err, Chris, do you spend ALL your time looking at Youtube videos?


Yeah. Apart from when I'm on here talking about them.
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby JimN » Sat Jan 19, 2019 3:58 pm

George Geddes wrote:Jim

Yes, Alan Longmuir played that way. Could probably have afforded a custom bass in later years...

George


I thought so.

The Jazz Bass must be the popular model which is least suited to being played upside down, and it stuck in the memory for that reason.
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Re: unusual string configuration

Postby johnc » Sun Jan 20, 2019 4:37 am

Back in the day, there were a lot of players who were left handed and they had to play like that...proper left handed guitars were very rare...and left handed basses were even harder to find.

Some people restrung their right handed guitars to facilitate playing left handed, some pressed on and learned to play 'upside down'..a lot of lefties could play either way!!

My dear old pal who was the bass player in my first band built himself a left handed solidbody electric guitar at secondary school (woodwork lessons!) and our drummer built him two left handed basses for use in the band...
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