25yr guitar player....just purchased my first fretless bass

[warwickvette]

I jumped on the fretless bandwagon in a big way.
I traded all my guitar stuff and $ for a warwick corvette
4 string fretless.AWESOME!!!
Ive always been the kind of person who loves to improv
on the fly and always wants to never repeat myself.
This has been a long overdue need to change instruments.
I think i am made for fretless as far as the fun factor.
Im not too good now but im sure as much as i play i will get
a little better at it.
Cheers

[FretLessSince68]

Super, the world needs more fretless bassists. Soon the guitar will feel like a toy.

I agree, improvisation is more available to bassists than most people realize. Often one thinks that the soloist is the one doing the improvisation, but wait, what's that, open your ears and listen to the bass and drums duke it out.

As a long time fretless player the one magic bullet piece of advice I can relay is to make sure that your left thumb stays behind the neck, and that your left hand position changes are controlled.

Practice boring mundane scales until you don't have to think about them anymore, then you are free to use the emotional aspects of the instrument where every note you play can have a dimension of expression not available to fretted players.

Develop a nice violin style vibrato, work on varying the vibrato from slow/suble/gentle to fast/nervous/irritating. There is a whole world of expression available.

Use Glissando (sliding note) when the time is right, it can save you when you blank on a note, adds that unique to fretless sound. Don't over use the Glissando, reserve it for the right moment.

Learn extended left hand position, listen to Alain Caron.

Good luck with your beautiful Warwick axe.

[mick monger]

Hey - I'm in a similar situation - been playing forever, now I found a fretless! Sure, I've listened to Jaco for years, and all the rest. It's a whole new thang, and it recharges my bass batteries. I have half a dozen basses, but frets are out at this point! One optimistic note - a friend of mine's been playin fretless for over 30 years, says "fretless is easier" - I love the guy. The neck sure seems slinky! Best of all, when ya wanna play along with the radio, ya don't hafta re-tune! WILD! good luck.....

[FretLessSince68]

Playing fretless has an additional level of technique similar to the violin family where one has to maintain good intonation. Really, intonation is one of the gods of fretless bass playing.

Once you have intonation nailed, and some never get it, THEN I suppose it can be said that playing fretless is easyer because the physical effort required of the left hand is lower providing that the instrument action is also low.

The point you bring up about playing to out of tune tracks or muscians is an important subject. Yes, this is a very valuable aspect of fretless. It does require that you keep your ears open as the compensated position you are now playing in is not concert and your position markers are now merely a reference to the altered pitch, or pitch offset. Your ability to maintain "being in tune with the source" is a skill that will benefit you greatly. I never tune my instrument flat, at this stage of my life it is easyer to play microtonalities.

If doing this you must avoid open string notes!!!!!!

I can't tell you the number of times this ability has saved a flat singer from sounding bad. They often do not even know that I modified my pitch to be on with them. I would not do this at rehearsal but on the gig making the show sound good takes priority.

This is another example of the expanded pallet that fretless players have to draw upon.

If at a jam session and some guy comes on stage with an out of tune guitar, you can make him sound good by compensating your pitch. Of course if other intonated instruments are also playing you can only fudge it a bit, sort of split the difference. This is a delicate skill requiring an ear. I would always prefer everyone to be properly tuned, but in the real world there are often problems that you can make go away with subtle pitch massaging.

The down side of all this is that the out of tune instrumentalist may not "hear" that he/she is out. So in a way, we fretless players are doing a disservice to the out of tune player to fudge the pitch to make them sound better. That's why I don't do this at rehearsal.

[FretLessSince68]

On the comical side of pitch offset control.

As you are probably aware, the human ear usually uses the lowest pitch in a musical sound to define a "key center". This means that an out of tune bass can make the entire group sound sour.

I once was in a group that had a guitarist who was a real butt. An egoist of the highest order and did actually expect the rest of the band to move his gear for him. His solos would go on forever and he came close to usurping the exhalted title of Kenny "too many" G for musical diarrhea.

So one night during his solo I deliberately played a quarter tone sharp, returning to correct pitch after the solo was done. His entire solo sounded flat, sour, and stupid, like a giant mistake. I was rewarded to see the audience looking up at the bandstand with expressions on their faces as if they were sucking lemons. He never mentioned it, I don't think he even noticed what I did, nor did anyone else, and I got revenge for years of suffering his giant ego and mega loud musical snot.

I've only done this once in my entire life so don't think I make a practice of it. It was sweet at the time though. I still laugh about this one, he deserved it.

The moral of the story is that we fretless bass players have a responsibility to be on pitch and have good intonation, or the entire group will sound bad. Oh, and be nice, we have the power.

[mick monger]

Your comments are insightful, and I learn alot from your writings. Keep on doing your good work, I read each entry and try and process your information. This is the exact reason I logged into this site, to learn, grow and get bigger as a bassist. I've been writing to the new folks on the forum, hoping to encourage them. I'm no expert, I defer the technical stuff to your expertise, and I look forward to your new postings. Thanks, dude! Most helpful...........

[FretLessSince68]

Thanks, Mick, for the kind words. It's participation that makes a forum grow and get better.

The questions and comments you, I, and others, submit, are what any good learning environment needs to stay current and involved.

Thank-you!

[FretLessSince68]

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