I Got A Double Bass

Well - as somebody who did the same thing a while ago, the really important thing is to play, and play and play - ONCE you have the basic setup mastered. Killer things like getting the height right, and then marking the peg so it's always the same, so muscle memory will get the intonation sorted and reliable. Depending on how good you were on electric bass, you should find transition pretty simple - but painful as your muscles in the left hand will be nowhere near strong enough. Play through the pain. Remember the basic rules - as in the limited things your third finger can do. I don't know what kind of music is your favourite - but play along with it worked magically for me. An hour of random popular big band music worked great for me from Spotify. You know the style, the chords and the end result - and you just go for it, and slowly the accuracy gets better, the brain works out the best fingering and your muscles obey your brain. No easy route bar hard work.
 
I can't offer any advice, but I can offer some congrats. So yeah, Congrats. and good luck.

I love playing bass, but I have zero desire to play double bass.
 
Well - as somebody who did the same thing a while ago, the really important thing is to play, and play and play - ONCE you have the basic setup mastered. Killer things like getting the height right, and then marking the peg so it's always the same, so muscle memory will get the intonation sorted and reliable. Depending on how good you were on electric bass, you should find transition pretty simple - but painful as your muscles in the left hand will be nowhere near strong enough. Play through the pain. Remember the basic rules - as in the limited things your third finger can do. I don't know what kind of music is your favourite - but play along with it worked magically for me. An hour of random popular big band music worked great for me from Spotify. You know the style, the chords and the end result - and you just go for it, and slowly the accuracy gets better, the brain works out the best fingering and your muscles obey your brain. No easy route bar hard work.

Day 3 and already I can find C and not look at where I am, just visualizing where I am on that fingerboard, that's so weird but weirder is how somehow I'm actually finding nearly accurate notes. My favorite thing I fall back on is starting on C and walking up from E to G and A back to C in half steps, the standard bluesy gospel sounding thing that could be supporting a C chord or C to G change with that walk up to G just being a walk up to the 5 on a C chord, but I tend to do that a lot, but shifting it up to the next octave by using the G and D strings is harder since it requires 4 notes - I keep thinking frets, but no open notes so that part of it it harder and I don't know the correct fingering yet so I avoid it since I think I kinda wanna get it right from the start with this thing. I think it's time to make a video.
 
I can't offer any advice, but I can offer some congrats. So yeah, Congrats. and good luck.

I love playing bass, but I have zero desire to play double bass.

Thanks It's very cool to feel the sound without any amplification and then that bow makes it much louder, very unique and awesome.
 
I has also made my bad back much, much better because the right stance for the bass is balanced over your feet, and your core muscles don't have to work the wrong way - so it's therapy too! I made the (wrong) assumption that playing fretless bass a little would help. It really doesn't!
I found that the real key was root to 5th on first to fourth finger - and once you get that right, the octave falls nicely too. What really was hard was using open strings. I'd not realised what a lazy player I'd become on my 5 string - using a left hand that had access to anything just by going up and down the neck. Suddenly having to USE open strings was hard work - to re-learn. F Major - never a problem on the five string, suddenly because a 'hard' key, as did Ab and Eb - common in double bass type music, and on the 5 string Eb, E or F was just a tone away on the neck. Arco came back to me almost straight way - from those cello lessons when I was 8-15. Something I'd not done for 40 years suddenly came straight back! I have trouble remembering if I had breakfast, yet I can play fine with a bow.
 
Update. I'm now finding a lot more notes up the neck, but mainly on the G string. Not spending as much time on it as I'd like to. I also have to stop after a while from various pain. But I did adjust the angle from straight up to leaning more towards me which helped a lot with keeping my elbow out and closer to a right angle to the neck like it should be. if bass was vertical, it was too hard to keep arm out and up, but leaning helps a lot, and that was also has easier access higher up the neck. It still is amazing to have it and amazing that any notes can actually be found with no frets or dots and I decided to skip the tape markers too, I can hear it and I'd rather not have to look at every finger placement either. I'll have to post some sounds soon.
 
My favorite thing I fall back on is starting on C and walking up from E to G and A back to C in half steps, the standard bluesy gospel sounding thing that could be supporting a C chord or C to G change with that walk up to G just being a walk up to the 5 on a C chord, but I tend to do that a lot
My favourite thing was getting enamel paint and painting lines on the fingerboard because I'm lazy and want to have the sound of the double bass in some of my songs, not the expertise of playing something I'll only record with.:D

I found that the real key was root to 5th on first to fourth finger - and once you get that right, the octave falls nicely too
I found that the key was tuning each string on a tuner, then step by step finding each note, painting a marker with enamel paint until I'd reached the bottom of the fingerboard, then remove the strings, paint a nice straight line across, wait 2 days for the paint to dry, restring and re-tune, play around a bit to make sure everything was in tune and fine and dandy and then record that sucker until my neck, back and arms gave way ! :thumbs up:
 
Hitting the right place with a finger is nothing compared to playing the Moog Theramini I bought myself for Christmas. You cannot draw lines in the air! AND - as you have too tune it every time it is turned on to compensate for the space it is in, the actual place you put your hand changes every single power up. The thing is fund, has amazing sounds and if you want to play the theremin like the amazing people on YouTube, there is a vital ingredient missing. Not just talent, but witchcraft, honestly!
 
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