LeftyBassist.com

was at the right place at the right time this afternoon



Yves Carbonne playing a session with his new extended range fretless at the Jerzy Drozd booth

all the best,

R

Insane.

FYI, Yves came to my house a few years ago to check out my '77 J when I was selling it. He took the bus into Jersey from Manhattan with his wife. Both very people, though I'm ashamed to say I had no idea who he was at the time. He REALLY wanted my '72 instead, but I wasn't willing to part with it.

That's just not right! Very cool!

That's a lot of strings!

Yves is one of the small group of guys who are really pushing back the bounderies of bass guitar in so many ways. The man has a vision and the skills to realize it and I'm glad that there are several builders out there who are open minded enough to be willing to build such instruments.

There's boundaries?

Only those which people create within their minds.

Unfortunately there are many of our fellow bass players that harbor rather narrow conceptions as to what defines Bass both physically and musically and believe that outside of that traditional form and/or application cease to be Bass.

You and I are members of many of the same forums across the internet. Would you or would you not agree that there exists a fair amount of prejudice against ERBs and their players/advocates? I am often surprised and saddened by all the various ways that some bassplayers disparage others.

It is my belief that bass playing, like music itself, is a vast landscape and there is plenty of room for everyone to explore it in whatever way one feels compelled to.

Totally agree. What a awesome bass

Don't call me closed minded or anything, but I can't STAND the sound of the sitar strings on the top of his bass. I feel like it would be sweet if it didn't sound like a sitar.

I got to play the bass yesterday and the top strings didn't sound anything like a sitar to me, nor did they when Yves played it. Maybe the sitar sound is a fuction of technique or recording trickery? ...

The bass was surprisingingly easy to play with the exception of the lowest string - unless I was standing up. In which case it was still a bit of a stretch to play the lowest notes, but much easier as my wrist wasn't bent as much. Bass is ultra light as well, with a wide strap i don't think I'd suffer any neck fatigue. It's a LOT lighter than my 76 P-bass.

I watched a youtube video in which the high strings were clearly sitar strings. Both confirmed by sounds and user comments. Maybe it was a different bass though

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILbAVo6FBKI

#

There are no sitar strings on this instrument.

You'll notice the 3 highest strings shine in the light, that's because they are made of steel wire. They are plain steel guitar strings, exactly the same as the 3 highest strings on an electric guitar but made longer to fit a bass. Since the highest string is tuned a wholetone higher than the highest string on a guitar Yves uses special high strength plain steel bass strings made by Octave 4 Plus.

Yves discussed all this on his forum.
menokefug 3 months ago 2
menokefug 3 months ago 2

I don't know him personnaly, but he seems to be a very interesting guy. He actually own 2 '63 fender, one of them has been used by french luthier Christian Noguera for his reedition of the Noguera JazzBass. you can see his collection on arni's community.

How many strings on this "Bass" ?

I have a hard time to find my notes on my 6 strings and feel the string's position.

You have to spend a lot of time on this kind of axe before it feels natural I guess.