LeftyBassist.com

I recently registered for basschat.co.uk and someone is starting up a lefty bassist thread. he started it today and right now, me and him are being harassed by righties. we need to get more lefties on that scene to show them that we're everywhere! So far the support is showing up but at a very slow pace, so I need anyone who's alefty (everyone registered) to register on basschat and give us some support!

Link to thread?

I think here it is : http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=51304&hl=

"leftybassist.com is the closest it comes and its pretty poor from what I've seen"

Alright! Now I can see why we should be lending our support to Josh's bid for a lefty forum on basschat, because apparently he thinks we aren't very good here!

Josh started that thread after he and I discussed the notion. I had suggested that it might be a good idea to have a dedicated lefty forum on Basschat (so that Lefties were properly represented on a UK forum). He agreed to start the thread, and what can best be described as a 'lively' debate took place over the next few days. The regs indicated to us that they would monitor the situation but were initially not keen. Current situation is that people have stated their views, and things have gone kind of quiet. My worry is that it'll all get conveniently forgotten and things will go on as they have been - unfortunately we don't seem to see lefthandedness as a serious issue in the UK. Or should I say, those of us that do have so far been unable to generate enough momentum to change enough people's minds. For what it's worth, I wouldn't take Josh's comments too personally. You might find it useful to consider his views as pro - Basschat rather than anti - Leftybassist. He's a good guy and was just trying to get people to think seriously about the issue.

If you want to have a look at the debate, try following this link:-

http://basschat.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=51304

I used to be on basschat but left, it was too....perhaps childish is the word.

Just to be clear, I'm not looking for a fight (and am not going to take part in a 'my forum is better than your forum' argument). If this is your view then that's fine with me. I care about being left handed in a right handed world, and try to get other people to think about it more than they normally would whenever I can. I joined this forum to share space with like-minded people: isn't that why we're all here?

I've said this many times here before but the reality still seems to not be accepted that there are very few lefty bass players online. I know it gets suggested that there's plenty of us because Arni has over 500 guys registered on his site, but not all 500 of those guys are actively participating in online bass forums. It took Arni years of work to collect that list too. We have over 200 registered members here, but plenty of those members have never posted or are very sporadic. I think we have a core of about 20 members (so about 10%) who are active on here on a regular basis. And there's only so much that few guys can do to regularly keep fresh discussion going. That shouldn't be a discouraging fact, but it is fact; any lefty bassist related forum is going to move very slow. It will build slow, it will get added to slowly. It would be wonderful to have a forum with the pace of fresh topics like talkbass, basschat, BOP, BABP etc. but the only way that can happen is to get more people actively and routinely participating in the forum. So we're in a catch 22; the only way to make the forum move faster, have more fresh content, etc. is to get more people on here, but then people accustomed to the pace of regular (ie. righty) forums come here and are disappointed by the lack of fresh content/pace and don't post.

While Josh might think there are hundreds of lefty bass players chomping at the bit to join a new, fresh forum dedicated to left handed bass playing, that simply isn't the case. I don't take offense by Josh calling this forum poor, but I think to expect much more than what we have here from a forum on basschat is unrealistic. I think the response to the thread on basschat thus far reflects that.

That being said: I am proud of the tiny oasis we've built here in a desert of right handed dominant forums, but I have no designs on cornering the market on left handed bass forums. If you guys think there's merit to a second forum elsewhere and want to make it happen more power to you. I'm not a computer savvy guy, I'm certain there's a lefty forum far fancier than this that could be made. I have no business connected to this forum, no designs to ever make money from it, so I don't feel any competition with other potential forums. I thought there was a need to have a lefty bass forum after the DP and there were a lot of guys whom I've enjoyed chatting with for years that I wanted to continue to be in touch with, so this place came to be. I do think having all the lefty guys under one roof would make for a better forum, but I don't have to be the guy who built that roof. If anyone has a vision for a better forum make it and if I like it more than here I'll join your forum!

Don't worry, you won't find a fight over this here. The point of this place is to be a resource for lefty bass people everywhere, not the hot forum of the week. We aren't trying to one-up any other bass forum (because hey, if we tried to compete with most of them we'd get our butts kicked on numbers alone ).

If you're feeling like the UK is under-represented here you're welcome to encourage all the lefty UK guys to come on here and get active and make this place your home too. I don't think it's going to help get a more UK represented lefty forum on basschat if we all go join basschat. All that'd do is add a lot more North American/European content to your UK forum.

Since your mini-tirade(as I perceive it, perhaps I'm wrong) was in response to my post, I'll simply say thay my original post to this thread was my way of stating that I would not be visiting the forum that the OP suggested, that's all.

I'll spread the word. Sad to say I agree with everything you said above. Personally I'm not looking for large numbers and I'm not looking to be marginalised as I was accused during the Basschat debate. All my life (over 50 years of it to date) I've tried to convince people that being left handed is different in a way that being tall (for example) isn't. Mostly people smile benevolently, but every once in a while I manage to get under someone's skin (which I view as a result because when they calm down they might actually think a bit more about what I've said). I'll bet every member of this forum knows exactly what I'm talking about.

In the meantime, and in case I didn't say it before, thanks for the welcome.

Look at the bright side - think of how much money we've all saved by not being able to purchase cool instruments that aren't made in left-handed versions!

Seriously, only two things annoy me about being a lefty player. One is rarely being able to join in an impropteau musical activity at a party or whatever since the instruments lying around are inevitably right-handed. The other is being chided by another player for not simply "learning to play righty." That almost never happens BTW, but when it does I tell them that teachers who force lefty students to learn to write right-handed can actually be reprimanded on several counts including discrimination and unprofessional conduct.

Couldn't agree more! Goes for music tutors as well IMHO. Trouble is, nobody wants to hear it. Still, it's nice when I get lefty students say to me 'Wow! It all makes sense now!' after I've got them to swap over.

After reading the basschat thread, and seeing how a sincere attempt to create a section for lefties has gone woefully downhill, I am glad that leftyBassist is here for us. Since joining this forum back in November '08, I've appreciated all of the information that's been posted, and how little bashing, and "chiding" I've seen. The one thing that annoys me over at Talkbass is how quickly someone can be attacked for a question (especially newbies), or for presenting their opinion on a subject they care about. There is literally none of that here, and we all are genuinely interested in helping and informing one another on all things bass. I thank you all for that!

As you can tell by all of the threads my fivebass52 monicker appears in (and seems to end!:)) I enjoy checking in to LeftyBassist on a daily, and sometimes, hourly basis! My new passion for Ibanez ATK basses was enhanced by the feedback from you all, and especially Jeroen. I learn more and more each day on what is out there on lefty basses, and am amazed at times by how much history and technical knowledge is written on a particular bass (for example the recent thread on the Rickenbacker), that you all seem to possess. At times I feel like a young kid in a toy store! At age 57, when it comes to playing and learning about all things bass, it's easy to maintain that kid-like wonder - especially when reading through the threads here!

To sum up, I think this is one of the best forums I've seen, regardless of subject. We may be a small community of musicians, and, as was stated earlier, it would be nice to see more participation from more members, but I've seen our forum grow gradually, and it seems like there is more interest. It's nice to see some new members from Russia and that area. I like the world view our members bring...

And thanks to Andrew for firing this forum up... kudos to you! You and Arni appear to be selfless and sincere in maintaining your sites for us lefties to enjoy, and it's refreshing not to have to put up with the b*llsh*t and bad comedians/cynics that all too often take the joy out of reading through other music forums. Lefties are great!

Mahalo and Aloha,
Ian

I was very fortunate in that my very first bass teacher - who was a righty - thought it would be silly for me to try and learn right-handed if it didn't feel comfortable. His view was that I would spend so much time building coordination by forcing my body to work backwards, that I could get discouraged and would quit before even learning a single song. Enlightened!!

And he was absolutely right! Kudos to your teacher.

I went for guitar lessons to a local music store when I was first interested in playing as a kid, and when I sat down for my first lesson I instinctively flipped the righty loaner guitar I had upside down. The teacher replied, "What are you doing? Flip it back the other way," to which I replied, "But it feels better to me this way." His response was, "What do you know about how it should feel? You don't even know how to play yet!". That was the one and only time I went for a guitar lesson.

In the UK, that still happens a lot more often than you would believe. I belong to a professional association called the Registry of Guitar Tutors, and a couple of years ago I had an extended argument with one of the Registry's 'golden boy' tutors about exactly this topic through the pages of our professional journal. After several months and some pretty frank exchanges the editor stepped in and forced a truce. Bottom line, the guy just didn't get it. I don't want to sound bitter and twisted (cos I really enjoy my job), but I do sometimes get very depressed about the kind of disservice many of my professional colleagues are doing to their lefty students.

LB392 - Glad you stood up to your colleague about this! This story backs you up even more IMHO:

My initial electric bass teacher was also my guitar teacher and he was the go-to guy for the New York Philharmonic Orchestra when they needed a guitarist and a university professor to boot. So he was steeped in classical tradition, traditional teaching etc. No slouch! He said that, unlike orchestral string instruments which have very strict technical rules for all kinds of reasons, guitar and electric bass are folk instruments. That basically liberates the player to play lefty if he/she is naturally left-handed. He said he'd also seen plenty of classical guitarists play lefty too so there really is no reason not to take advantage of it.

When I was a kid there were no tutors to tell me how to do it, so I just played the way that felt normal to me. The learning and advanced technique came much later. So here's my tip for success as a Lefty: be older! Simple!