MostlyBass.com

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Last Friday I received a cortisone shot in my right arm for tennis elbow / tendonitis. WOW! What a difference. It really worked!

Coming soon – a review of D’Addario’s new Zyex double bass strings!!

Mariner Software, makers of some of my favorite software including MacJournal, StoryMill, and Paperless is having a 40% of sale.

Visit http://www.marinersoftware.com/store/cart.php

and use Coupon Code: 20YEARS

I’ve been reading The Practice Revolution by Philip Johnston and I’m revising my school practice records to focus on goals, missions, methods and results rather than just minutes practices per week.

As my experiment with flatwound strings continues I’m really getting into their sound. I ordered two different kinds – Fender and LaBella. The Fender is a much louder, stiffer string while the LaBella Deep Talkin’ feels a lot like a gut string and lacks punch.

So what will my next string be? Of course I’ll have to try the halfwound – a happy medium between round and flatwound.

Do you have a favorite saying that your teacher or conductor often repeats? Post it in the comments!! You do NOT have to identify the person and in some cases it may be better not to…

Here’s one from a regular reader:

• When Warren Benfield thought I was using too much rosin he said, “Don’t be a rosaholic.”

Years ago I bought a Cushy brand case for my bass. At the time they were almost identical to the well known Mooradian cases. Recently I had a student purchase a new Cushy case. Cushy has redesigned their cases and they feel cheap and don’t fit well.  They bow pocket is smaller and doesn’t fit a bow case any more. Stick with the Mooradian!

Hey readers! I’m home recovering from foot surgery and can only play my bass guitar…. So I decided to experiment with flatwound strings – something I haven’t played on since high school. I was looking for a rounder thicker sound for my electric bass. I left the low B string a regular roundwound to keep the definition on the low and replaced the top 4 strings with Fender Medium Flatwounds. Initial reactions:

-Definitely less volume than roundwounds
-Less sustain
-They have a very old school reggae sound

I’m still undecided if I like them or not but of course I’ll give them a week or two to see.

Thoughts on strings? Let me know!

What’s your favorite bass amp?

Right now I’m playing through an SWR LA-15 100-watt combo amp. It’s impressively loud and I like the extra inputs for practice tools such as a drum machine.

Have an idea for an article? Need to vent your bass issues? Want to contribute to MostlyBass.com? It’d be great to have some guest writers and contributors for this blog.

Email me at tambroni AT hotmail DOT com

So yesterday I’m practicing Brahms 2 with a metronome and I realized that the metronome wasn’t helping me. I was just playing catch up and slow down to be with it. Ugh. This excerpt (as all do) really needs to groove – the eighth notes need to be perfectly even and clear and the quarter notes need to, well, groove.

So I turned my metronome off. I picked up my drum machine. Set it to play 1/16s on the hi-hat, bass drum on 1 & 3, and snare on 2 & 4 – you’re basic 1/16 beat. I played along… VOILA! Now we got a groove. My foot was tapping, I was enjoying the excerpt a whole lot more and it was nicely in time. I tried it without the drum machine. Still grooving! Ah, on to Marriage of Figaro.

Metronomes, like tuners, are not the be all end all solutions to problems. As a matter of fact, for the more advanced musician, they are probably better ‘check-in’ devices to make sure things are on track. But a drum machine creates groove and makes practicing a whole lot more fun.

I use the Alesis SR-18 which is nice but cumbersome to use. I’d recommend the older SR-16. For less expensive options try using loops in GarageBand or do a search for drum machine software. I just splurged on some expensive beat creation software for my recording and will post a review on that soon.

FunkDlite

Left4Dead

All words and music by me.

After owning both the DP-004 and the DP-008 there is no contest. All the complaints I had about the DP-004 are fixed in the DP-008 such as:

-Backlit display
-Easy access to the SD card
-XLR inputs
-Reverb (and good ones by the way) for each track
-EQ for each track
-More cut and paste options for tracks
-More dedicated buttons such as for the metronome and tuner
-Auto punch in and out
-Footswitch input for punch in / out

This is an awesome piece of equipment! If you’re just looking for instant feedback and playing along with practice tracks the DP-004 is fine. But if you want to do anything more, then go for the DP-008. I got mine for $214 from a store on eBay named Unique Squared.

After using my Tascam DP-004 for a while I decided to upgrade to the DP-008 8-track version. Ah yeah!

Another school year has come to a close. This year was a busy one. It was my first year as vice president of our teacher’s association and I was also on the negotiation team for our new contract. Oh and I taught too

Each year I reflect on how I can improve what I did for next year to give my kids a more positive experience. I also recharge by reading books, practicing, and hitting the gym a lot!!

My goals for next include tweaking my rehearsals to be more productive for longer stretches of time and working to stay refreshed throughout the school year. That’s tough. How to not get a little tired at some point. But I figure I’ll change things the moment I feel stale or start playing more with the students – they know I love to play the bass.

I’m currently reading Talent Is Overrated by Geoff Colvin – I highly recommend it. Despite it’s business focus it uses many music examples from throughout history.

One of my summer goals is to be more active on posting here. If you’re reading this and would like to be a guest blogger, please let me know.

“It doesn’t matter where you sit in the orchestra. What matters is that you are in the orchestra!” – a former student!!!