Site photo relic bass

[Grant]

Why is the site photo relic bass strung upside down for a lefty with the E string on the bottom? Has anyone else noticed this?

[Matt R.]

Belongs to an admin. That’s how they string their bass.

[Grant]

Oh so they must have learnt by turning a righty up the other way.

[Matt R.]

There are a few here that do the same thing.

[ezstep]

I have met many who play the "right" way, and I have met plenty who play the "other" way. Nothing correct or incorrect about it. Watch a few Keith Horne videos.

[fivebass52]

I have met many who play the "right" way, and I have met plenty who play the "other" way. Nothing correct or incorrect about it. Watch a few Keith Horne videos.

Keith... you just mentioned one of my Bass Heroes! Bought his first CD years back, from him directly. Found his email address, started a correspondence with him for awhile... very nice guy!

[ezstep]

I met him, once, when the bass players took over the world (remember those?) in Nashville at NAMM. Dave Pomeroy, Dave Roe, Bob Babbitt, Keith Horne, et al. All of them seemed like nice guys.

[pjmuck]

Why is the site photo relic bass strung upside down for a lefty with the E string on the bottom? Has anyone else noticed this?

The bass is Andrew's, and it taunts me every time I log on to this site.

[Carmine]

I have met many who play the "right" way, and I have met plenty who play the "other" way. Nothing correct or incorrect about it.

Agreed, nothing correct or incorrect about it. There's way more "lefties who play strung righty" out there than most "lefties who play strung lefty" seem to realize. Probably less of them now among young players, but there's a whole lot of 'em in my age group.

[Upsidedown]

That header pic oozes mojo. I knew I'd like this site the moment I saw it.

That Keith Horne is actually right handed! Seems his brain simply couldn't handle the "logic" of having the highest string closest to the floor. It was easier to hold a right handed guitar upside down & play left handed than reverse the string order and play right handed. I'm the same although naturally left handed and giving me a left handed strung guitar would be like asking me to play a piano from the back. True I never knew left handed instruments existed when I started, but if anyone had tried to make me play with the bottom E at the top, I'd probably have gotten nowhere.
On guitar, I tune E(bottom)ADGCF(TOP), because my brain can't handle EADGBE, that odd interval change between G and B totally foxes me. The way I tune it, I can transpose riffs all over the place without having to think.

[paulo]

If I had to explain, I think it's 30% weird and 70% cool.
Very cool being able to go to any guitar store and flip a bass and try it out!
I also agree that it would make more sense to have the E string at the bottom.
Who's idea was that to put the E string at the top??
This is a good example of left handed bass player with the E string down to the floor!
Scott Reeder: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgBgaaYnH6w

[Grant]

Who's idea was that to put the E string at the top??

I think it is historical and started with the guitar and its forbears and is based around the ergonomics of the fingers and the most common notes played as the fingers come around the bottom of the neck.

[Carmine]

Many of us were influenced to some degree by the near impossiblity of laying hands on a Lefty bass. I've told this story before but I don't mind telling it again:

Back in the mid 70's I was a kid of modest means in a small rural midwestern town. Everybody wanted to play guitar or drums, so there was usually an opening for a bass player but I couldn't afford an instrument. For the first 2 or 3 years I didn't have my own bass...I would just beg and borrow from friends, so playing strung righty was out of necessity. All through the mid 70's to mid 80's I played upside down righty basses that were either symmetrical designs or didn't look completely stupid played "upside-down"- a righty Gibson EB3 and later a Kramer DMZ5000 were designs that worked well for me in this regard.

Back in the pre-internet days, there really wasn't a good way to know that there were lefty basses being made. The first I knew of it as a option was probably those early 80's Carvin mail order catalogs, but I really couldn't afford to order a guitar (like a lot of poor musicians my M.O. was to trade in something at the local store and pay a couple bucks a week until I could pay something off). Even out on the road, my right handed band mates would make those great pawn shop finds, but I never ever saw any lefty basses in the stores. That's also probably why I was a "Fender Hater" for many years... I had no idea Fender made lefty basses and I refused to play a Jazz or P bass upside down. But when the internet began to take off I was amazed to find out that even back in the day Fender and some others had been building a few lefties all along.

Having said that, I've always felt that learning to play E on the bottom, G on top has been an advantage since I could always flip and play any right-handed bass. And for bass playing, lower notes on the bottom has always made much more intuitive sense to me. The patterns and fingerings are different but it doesn't limit my playing at all- it may even help to differentiate my style a little bit since I might be making slightly different choices at times!

[Upsidedown]

I had the same anti Fender feelings and an inexplicable love of EB3's. Mind you, back in the early 70's here in the UK, many of the top bands and my favourite players used EB3's.
I've since changed my mind about Fenders since realizing that if I get a lefty, it's very easy, and non-destructive, to reverse the nut and strings. Still can't try it out properly until I've done that though.

Larry Williams is a guy that doesn't mind hanging a righty Jazz5 upside down just as it is. Never seen him with a lefty bass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zWVnqw8sVQ

But heck, some of those contemporary bass designs out there, the top horn side neck joint is getting closer and closer to the headstock. Fortunately, I can't stand the sight of them, because they are impossible inverted.

[pjmuck]

As stated, it makes perfect sense that a lefty would play upside down when first starting out, given the lack of available "true" left handed instruments in retail stores to try out. So if you happened to learn to play that way, then more power to you, since you could now walk into any store and play a righty off the wall. This goes for guitarists too, as Dave Wakeling (The English Beat) plays his lefty guitars strung upside down. As for stringing a true lefty instrument that way, I attribute most of that to ergonomics and layout, as bodies are contoured specifically to a righty or lefty and most prefer their switches and knobs out of the way (Hendrix preferred them "in" the way, however).

Now you wanna talk about odd? How about Curtis Mayfield, who played right handed but strung his guitars lefty.

[Matt R.]

I didn’t know that about Curtis Mayfield!

[paulo]

Is Andrew's bass in the photo gallery?
Would love to see the rest of the half bass body that I see every day when I load up the LB page!

[andrew]

It is my bass but I do not string it righty style. The previous owner strung it that way. He is a photographer so he took some nice pics of the bass and the many years ago that Peter and I started this place I used the one still seen here as the header. There was a plan to rotate that bass header pic early on but the pic rotator was never added to the site and so that pic has been up since the go. I like to think of it as a nod to Ronn who has been here with us from the start too and does play his basses strung that way.

I'd post a pic of it now but it's at our rehearsal space. It's now strung lefty and has a lot more wear on it. It's an amazing bass.

[pjmuck]

I didn’t know that about Curtis Mayfield!

Well now I'm second guessing my statement. I could have sworn I read somewhere that he strung upside down, and I thought I had seen live footage confirming it, but I can't find the info anywhere. He did, however, string his guitars in F# to replicate the black keys on a piano, as he was self-taught. Or, I could be wrong about that too.

[fivebass52]

Larry Williams is a guy that doesn't mind hanging a righty Jazz5 upside down just as it is. Never seen him with a lefty bass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zWVnqw8sVQ

Dayamn!