5 Strings

For the first few years of my bass journey I played only 4-string bass. But after a while I had progressed to working on cello music in my bass lessons. Eventually I got the bug to move to 5-string bass. I now consider myself to be a 5-string bass player. The only vestige of my 4-string days is my Ibanez SRF700 bass. I do also have a 5-string fretless bass (Gary Willis signature GWB35) but to tell the truth I don’t like it as much as my 4-string SRF700 so I only use the GWB35 when I need the extended low range. For example, when I record 4-part bach chorales I’ll play the lower parts (bass and sometimes alto and tenor parts) on my GWB35 and the upper part(s) on the SRF700.

I also am pretty much an Ibanez player. All the basses I currently play are from that company. I even bought myself an Ibanez T-shirt. I really like the sound and feel of instruments from that company.

For me, 5-string is the perfect bass. I can’t see myself moving to more strings than 5, although this bass is intriguing to me…