Quote:
Originally Posted by Matthew Tucker
Well that is the balancing act ... and where the art comes in i suppose. Whatever vibration is happening at the back of the instrument, that is energy that is NOT moving the front. So it robs the front of energy at certain frequencies and thus colours the sound and decay characteristics of the bass. I like to imagine the extremities; if the back was made of concrete the top would receive and emit all of the string energy, with a lot of sustain,but the sound might not be pleasing (it might - who knows?). On the other hand I imagine if the back were made of rubber and could freely vibrate it would dampen the movement of the front resulting in short sustain and dunno what tone. And that's not taking into account the structural necessities. Somewhere in the middle is right. As a broad generalisation, I think for arco, sustain is not so critical but darkness is, for pizz/jazz use sustain is more useful and the decay characteristics of the bass are more important. but it depends on the player too.
But with all that above, its still hard to know for sure what the effect of one or other change will be!
I would replace the brace with spruce as it was originally, probably a 4-5" centre brace, one across each bout to give a slight and even radius to the back if possible, and one at the bend if it needs it. Depending on the position of the bend, you may choose to put one brace near or on the bend for the upper bout.
Or you could get really funky and do a cross brace!
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Interesting thoughts there.
What is the deal with cross bracing ? I've always wondered about those basses with a single longitudinal brace .....