Last October or so, I had my bass fixed up and setup by Jeff Bollbach. His work was truly fantastic, and my bass sounded and played better than ever. I however, neglected to get my fingerboard planed and dressed because it was a bit out of my budget at the time.
I ran into a few problems afterwards, however:
- Jeff noted that there were a couple of high spots on the fingerboard in thumb position on the G string. These high spots came to haunt me later as the colder weather came around.
- the G string, a Flexocor, was noticeably more nasally than any Flexocor that I have played. I had acquired it used, and it was nasally on other basses as well.
- The high spots tended to hit the G string when the string was bowed. I believe they acted as harmonics and caused the G string to squeak and squeal badly.
- My A string....was just not there. It didn't play particularly well with the bow, and it required a good deal of bow pressure to get it to vibrate with the bow. It also sounded pretty dull.
- The G on the D string had a terrible wolf tone.
- Thumb position was still pretty hard to play on the bass.
1. So I had first tried to change my G string to an old Helicore G I had around - it was even worse. So I put the Flexocor back on.
2. Next, I lowered the E to a low D. This relieved a lot of the tension on the bass, and made it easier to play all around. It also made the bass more sonorous and full-sounding overall. But the other problems still remained.
3. When I finally had enough of the squeaky and buzzing G string, I decided to get a new Flexocor G. But then, I raised the bridge adjusters, and both the squeaks and rattles were gone. That problem was solved; however, the rest of the problems remained, and the bass was now a tad harder to play - that said, it was also easier to play without a squeaky and buzzing G string bothering me.
4. I had stopped playing for a while, as it was a bit discouraging to play my bass. I had always wanted to swap the E and A strings from their respective pegs, and I even wanted to tell Jeff to do it for me when I picked up my bass last October. But I figured at that time: why fix what wasn't broken?
Today, I decided to make the switch....and the difference has been nothing short of stupendous - almost all my problems have been fixed. Let's hope it stays that way. *cross my fingers*
With the E (low D, actually) and A switched, I believe the bass has much lower tension before overall. And it shows while playing: thumb position has been almost a breeze, and I managed to get in close to 2 hours of practice because it was so much easier to play now.
The A string, which was once difficult to bow, is much easier to bow. It still sound a bit dull, just less dull.
The bad wolf tone I had gotten whenever I bowed the G on the D string....was totally gone. Or hidden. Whatever it is.
But the biggest change was on my G string. Previously, it sounded nasally when bowed on almost any position. Now? It merely sounds bright, which is much, much more tolerable.
Who knew that swapping those two strings could do so much! Perhaps there are other reasons why everything changed for the better. I don't know.
Soundwise, the bass has a bit less volume, I feel, up close. Dunno what it sounds like further away. But it's a tradeoff that I'm definitely willing to live with.
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