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Old 07-11-2013, 01:11 AM
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Ken Smith Ken Smith is offline
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I agree pretty much with Adam on this on but with a few other ideas. That is an older German bass by its style and made possible in the early 20th century> it can be older but not by much. The NEW Finish has stripped away its MOJO and all signs over being an old bass. Only in extreme cases should that ever be done. Usually only IF it was done before by someone else and done poorly. In 50 years it will start to look old again IF the material used is actual Violin Varnish in either Spirit or Oil.

The Inlay in the bass as Adam is nothing connected to the bass or anything old. It is modern marquetry and seeing as mentioned that it might have been modified into a travel bass (or a heel-block repair), the Inlay, travel work(or repair) and finish were possibly all done recently within the last few years.

The Bass itself is probably from the Saxon region of Germany. These basses and other string instruments were imported by the thousands from the early 20th century and sold under various fictitious brand names depending on the importers creativity to make up a convincing name. These are made in shops, factories and even cottage industry workers on both sides of the Czech/German border where work was sometimes shared and then assembled at one of the main shops before selling them.

Some of the brands sold domestically in and around Germany in the 19th and 20th centuries were often labeled correctly by the shop that produced them. Those names we never see here unless an individual brought one over as these were not made for Export to the USA. Names like Alfred Moritz, Louis Lowendall, W.Uebel, Louis Dölling, Alfred Meyer, Joseph Rubner and several others made actual basses in their shops in *Saxony (*Dresden,*Markneukirchen), Berlin and surrounding areas. These are the better grades of the commercially made domestic German basses. The ones exported here were often built for cost of lower quality and interior work although the higher end models of these fictitious brand names are often quite good. The Bass above is similar to ones imported by a Midwest company and sold under the fictitious label of G.A. Pfretzschner. A shop or person that never lived or existed.
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