Christopher Basses

[Shane Wilcox]

In case anyone is interested, I am the proud purchaser (if not quite yet the possessor) of a new Christopher 401T (i.e. carved Gamba flatback). It's a biggish 3/4 size (on some websites it appears to be listed as a 3/4-7/8), dark matte stain, nicely put together and with Rubner machine heads and an adjustable bridge. It's strung with Corellis (I'm assuming from their gauge and tension that they are the 370M, but waiting on confirmation of that), and sounded loud and rich played pizz.

Unfortunately, I didn't get to play it under the bow. The vendor (an experienced bassist, but not a luthier) loosened the strings (in his defense, it was only a little) in order to lower the bridge and the sound post dropped. He thinks it may have been on the short side, but will obviously be getting it back to his luthier. Good that it happened in his shop while he was messing with it!

I compared it with a Stentor (see other thread), and a German carved bass from the 60s (looks very much like the vendor's Hofner from a similar time). Much bigger and "fuller" (I guess more pleasant combination of harmonics??) sound than either of them, at least pizzicato. There were a number of other Chinese and Korean basses there, but these were not really in the same league (or price bracket!)

I'm looking forward to its arrival, probably in a week or so, and if I have anything further to add, especially regarding how it plays bowed, I will.