Bass Instruments: The History of the Bass Guitar

Instruments teach the people who use them a great deal. For playing an instrument, you can have your first example of love without need of love in return from a person loving their instrument, you can learn notes and patience and many other valuable lessons, some of which have to do with a persons emotions or morals. While some people may not understand when a musician says that an instrument shapes your life or that it shapes you as a person many other musicians would have to agree. You learn a great deal from an instrument and from the experience of trying to learn how to play one. You learn to cooperate with something new and the beauty that can come out of it. With the history that is behind the bass guitar and other bass instruments there is no wonder behind the enchantment that they hold.

The bass guitar has been around for over seven decades and was originally developed in Seattle, Washington. When this took place it all surrounded one man named Paul Tutmarc, who placed his newly made jazz instrument in an upright position rather then the hand held bass that some prefer today. He even designed his bass guitar to be played this way much like a cello but with a new sound many people had not previously heard before and truly enjoyed. Paul Tutmarc made a company called Auiovox which featured the electric bass guitar in 1935 under the name electric bass fiddle, which some people still refer to the electric bass as. Unlike what most believe, the first bass guitar was not a hallow mass without frets but in fact not only had frets but also had four strings, just over 30 inches of scale length and was easily played in the upright position.

In recent years and even going years back every person who enjoys guitar or bass guitar knows what fender is as a company. In 1950, Leo Fender and George Fullerton developed the first electric fender bass that was ready for mass production. It was in 1951 that this bass ended up being known as the Fender precision bass that so many people know about today. This was the first bass that was designed to be held like the bass that we know today with curves that are made to help it be held comfortably or even be rested against your lap as your play sitting comfortably.

In later years, the bass continued to become better known and to advance which included Monk Montgomery who was the first person to go on tour with a fender bass guitar as his instrument of choice. There came to be many other people who toured with this instrument and today it is one of the main parts of many different famous bands. It is also a part of many musicians’ hearts. This is one musician that has not only effect the people who have come to love it as an instrument to play or an instrument that love to hear but has also effected history and helped music to progress.

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Originally posted 2008-11-10 13:33:52. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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