NickA

You can ride a coque horse there even 🙂 Caswells shop is a bit industrial estatey, they're mostly mail order, but nice enough if you just roll up. But of a show room.

I think my 5 string is 18mm at the bridge..same as two of my 4s ....and feels pretty huge. And then my Warwick has the same string spacing as the Wal, but feels much narrower due to the thinner neck, and a jazz bassy fretless I have is 20mm at the bridge but only 10mm at the nut...that one feels really narrow. Can people really tell the difference? Doesn't spacing at the nut and the neck profile also matter? Just interested as to why 19mm at the bridge is so critical compared to eg how the bass sounds ...And all the other dimensions.

"my viol bows" wow! To have one viol bow is quite something; several is impressive. if you're into early music.. wonder if you know how to move on a da gamba ( plus bow) and a baroque cello bow. I have all those looking for new homes. Sorry, topic drift.

The Walish is a nice bass, no doubt. I agree it has a clearer "more open" sound than the Wal. ...a better sound in many ways. The Wals being made today are replicas of those designed in the 80s. Paul Herman isn't rocking the boat by making something different or updated ..if Wal and Pete were around today, to design a MK4, I wonder how that would sound! I guess, eventually Paul will run out of ancient op-amps and then we might find out. I'd love to hear how a fretless Walish would sound too as, to me, fretted Wals are knd of missing the point and a bit ordinary by comparison. I've one of each and it's the fretless that's really special. As for neck through basses ... My all ovangkol neck thro Warwick is a totally different beast. All twang and clarity with endless sustain. Presumably the bolt on neck and its inherent lossiness is part of the Wal sound.

Andrew McGill is in Banbury. Bass bow expert. He won't be cheap, but will do a perfect job. Casswell strings are also in Banbury and do a rehair service..they will be cheaper. I guess it depends how much your bow is worth.

Specific to P&H fibreglass bows with "self change" bow hair system.

Decent bow people are like hens teeth. We have no-one local. Marc Soubeyran sends you a stamped and addressed bow tube, insert bow, hand to courier, bow comes back in a few days, you keep the tube for next time. I drove 60 miles to see Andrew McGill; tho he's also happy to do it by post. Strange thing with black bow hair..everyone in my orchestra ( me included ) uses black, but look at a professional orchestra and they're all using white. go figure. On the cello, dark hair is considered low grade beginners stuff ..everyone else wants white stallion bow hair.

Maybe try a different bow maker? I've used Marc Soubeyran previously and Andrew McGill is doing a bow for me at the moment. I should think if Andrew can't get it no-one can! NB: my spare bow has white hair ...and it's ok. Some people say it doesn't have the same grip but I can't really tell the difference once the Rosin's on. Also I note that the more expensive arcus bows (S6 to S8) have white hair...it's only the "cheap" ones ( ie my arcus S3) that have black.

Call David at Bassbags.co.uk. They have been supplying bass bags for decades I have one from them and it's ... just perfect. Sturdy, well padded, lots of carrying handles (which are in the right places for me!) this one I think; but they have other options https://www.bassbags.co.uk/product/westbury-double-bass-bag-11mm-padding/

Happy ending!!! We twisted the luthiers arm so far up his back, he finally replaced the end pin and put our space 4 string tail piece on. It's being played again. Actually a rather nice little bass ..SO much better than the half size b&h laminate it had been temporarily replaced with. Buzzes on the g. Needs a new bridge really. Probably the fingerboard shooting ( then staining again .,.it's not real ebony). Maybe next year. Ideally it needs a new neck and fingerboard ..being blockless that might be tough; but the body is good enough, that it might be worthwhile. So pleased we didn't scrap it and replace with a Chinese hybrid. 😁

I've put the word out to my own amateur orchestra ( I play bass in it) and a local cello teacher. Keen to cut out the dealers ;-). The Benedict Lang and the fancy Roy Collins bow on musical chairs. Let's see what happens! I don't expect to sell locally really, and Sheffield's not far. 😉

...My local people, bass bags, will sell on commission ( only 10% I think) but not right now, as they're moving premises, and not any of the bows. I'll be talking to bigger dealers about the fancy cello, so can always ask about the bits and bobs.

Wondering what might be the best place to sell 'cellos and bows. My dad died a bit ago and I have his two 'cellos and umpteen bows to move on. One of the 'cellos is seriously valuable, so will probably have to go via a dealer or auction house. The other "teaching" 'cello is up on Musical Chairs and I might put the more valuable bow up there too ... but it's £10 per listing per 6 months and quite up market ... probably not the place for several mid quality bows. Any suggestions?

I've found the pjb kit works fine alone. Nice high piezo friendly input impedance and a built in hpf. Mr Jones knows a thing or two about bass amplification Depends on the pickup tho, I guess.. certainly works nicely with my realist sound clamp...so long as it's clamped to the right bit of bridge with the right amount of pressure.

Hi Silvia, you're no smaller (vertically!) than the lady who sits next to me at orchestra. She plays a 3/4 Bryant 5 string (rather better than I do) and would struggle to breach 5ft.

Problem with thumb rests is that they lock your right hand onto a particular bit of the bass robbing you of all kinds of tonal variety. And take your thumb away from damping duties. Probably why you'll almost never see one on a really nice bass ... or being used by a really good bassist! Snobbery? Yeah maybe ... just take this as the opinion of an aging jazzer 🙂

I was going to post that damn you 😂 🙂

Absolutely! But won't help the op with the twizzling eub issue. Being a cellist before an ebassist before a double bassist ....I've always used finger tips with LH thumb gently on the back of the neck on all three. Imo hooking your thumb round the neck and flatting your fingers is asking for trouble, even without a motorbike injury.

You don't HAVE to use a pre. My realist pickup goes straight to the bass amp and usually sounds fine. It does have an onboard volume control which is useful. A phase reverse might be useful, but they feel weird as the bass's own sound cancels what's coming out of the amp, an EUB should not suffer feedback anyway. Notch filter ... maybe. High pass? Already in the bass amp. Always nice to buy new gizmos of course.

At work we bought a QSC PLX 3602 power amp off ebay (£200 I think) - laboratory quality clean (which is what we needed) and effectively limitless power into tiny impedances. Plumb a sans amp into one of those beasties ...... .... and the next problem is finding a clean speaker 🙂 🙂 Schlepping a rack mount power amp and pre, plus a separate cab around is not ideal, I agree. Hence my super portable little PJB combo.

Don't really understand. Don't you play a double bass and and EUB the same way? And yes you can use your thumb to pluck against, you hook your right thumb under the fingerboard. You don't pluck directly across the strings either, more a diagonal movement using the side of your first and/or second finger. Maybe have a basic start up lesson. I've had far fewer right hand tendon issues from double bass playing than from bass guitar. The usual EUB issue is that they tend to twizel around whereas the dB stays locked to your body as you kind of wrap yourself around it.

Good philosophy. You can turn it off! A filthy amp is only that.

I don't think anyone uses them any more. Quick scan of pics via google doesn't show any current major 'cellist using one. Still, there was stuff Tortellier could do that, at the time, was almost unbelievable. Listen to the spiccato passage in his Dvorak concerto recording .. angling the cello out so as to use only the weight of the bow might have been a factor. And he pulled some marvellous faces too 🙂 At that level I agree you'd want everything to be perfect... at my level maybe not. Good article here saying what's involved; I think the bridge on my sub £10k cello got as far as the start of the section called "carving" then stopped .. which is fine by me. I don't need pretty. https://indd.adobe.com/view/7cba0480-f04f-480c-87fd-68e2ac7bee1e#new_tab

Hannah's mum sent her whole daughter (plus cello and spike) off to the Yehudi Menuhin school ... .. the spike alone evidently doesn't do the biz 🙂

Oh lord I'd forgotten those. Everyone (tortellier, rostropovich) had one in the 70s. So did a lass called Hannah Roberts in my local youth orchestra ...she played Kol Nidrei with us, aged about 8; god we were jealous. Her mum was the peripatetic 'cello teacher for Cambridge when my dad was the one for Huntingdon... she had one too. Cambridge was always posher than Huntingdon. Hannah has done OK with the old 'cello lark ( https://hannahroberts.com/ ) but seems to have dropped the bent pin. 🙂