Bass Builder by Digital Publisher

Your Style, Your Bass Fodera Cover Story

Getting Out of the Way

Collector's Corner Anthony Wellington, Teacher, Player, Collector

A Brief History of

Boutique Bass Guitars

$9.99 US

Contents A Brief History of Boutique Bass Guitars ............................... 8 Fodera Cover Story: Getting Out of the Way ........................ 18 The Business of Bass Building ...................................................... 26 Collector's Corner: Anthony Wellington.................................... 32

Bass Builder Guide's editors, writers, and contributors aim to publish accurate information and recommendations, but neither assumes responsibility in the event of claim of loss or damage resulting from publication of editorial or advertising matter. Statements of writers and contributors are their own, and do not necessarily reflect Bass Builder Guide Policy. ÂŠ 2012 All Rights reserved. Bass Builder Guide and its contents are copyrighted. Content printed in the magazine may not be reproduced or reprinted, in whole or in part, by any other party without the written consent of the Publisher.

For more information on Bass Builder Guide, LLC please visit www.bassbuilderguide.com

Bass Builder Gude, LLC. P.O. Box 706 Medford, NJ 08055, Phone 484-319-1287 Fax 609-654-1556 E-mail: mariasantory@bassbuilderguide.com Display until August 2013 2

BASS BUILDER #1 > CONTENTS

STAFF Pubisher and Editor in Chief Maria Santory Writers and Contributors Elton Bradman Ray Santory Rick Turner Mike Visceglia Publisher's Assistant Jennifer A. Wickes Cover Story Photography by Roberto Falck Art Director Kit Oliynyk Interns Tre Jackson Bethany Vaughan

Brute MJX-5

NBS-5 Xtreme bass

KXG-1 guitar

KXB-12 Xtreme bass

NBS-4 Xtreme bass

w/custom pickguard

Brubaker Brute is a division of AP International. For more info please call 732-919-6200 or visit www.apintl.com or brubakerguitars.com

BASS BUILDER #1 >

Ansir

www.ansirmusic.com

Jody has a background in business operations, product design and manufacturing. Founder and co-founder of several successful businesses over the past 25 years, Jody has operated high-tech manufacturing companies as well as businesses operating in the entertainment and consumer electronics spaces. He is an active inventor with 3 US Patents awarded, several patents pending and more in process. Recent projects included partnering with Silicon Valley entrepreneurs to form a musical medical device company using novel technology Jody invented to improve the quality of life for musicians with disabilities.

IMPERIAL SL

BASS BUILDER #1 > ANSIR

Jî&#x192;&#x161;BASS

Jody Michael Inventor & Entrepreneur 440.897.20.37 jody@ansirmusic.com

Jî&#x192;&#x161;BASS

BASS BUILDER #1 >

A Brief History of Boutique Bass Guitars by Mike Visceglia

ny responsible piece on the history of boutique bass guitars has to focus on two specific areas of time and place, one being northern California in the late 1960s, the other being New York in the mid 1970s. As the music of the 1950s morphed from big band swing to big band R&B, and ultimately to Rock and Roll with amplified guitars, a stronger back beat, louder drum sounds and more powerful singers, Leo Fender’s Precision and Jazz basses came into well deserved prominence, and helped the bass guitarist to not only be heard but to become stars in their own right, i.e., James Jamerson, Carol Kaye and Joe Osborn, to name a few. But as Rock and Roll evolved sonically, both live and in the studio, by the late 60s players began to demand more from their instruments. The first response to this demand was when, what can undoubtedly be called the first ‘boutique’ bass guitar company in the world was formed in 1969, when Ron and Sue Wickersham created ‘Alembic.’ With its use of exotic hard woods, low impedance electronics, on-board EQ, hand fits and finishes, and neck-through-body designs Alembic became the boutique standard of the time. The first Alembic bass guitar was made for Jack Casady of the Jefferson Airplane. But soon to follow were Phil Lesh of the Grateful Dead, Lamar Williams of the Allman Brothers, John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin and John Entwhistle of the Who. But it was Stanley Clarke, with his Alembic bass, who opened up the jazz and burgeoning fusion scene to the benefits of the boutique bass guitar. With the notoriety of players like these, the marketability of the hand-crafted

BASS BUILDER #1 > A BRIEF HISTORY OF BOUTIQUE BASS GUITARS

bass guitars as an alternative to Fender and Gibson became a reality that would eventually spawn numerous companies around the world. The ‘Alembic’ bass guitar reigned supreme through the first half of the 1970’s until a consortium of young geniuses, players and entrepreneurs turned the boutique bass business on its head in New York City. In the mid ‘70s bass guitar icon Anthony Jackson had a very unusual idea. He wanted to have an instrument made with an extended range, to include a low ‘B’ stringa fourth below the typical ‘E’ on the bass, and a high ‘C’ string- a fourth above the standard ‘G’. Toward this end he approached a New York City based luthier named Carl Thompson. Carl was initially not a fan of the idea, but with the persistence of Mr. Jackson he eventually relented and, what Anthony has termed the ‘Contrabass Guitar,’ came into existence. This was the first bass guitar not only to have this wide of a range but to also maintain the string spacing that bassists were use to, as standardized by Fender. Needless to say, it was the biggest design innovation to the instrument to date. But Mr. Jackson was only getting started in his pursuit of more and more refined and adventurous reinventions of the bass guitar. Around this same time an informal co-op of luthiers and artisans was formed in New York City. This brain trust consisted of some of what would become the biggest names in the boutique bass world: Vinnie Fodera, Ken Smith, Stuart Spector and Ned Steinberger. I personally witnessed this formative and inventive group at work, creating, designing and sharing the ideas that would set the standards for boutique bass

ALEMBIC 1972 DOUG IRWIN IN THE COTATI WOODSHOP

makers around the world. Vinnie Fodera, with the ethic of an old world artisan, began his career with an interest in building classical guitars, but switched to bass building while working for Stuart Spector, who at the time had only one bass model that he was marketing. In another part of the work space, Ned Steinberger was making custom furniture- but always had his eye on what was happening with the bass makers. Ned pretty quickly changed occupations to bass making and came up with the extraordinary concept of removing the headstock from the bass, placing the tuning machines down near the bridge, and using graphite as the main component in construction. His main goal was to use a strong and consistent non-organic element (as opposed to wood) to make instruments that were more stable and devoid of ‘dead spots’ on the neck. This revolutionary idea, while not to every player’s liking, won many design awards and to this day serves him well, especially for his ‘NS’ bodiless upright basses and cellos- as championed by bass legend Tony Levin. This headless design was copied in the ‘80s in England with the ‘Status’ bass company. The only other boutique bass guitars of note that were made in England at the time were the ‘Wal’ bass by, the now deceased luthier, Ian Waller. The ‘Modulus’ bass company also took the graphite idea and to this day uses it in all of its models to reinforce their bass necks. Ken Smith was the only luthier at the time who started out as a professional bass player, having been successful on

BASS BUILDER #1 > RICK ELTON A BRIEF TURNER: BRADMAN: HISTORY THEOF HISTORY BUSINESS BOUTIQUE OFOF BOUTIQUE BASS BASSGUITARS BUILDING… BASS

Broadway and in the thriving jingle scene in New York in the 1970s. This hotbed of creativity can truly be pointed to as the springboard for boutique bass luthiers world wide and the acceptance of these innovations into the mainstream market. It would be remiss to not mention the great bass maker Mike Tobias, who is a contemporary of these masters and started his ‘Tobias’ company in Florida around this same time. ‘Tobias’ was later sold to Gibson in 1990. I mention these specific luthiers because they are the ones that helped generate artistic and market interest in boutique bass making throughout the world, and are still thriving today in a business where boutique companies are now too numerous to mention. Generally speaking, the boutique bass market falls into two primary categories: painted bodies with bolt-on necks and hardwood designed bodies with neck-through construction (although there are painted bodies with neck-through construction and vice-versa.) Painted body/ bolt on neck players are usually a fan of ‘Fender’ or ‘Gibson’ style basses and hardwood body/neck through players are usually a fan of ‘Alembic’ or ‘Fodera’ style instruments. Some companies like ‘Lakland’ and ‘Alleva Coppolo’ offer painted bodies exclusively, while others like ‘Pedulla’ or ‘Nordstrand’ offer both. There has also been a great evolution in machine and hand made metal components like bridges, nuts, tuning machines and frets, offering the consumer an array of options. Since the boutique manufacturers offer a variety of these morecustomized parts, it has become advantageous to pay a premium in a higher price for this attention to detail and quality.

VICTOR WOOTEN AND VINNY FODERA

But it was and still is the players who, working intimately with boutique luthiers, constantly pushing the boundaries of materials, design and electronics that continuously help the boutique bass guitar business thrive. One can site the ongoing relationship between Anthony Jackson and ‘Fodera Guitars’- with the ‘Anthony Jackson Presentation’ single cutaway design- or Michael Manring with ‘Zon Basses’ as shining examples, and more recently, Will Lee with his relationship with ‘Sadowsky Guitars’ and the ‘Will Lee’ model. Some companies, like ‘Sadowsky’ even offer their pre-amps to be retrofitted into other instruments.

Gradually, over the years boutique basses have offered the professional and the layman an alternative to mass produced instruments and have influenced companies as big as Fender, causing them to compete somewhat in the boutique market. 12

BASS BUILDER #1 > RICK ELTON A BRIEF TURNER: BRADMAN: HISTORY THEOF HISTORY BUSINESS BOUTIQUE OFOF BOUTIQUE BASS BASSGUITARS BUILDING… BASS

Some interesting and very effective innovations have been made recently by companies like ‘Spector’ and Canada’s ‘F Basses’ with the inclusion of hollow chambers in the body design of some of their models. This not only makes these basses lighter but also more resonant, which is especially good for fretless bass guitars. The hollow body/chamber idea has been perfected by boutique maker ‘Rob Allen’ who makes some of the lightest and most resonant basses on the market. Gradually, over the years boutique basses have offered the professional and the layman an alternative to mass produced instruments and have even influenced companies as big as Fender, causing them to compete somewhat in the boutique market. Certainly the Fender ‘Custom Shop’ is a response to the detail and personal touch that boutique bass makers have given to the professional and part time player. All in all, it’s a wonderful time to be a bass guitarist and even with the higher price tag of the boutique market, compared to what classical musicians pay for fine instruments we’re way ahead of the game!

Birdsong Guitars www.birdsongguitars.com www.sdcurleeusa.com

As a designer and builder, I’ve been developing professional quality short scale basses since 1998. I couldn’t find the balance, tone and build quality I wanted all in one small bass so I began making my own, resulting in the 31” Birdsong Cortobass in 2004. Short scale basses are our main devotion and every Birdsong is hand built in our workshop in the Texas “Hill Country” by a small team of luthiers and players to be lightweight, easy playing, comfortable and much bigger sounding than one would expect. Birdsongs start at $1850 including case and shipping.

CORTOBASS

BASS BUILDER #1 > BIRDSONG GUITARS

FUSION

PO Box 1745 Wimberley, TX 78676 info@birdsongguitars.com 512.392.4400

HY5 5STRING

SDCURLEE

Delgado Guitars www.delgadoguitars.com

Playing guitar by age five, repairing guitars by age seven, and building his first guitar at the age of 12 to beat his fatherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s record of 14, Manuel A. Delgado is the owner and operator of Delgado Guitars. A family business started by his grandfather and great-uncle, Manuel and his family have been building handmade guitars since 1928 for artists like AndrĂ¨s Segovia, Los Lobos, Jose Feliciano, Charo, Arlo Guthrie and countless more. Choosing to keep the tradition alive, Manuel builds each instrument individually using the methods taught to him by his father and grandfather which have been proven to stand the test of time.

BAJO QUINTO

BASS BUILDER #1 > DELGADO GUITARS

615.227.4578

DELGADO'S ACOUSTIC ELECTRIC BASS

DP Custom Guitars

www.DPCustom.com

davidp@DPcustom.com

BUCKEYE BURL

MAPLE

Handmade electric basses from select hardwoods and exotic woods. Custom configurations and shapes done to your specification. Chose from a wide variety of hardware and electronic options to suit your music tastes and playing style. For more info and to get started specifying your bass the way you want it, please visit www.DPCustom.com

QUILTED BUBINGA

MAPLE BURL BASS BUILDER #1 > DP CUSTOM GUITAR

Drake Custom Bass www.drakecustombass.com

Drake Custom is a small custom shop founded by Andrew Drake who has been building basses professionally since 2005. Andrew specializes in easy playing 32 and 33 inch medium scale 4, 5, and 6 string basses as well as long scale basses and 8 string tappers. Andrew crafts his own necks and bodies by hand with pride in his design and workmanship. Special attention is focused on the playability, sound, and longevity of each of his instruments.

DC MODEL 7

BASS BUILDER #1 > DRAKE CUSTOM BASS

DC MODEL 6

641.891.6404 drakecustom@live.com

THE BETTY

Garz Guitars & Basses www.garzguitars.com

743-770 Pickens Rd P.O. Box 687 Doyle,Ca 96109 530.827.2369 garzguitars@psln.com

MAG 6 LW

COBRA 6 STRING

I have been building instruments since 1986. All basses are handcrafted by me, one at a time. I use the highest quality woods, electronics and hardware available. You can choose one of my current models, or I can design one for you. I have many custom options available. Contact me for your dream Bass.

COBRA 5 STRING

KUNGHA 6 STRING BASS BUILDER #1 > GARZ GUITAR & BASSES

A Hundred Little Decisions: Getting Out of the Way

Fodera’s approach to crafting modern bass tone is all about getting out of the way and letting each player shine through. E.E. Bradman talks to Fodera’s Jason DeSalvo for insights into the company’s ever-evolving ideas of tone

ruth be told, it’s all about tone. Tone sets us apart or marks us as a member of a group; it gives instruments their identities, announces our intentions, and helps define our chosen genres. Just as our tone of voice is as important as what we say, our bass tone, our musical voice, sets the stage for everything else we play: It’s tough to appreciate good phrasing, well-developed technique, and other desirable qualities if we can’t get past a player’s tone. Many of us will spend a lifetime and a big chunk of our bank account looking for instruments that can help us manifest the tones we hear in our heads.

market, owning a Fodera is a sign of having “arrived.” But what exactly is “Fodera tone?”

For many players, that search leads to Fodera, the New York City company that builds instruments designed and crafted by bassist Joey Lauricella and luthier Vinny Fodera. Fodera is renowned the world over for its blend of old-world craftsmanship and attention to detail, as well as a thoroughly modern aesthetic that would be impossible without 21st-century advances in preamp, pickup, amplifier, and manufacturing technology. Like Rolexes and Rolls Royces, these instruments long ago transcended their humble, practical beginnings to become status symbols; even in today’s crowded boutique bass

Are all your basses custom basses? We now have two product lines. Our Standard line—which includes a Matt Garrison, a YingYang, and an Emperor—cater toward a very common set of specifications that are regularly asked for. To get one of those, you don’t have to wait as long, and we make them in batches of 60 or 30 pieces. When you buy one, you are buying that instrument the way it sounds, for the tone it has. For everything else, there’s our custom line. Roughly 50 percent of our production is Standards, and 50 percent are custom instruments.

Few would know the answer to that question as well as Jason DeSalvo, the business consultant who has been the third member of Fodera’s leadership team since 2009. As a bass player whose first interaction was buying a Fodera back in 2006and whose journey through bass tone has inspired him to assemble a stable of 12 Foderas since then DeSalvo has plenty to say about what gives a bass its tone, Fodera’s earliest tone templates, the definition and evolution of the Fodera sound, and the company’s intensive approach to helping customers find their own voices.

BASS BUILDER #1 > A HUNDRED LITTLE DECISIONS: GETTING OUT OF THE WAY

How does a new customer’s Fodera tone journey begin? Once a customer emails or calls to say they want to build a bass, the first part of the process is asking the right questions: What are you playing now? What tone do you like? What tone don’t you like? The most important thing in getting the right tone for a customer is understanding their concept of good tone. I ask them, if you could have a bass that sounded perfect, what would it sound like? We start by having them send me some sound samples, or by them saying something like, “Man, I love the sound of my ’64 Jazz Bass.” We know by definition that a Jazz Bass has an alder body, Brazilian rosewood fingerboard, maple neck, and it’s a bolt-on. So they’ve just given us some clues to level the field and let us start thinking about tone. How much do the woods determine the tone of a bass? We are definitely, devoutly, 100 percent, positively in the camp that wood matters. We believe we are building acoustic instruments that happen to be electrified, and that every single thing we do related to the choice of woods plays a role in the final tone of that instrument. We don’t believe, as some builders do, that it’s all about the electronics, and that you won’t hear the difference in the wood.

I think we have one of the most versatile preamps out there, but our preamp is meant to be as transparent as possible. It will let you alter the innate tone of an instrument, but it’s not going to let you change the tone of the instrument. If I build you a bass out bright woods, it doesn’t matter how much I boost the bass on that preamp, it’s never gonna give you that kick-in-the-pass big bottom that you’d get if you had an alder bass body. It’s just a different thing.

The last wood we decide on is the top wood. A lot of our basses are known for their gorgeous exotic top woods, but those top woods are much more of a spice than a main ingredient, because they’re thin and because they’re not really significant in terms of the quantity of the mass they add to the instrument. There are some very dense top woods that we use, and in those cases, we have to take into account the sound that they make. But most of the time, choosing the top wood is the last thing we so.

Take us through the process of choosing body, neck, and fingerboard woods. Generally, we build 95 percent of our instruments with walnut, alder, ash, or mahogany. The body wood is the largest piece of mass on the instrument, so it is going to have the largest impact on tone. The neck wood also has a high proportion of the instrument’s overall mass, and it has a significant impact on tone. We build predominately with two different neck woods: Ash, which has a slightly warmer, more percussive sound, and maple, which has a brighter, more ringing tone. About 85 percent of our necks are maple. Then we get to fingerboard wood, which has a fairly profound effect on tone. Even though there’s not a lot of mass there, the string is being fretted (or on a fretless, is being vibrated directly) against that fingerboard, and the way in which that wood excites and resonates is very different depending on the woods we use. For fingerboards, we choose between bird’s eye maple, pau ferro, ebony, Macassar ebony, Brazilian rosewood, Indian rosewood, and Madagascar kingwood. We have a number of fingerboard materials, all of which have different densities and tonal properties.

What happens when there are conflicts between how a customer wants a bass to look and how they want it to sound? It happens all the time. After we’ve made recommendations for woods based on the sound clips they’ve sent us, some customers will come back to us and say they love that sound but they don’t like the way the wood looks. And then we have to tell them that although they had their heart set on an ash body, for example, because they like that nice grain, they want a warm tone, and ash is not warm. We’ll tell them, It’s your bass, we’ll build it either way, but if we build it with ash, you’re going to love the way it looks but you’re probably not going to play it very much because it’s going to have the sound that’s in your head. What kind of electronics options do you offer? We use a preamp co-designed by Joey and Michael Pope of Michael Pope Designs, and that goes into every bass unless a customer wants a bass that’s completely passive, like Anthony Jackson, who runs his jack straight to the pickup. When we talk about electronics, we’re really dealing with pickups. We used to have a lot of choices, but over the years, we’ve found that

EMG’s or Seymour Duncans—either dual- or single-coils—seemed to consistently give almost every customer the sound they were looking for. Depending on what tone the customer wants, we’ll choose the right pickup for them, and then we’ll talk about spacing—we can space pickups in ’60s position, ’70s position, or any realm within that; we also offer other combinations, like Tom Kennedy spacing, for example, or Richard Bona spacing. Over the years we’ve developed a menu in our heads about how pickup spacing affects tone. How much time do you spend with customers discussing the options? We do have customers who’ve worked with us before and know exactly what they want, but for every one like that, there are many who need help narrowing down the millions of options. Usually, on a custom build, there’s anywhere between five to 30 interactions before a final spec is set; a lot of times, that involves the customer making a trip to the shop. I’ve had customers that I’ve spent 40 hours of my life with before they have a final spec. If somebody needs that time, it’s there; we’re never going to say, “We’ve talked to you enough now. Make your decision or go somewhere else.” That’s just not who we are. How do you know you’ve succeeded? If we’ve done our homework right, when customers get their basses, they’ll have that big Fodera grin, which is like, “Yes!” At this price point, we can’t afford to put a bass in someone’s hands and not have them have that grin. The stakes are too high. When you’ve saved for a couple years for your dream bass and you finally get it, it better sound and play like you dreamt it was going to. We take that really seriously.

BASS BUILDER #1 > A HUNDRED LITTLE DECISIONS: GETTING OUT OF THE WAY

How would you describe Fodera tone? I think the Fodera tone is an absence of tone, if you would. We like to think of our job as bringing out a musician’s voice, not imposing our concept of tone on them. We make basses that are articulate, nuanced, rich, deep, and extremely versatile, but the actual instrument should sound like a neutral filter. It should be a canvas for you to write what tone you want. Do you want to go with old-school tone you associate with a 1960s Jazz Bass or even a ’50s P-Bass, or do you want that Victor Wooten sound—that ultra-modern, extremely precise, almost high-end audio quality to it? Those two tones are about as far apart as you can be, and yet we make basses with both of them every day. The Fodera tone is more about understanding what the customer wants to get out of it, and pulling the right ingredients together to make sure that we deliver that. There is no one thing that goes into making a great Fodera—it is the end result of a series of a hundred little decisions made throughout the process of working with the customer to design each bass.

tone (although Tony actually uses a maple neck, so his basses tend to be a bit brighter). We have a lot of really spectacular artists we’ve been fortunate enough to work with, and part of their journey with us has been working with us to develop their signature sound. Then we replicate that tone for customers who like that person’s sound. After such an intense process of choosing and building a bass, what happens when a player tires of their Fodera’s tone? We do have people who change their tastes over time. There are a

As transparent as the preamp may be, some of Fodera’s most prominent players share a certain approach to tone, which seems to influence what customers ask for. Yeah. Let’s say someone just went out and heard Janek Gwizdala play, and then they’ll come to us and say, I want my bass to sound exactly like that. Well, that means they want a walnut body, an ebony fingerboard, an ash neck, Seymour Duncan single-coil pickups, and they want a certain spacing—that’s that instrument’s tonal signature, which is very easy to replicate, because we know what it is. So we do a lot of basses with walnut bodies, ebony fingerboards, and ash necks; that’s that Janek GwizdalaMatt Garrison-Tony Grey kind of

BASS BUILDER #1 > RICK A HUNDRED TURNER:LITTLE THE BUSINESS DECISIONS: OFGETTING BASS BUILDING… OUT OF THE WAY

number of people who will trade in their Fodera and work with us on a new build; that happens at least a couple times a month. And then we go out and find a happy camper for the other one. If your tastes have changed, there’s going to be some other cat out there who’s gonna love what you had, and we’ll find a home for that. And there are a number of players out there with several Foderas; some cats keep their basses as a historical record of where they come from so they can go back and revisit it by playing the older basses.

Fodera Guitars www.fodera.com

68 34th St. 3rd Floor Brooklyn, NY 11232 718.832.3455 sales@fodera.com

EMPEROR 5 ST

YYS

Founded in 1983 by Vinny Fodera and Joey Lauricella, Fodera remains a small, family owned company crafting less than 300 instruments per year all right in Brooklyn, NY. Our job here at Fodera is to listen to the needs of our players and build instruments that get out of the way and let them shine through. We pride ourselves on not having a typical “Fodera Sound.” All of our instruments are crafted from the very finest tone woods personally selected by some of the most experienced hands and ears in the business.

BUCKEYE BURL IMPERIAL II

OLIVEMONARCH DELUXE BASS BUILDER #1 > FODERA GUITARS

Andrew Drake of Drake Custom

Beau Leopard of BL Design

Cleve Johnson of LedBelli

Devon Smullen and Family

George of F Bass

Jacques with Darryl Jones

Jason Desalvo of Fodera

Jimmy and Caeser Coppolo

Jody of Ansir with Mina Burnside

BASS BUILDER #1 >

Joey Lauricella of Fodera

Jon Maghini M Basses

Manuel Delgado

Mark Garza of Garz Guitars and Basses

Mike Kinal's Guitar Class

Pete Skjold in shop

Kenneth Lawrence

Three Generations of Delgado

Gerald of Marleaux Bass Guitars BASS BUILDER #1 >

The Business of Bass Building By Rick Turner

started as a real professional bass builder about 40 years ago, and learned a lot of the business side the hard way…doing it all wrong and being forced to pay the price for it. I’ve had bad partners, been embezzled from, had tax problems, borrowed too much money, ran credit cards up too high…you name it. But I’ve gotten my “School of Hard Knocks” MBA, and am happy to share a bit of what I’ve learned. The major considerations in your business are bookkeeping, sales & marketing, and staying up with the legal aspects of being in business, including needed licenses, proper tax filing, and staying on the right side of employment law. Here are some quick overviews of the issues:

BOOKKEEPING For bookkeeping, I recommend Quicken, which would probably be fine for a one person operation, or QuickBooks which is great for the next step and is good for pretty big companies. You can set your “Chart of Accounts” to help track all the items you buy and categorize your expenses correctly. If you have open accounts with some of your vendors, you can post invoices, pay bills and print checks out of QB. You can also develop your own parts numbering system, and have all the items you buy regularly stored for instant recall for when you write purchase orders. And with QB, you can do payroll pretty easily as well. Hire a professional bookkeeper to help you set up your books properly. In a one-person shop, you could then do most of the actual data entry yourself and have a bookkeeper look things over once a month, or once a quarter. You really shouldn’t need an accountant (very expensive) more than once or twice a year.

BASS BUILDER #1 > THE BUSINESS OF BASS BUILDING

SALES & MARKETING… AND ADVERTISING Sales & marketing…What’s the difference? “Marketing” is the art and science of figuring out who is (a) most likely to want to buy your products, and (b) finding the most efficient pathway to letting them know about your work. Don’t confuse marketing with advertising; they are different. “Sales” is actually closing the sale…it’s all about getting the money. They are all very discrete and separate tasks, but go hand in hand. For custom and small shop bass players, it’s pretty easy to define your market…open minded bass players who are not strictly wedded to playing the same old P-bass forever. Luckily, bass players seem to be more open to alternatives than most guitar players, and many play more than one instrument or brand of bass. I was incredibly

Rick Turner

fortunate in the early days of my career to find (and be found by) open minded bassists like Jack Casady, Phil Lesh, Stanley Clarke, John Paul Jones, John Entwistle, and John McVie, who wanted the option of a more hi-fi approach to tone, and found them all quite approachable. It was a right place, right time, right new vision of bass building, with virtually no competition in my part of the bass market. It’s not as easy now, but bassists are still approachable and open to at least seeing new ideas and new instruments. Sales…well, here’s the biggie…SELL DIRECT TO STORES. By selling direct… you get all the dough, but the big mistake budding luthiers make is underpricing their work- you think you can sell at what would really be a wholesale price to retail customers. You are doing this thinking it’s how you’re going to get “market share”… by undercutting your competition, and don’t forget that EVERY bass on the wall of a music store is literally your competition. So you sell half a dozen basses to your pals and friends of theirs, and suddenly you can’t get arrested. You’ve saturated your easily reached market. Now you want to sell through a store…and the consignment fee is 25% or 20%, if you’re lucky. Can you do that or do you suddenly have to raise your prices? The best you’re going to do is about 60% of retail, and if you can’t make your numbers work at that price, you basically do not have a business.

The torturous and horrible part of bass building, the business end. It’s not why we become luthiers. 28

BASS BUILDER #1 > RICK THE BUSINESS TURNER: THE OF BASS BUSINESS BUILDING OF BASS BUILDING…

THE LEGAL NICETIES This stuff is just a drag to deal with, but it’s oh so necessary unless you really think you can fly under the radar. In a commercial building, you might have to deal with building permits for the build-out and electrical work, or a “Use Permit” from the

local planning department that allows you to operate a woodworking shop. There are also a business licenses, permits for our spray booth, one from the city with yearly inspections from the fire department…and the other from the local air pollution board. You can’t do much without a resale permit that ties you into the sales tax system. Landlords also demand that you carry various forms of insurance…fire and other loss, liability, etc. Then there’s payroll and dealing with employees. These days you just cannot easily get away with paying workers under the table or pretend that employees are sub-contract laborers. If you’re doing it fully legally, you’re going to have to carry Worker’s Compensation insurance. To not do so is to risk losing your business and more if a “fake employee” hurts themselves, and it WILL happen. However much you pay an employee per hour, they are actually

BASS BUILDER #1 > RICK THE BUSINESS TURNER: THE OF BASS BUSINESS BUILDING OF BASS BUILDING…

costing 25% to 30% more in direct and indirect ways. To this you have to add employers contributions to Unemployment Compensation and Social Security, the cost of Worker’s Comp, bookkeeping costs, and paid days off…sick pay, holidays, and vacations. Having employees also affects your other insurance costs, liability in particular. So this is the torturous and horrible part of bass building, the business end. It’s not why we become luthiers. It’s time consuming, it’s not artistic, and it’s a bit distasteful…but if you don’t do it right when you’re playing the game, “they” will take away all the marbles and you go home a loser. Every hour you spend on the business side is an hour you’re not building instruments, but those are the breaks…so get good and efficient at it, suck it up, and do it so you can stay in business!

Kenneth Lawrence Instruments www.kennethlawrenceinstruments.com

Kenneth Lawrence Instruments is a one-man shop founded in 1986 specializing in high-end basses and guitars. With over 30 years of performance and recording experience, a player’s perspective is employed resulting in extremely comfortable and versatile instruments of uncompromised quality.

COCOBOLO ASSOCIATE

BRASE II BDSEYE MAPLE

BASS BUILDER #1 > KENNETH LAWRENCE INSTRUMENTS

1055 Samoa Blvd., Arcata, CA 95521 lawrence@reninet.com 707.822.2543

CBRASE II SPLT

Kinal

www.kinal.com Michael Kinal has been building and repairing stringed instruments for over 40 years in his Vancouver shop. After graduating from High School he developed his own line of guitars and basses. In 1980 Mike completed a B.Ed. in Industrial Education and started teaching at the Secondary level. Over the years he has built and repaired instruments for a number of professional musicians. Currently, Mike teaches woodwork and guitar building at St. Thomas More Collegiate in Burnaby, B.C. He also plays bass professionally and builds his own line of instruments which includes 4 string, 5 string, 6 string and a Kinal Kompact acoustic bass.

Kinal Guitars and Basses 3239 East 52nd Avenue Vancouver, British Columbia V5S 1T9, Canada kinal@telus.net 604.433.65.44

SK21 SUNBURST

SK5î&#x192;&#x161;B GREEN BURST

KOMPACT

MK21 BOCATE BASS BUILDER #1 > KINAL

Collector's Corner Anthony Wellington: player, teacher, collector By Mike Visceglia

orn in Alexandria, Virginia and still residing in the DC area, Anthony Wellington reflects the rare qualities in a musician of being both a master bass player, a teacher and a formidable collector, primarily of boutique instruments. At the age of thirteen he found his passion for the instrument by going to, what he refers to as ‘bass jams.’ It seems that during his youth most of the players he knew wanted to play bass. As he says, “Everyone wanted to play the bass part to “Brick House,” not the guitar part. So we would get together and have jams where everyone was playing the bass. After finding himself on the wrong side of the law and spending a year incarcerated, Anthony returned to the world with a revived determination to get back to playing. It wasn’t long after that he met the person who would become his mentor and friend, Victor Wooten. Although they are both about the same age, Victor has had a profound effect on Anthony and his career, and has remained a band mate, friend and protege since 1999. Anthony has become world renowned not only as a player but also as a teacher. He has started his own school outside of Washington, DC, where he calls his courses studies in ‘Bassology.’ He keeps many of his instruments there, where he and his

Anthony has become world renowned not only as a player but also as a teacher. He has started his own school outside of Washington, DC, where he calls his courses studies in ‘Bassology.’ 34

BASS BUILDER #1 > ANTHONY WELLINGTON

students can have access to them- from piccolo to 7 stringed basses- for lessons. He is also very active in ‘paying it forward’ to the community, and has bought and donated many basses to inner city and other deserving students who want to study music and the instrument, and to have an alternative to some of the travails and experiences that he has seen first hand. He has also worked directly with, and donated instruments to the Ellis Marsalis Center in New Orleans. I recently had a phone conversation with him to ask him some specific questions about his collection and some of his prized pieces, which now number more than forty. What was your first boutique bass? My first bass was built in the mid ‘90s by California based luthier Ken Bebensee. I still own it and also have one of his 6 string fretless basses with a bubinga top and a pau ferro fretboard. What would you consider to be the top five basses that you own? 1- My 5 string ‘Fodera Emporer’ 2- My 5 string ‘Fodera Yin Yang’ design Emporer 3- My ‘Ken Bebensee’ 6 string fretless 4- My ‘OM’ bass made by ‘M Basses’ 5- My ’78 Fender Jazz bass, which was a transition year instrument without block inlays. It was given to me by my high school teacher and was the instrument that changed my life. Are there any special or humorous stories about how you acquired a specific instrument? In April of ’96, I walked into a music store and saw a used ‘Mike Tobias Killer B’ bass. I asked the owner how much he wanted for it. He didn’t really know what it was but

did know that it had a G string that slipped of the fretboard. Not realizing that that was an easy fix he said “$600.00.” Containing my excitement, I went outside and immediately called Mike on the phone. When I told him about it he said that HE would even buy it from the store for $600.00. I bought the instrument, replaced the nut and it has been perfect ever since! Then there’s the story about a rare ‘Fodera Emperor Deluxe’ that was originally made for latin bassist Ruben Rodriguez. It’s a 5 string, with a FULL ebony top and a chambered body. It also has a hand rubbed lacquer finish- a very special instrument. When I saw it I knew I wanted it, but it was already sold to Ruben. After a while he then sold it and I kept track of it through its various owners. I eventually convinced one of them to sell it to me and it is now part of my collection. Is there any instrument that would fall under the category of the “THE HOLY GRAIL”- one bass that you would just love to own or would pay anything to own? Any bass that’s owned by Victor Wooten would fall under that category because of what he means to me and what he’s done for me.

BASS BUILDER #1 > RICK ANTHONY TURNER: WELLINGTON THE BUSINESS OF BASS BUILDING…

M Basses Company www.mbasses.com

For more than a decade M Basses has been on the forefront of the custom bass guitar industry. Working closely with many of the worldâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s best players, Jon Maghini has refined his model line to offer some of the finest hand crafted bass guitars available. With a growing demand for his work lead times can vary, please feel free to contact the shop for further details.

MJ5 OLYMPIC WHITE

BASS BUILDER #1 > M BASSES

MJ4 LAKE PLACID BLUE

152 Bemis St Terryville, CT.06786 860.583.0543 jon@mbasses.com

MJ5 FIESTA RED

Mike Lull Custom Guitars www.mikelull.com

In 1975 Mike Lull opened his first shop The Guitar Works doing repairs of all kinds on guitars and basses of all brands. In 1995 Mike decided to expand his business into building high end custom guitars and basses under the name “Mike Lull Custom Guitars”. Since then Mike’s reputation has flourished to the extreme as one of the premier custom bass and guitar builders in the world!

13240 NE 20th St. Bellevue, WA 98005 425.643.8074 service@mikelull.com

M4V

ML JT524

ML T5

ML 54P BASS BUILDER #1 > MIKE LULL

Marleaux Bass Guitars www.marleaux-bass.com

Gerald Marleaux took up the guitar at the age of 9, then made the wise switch to bass at the ago of 12. He soon found that there were no decent basses in his home town, so he acquired some wood from a local carpenter and made his first bass, a fretless 4 that he says “turned out very well”. For the next 10 years he honed his skills, was mentored by bass viol maker Emmo Koch anf apprenticed with a furniture company, all the while making small numbers of instruments, mostly for friends. 1990 marks year one for Marleaux Bass Guitars, and to this date over 1,800 basses have left the Marleaux workshop.

DIVA 5 STRING

VOTAN DELUXE 5STRING

BASS BUILDER #1 > MARLEAUX BASS GUITARS

Sägemüllerstrasse 37 D- 38678 Clausthal-Zellerfeld Germany 0049 (0)532381747

CONSAT CUSTOM 6STRING

Skjold Design Guitars LLC www.skjolddesign.com

In 1992 Pete Skjold designed his first bass guitar. It was a six string made for his professional playing needs by Chris Pearne. By 1996 Pete dove into bass building wholeheartedly and began training himself in the art of woodworking and production. By 1999 Pete had several prototypes that were finished and was fully committed to making a full fledge move to building full time. in 2003 Skjold Design Guitars was officially opened and has continued to flourish and grow with each passing year.

OFFSET WHALEBACK

OFFSET 92

BASS BUILDER #1 > SKJOLD DESIGN GUITARS

36728 US HWY 36 Warsaw OHIO, 43844 740.824.3598 basses@skjolddesign.com

SKJOLDSLAYER

LION'S PRIDE

Ruppert Musical Instruments www.rmi.lu

Finest tools for the working musician manufacturing in Germany and using only best brand components Ruppert Musical Instruments aims at delivering the working musician products of unbeatable build and sound quality. With our top-of-the-range preamps with sophisticated signal routing to support you, you’ll be prepared for anything, whether you’re live on stage in front of a crowd of thousands, or playing to a handful of people in a studio recording session.

ACOUSWITCH IQ DI

BASS BUILDER #1 > RUPPERT MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS S.A.

20a Rue de Bascharage L-4995 Schouweiler Luxembourg R.C.S. Luxembourg: B 147607 TVA: LU 23516830

BASSWITCH IQ DI

Glockenklang www.glockenklang.de

Glockenklang was founded by Udo Klempt-Giessing, owner and mastermind in 1979. The first bass equipment called “Bugatti” was introduced on the Frankfurt Musik Messe in 1988. Since then Glockenklang has been known as a manufacturer of high quality bass gear. Our actual amps are the Passenger, Soul II, Heart-Rock II, Bass Art Classic preamp and head and the Blue Soul head.

BASS ART CLASSIC PREAMP

BASS BUILDER #1 > GLOCKENKLANG

BASS ART CLASSIC TOP

Eimterstraße 147 32049 Herford Germany +49-5221-51506 +49-5221-108755 info@glockenklang.de

BLUE SOUL1C

HR II FRONTAL

Index of Advertisers Alembic...........................................................................................................................................................4 Alleva Coppolo ........................................................................................................................................5 Ansir....................................................................................................................................................................6 Aries ..................................................................................................................................................................7 Benincaso.....................................................................................................................................................9 Birdsong Guitars ...................................................................................................................................14 BL Design .....................................................................................................................................................11 Bottom Wave...........................................................................................................................................13 Brubaker........................................................................................................................................................3 Chicago Bass Club..............................................................................................................................45 Delgado Guitars ...................................................................................................................................16 Devon Guitars..........................................................................................................................................15 DP Custom Guitars............................................................................................................................17 Drake Custom Bass .........................................................................................................................18 Elrick...................................................................................................................................................................1 F bass ...............................................................................................................................................................C Fodera..............................................................................................................................................................23 Garz Guitars & Basses...................................................................................................................19 Glockenlang ..............................................................................................................................................46 Hilton ................................................................................................................................................................27 Holcomb Guitars...................................................................................................................................29 Jerzy Drozd Basses...........................................................................................................................31 Kenneth Lawrence Instruments..........................................................................................32 Kinal ..................................................................................................................................................................33 Le Fay ..............................................................................................................................................................35 LedBelli Bass Guitars .....................................................................................................................37 Luthiers Access Group....................................................................................................................47 M Basses.......................................................................................................................................................38 Marleaux Bass Guitars...................................................................................................................40 Mike Lull Custom Guitars ..........................................................................................................39 Ruppert Musical Instruments ................................................................................................44 Skjold Design Guitars ......................................................................................................................42 The Bass Place ......................................................................................................................................41 Zakrzewski Basses.............................................................................................................................43 48

BASS BUILDER #1 > INDEX