matthew wengerd|bassist

In Central Florida, keeping your bass humidified is not really a great concern. More often than not, I’m more worried about the heat and humidity causing my bass to literally fall apart at the seams. I’m pretty sure that it won’t be long before I’m in an environment that requires constant humidity to keep my bass safe. To that end, the Peabody Double Bass Blog’s Jeffrey Weisner posted a recipe for a bass humidification system that looks as though it may be a much more effective upgrade from the ubiquitous Dampit (whose “m” is often removed when its users refer to it).

Jason Phillips’ Bass Humidifiers

2 large kitchen sponges
2 plastic Ziploc-type bags. (I used to use a type that was sold as “breathable” and had lots of teeny holes in them to allow air to circulate. These must have not been very commercially successful, since I haven’t seen them in stores for awhile. If you can find them, buy them and give some to bassists everywhere… If not, follow the instructions below.)
4-6 feet of nylon fishing line, available at any sporting goods store
1 safety pin

Tie the line fairly tightly around each sponge, then moisten the sponges and squeeze them out enough to that they won’t drip into your bass. If you don’t have the breathable bags, poke lots of holes into your plastic bags with the safety pin. Then slip the bags over the sponges, and insert the sponges into your f-holes. The nylon line should rest on the bridge.

104 weeks now has a favicon! You’ll notice that, next http://mwengerd.blog…… in the address bar is a tiny version of the bass clef here. Favicons are particularly useful for surfers who are not yet using del.icio.us and still use their browsers’ favorites bars, where the favicon will be displayed next to this blog’s desription.

This website will convert a photo file into a favicon.ico file and this webpage has instructions for installing your favicon into a Wordpress blog. Now everyone can have a favicon!

Some of you may already know that, due to recent damage, I have sent my bass of to Gary at Upton Bass for repairs. Gary runs a well-thought-of business and is an active participant in the Talkbass forums. He also sold me my Revolution Solo pickup with which I am extremely happy.

Once I confirmed that insurance would cover the loss, Gary sent down a Kolstein Trunk (for his Klotz - The bass mine is modeled after) in which I was to return the bass. Gary advised that I remove everything from the bass (most importantly strings), which meant knocking down and removing the soundpost. The removal of strings meant no tension on the top (so as not to exacerbate the structural problems) as well as on the extension.

My extension has the same chassis as this one, though a different stopping mechanism - it is the KCStrings extension. You can see a little wheel at the top around which the string double back to the tuning machine. This is held in place and falls out when the string is removed. So, I packed this up in a box along with my Laborie endpin, strings, KC Marvin Tailpiece, Revolution Solo Pickup, soundpost, etc. The box was in my car, ready for shipping that afternoon.

Now, I had just made a purchase from Lemur Music of some SuperSensitive Clarity rosin and some hide glue. Do you think you see where this is going? The hide glue was at home, but I had brought the rosin along to switch out at orchestra rehearsal. The tub in which the rosin came was cracked and, in a car under the hot Florida sun, oozed out of the container and onto my seat and this little metal wheel, which had fallen out of the box (I should have taped it up by then). In a hurry to make a class, I set the container upright, pried the rosin/wheel mass off the seat and placed it on top of the open rosin container. I think you know what happened next.

Upon returning to the car, I found the rosin had leveled itself back out, looking lovely as ever, but almost overflowing. Encased in it:

I busted out laughing. What else could I do? I didn’t realize Gary was going to put my bass together to check the setup before he started work (what was I thinking?), so I delayed the inevitable freeing of this object from it’s synthetic tomb. I tried freezing, melting, and scraping the stuff off to no avail. I finally sent it out with a thin film of rosin, assuming Gary would know what to do. I haven’t heard any complaints from him yet. I assume he’s on an island in the pacific somewhere, cloning my bass.

As an undergrad, I talked a lot about the fact that music students do not get the kinds of breaks that math, education, business, etc. majors get. We have to practice through Spring Break and Christmas Break and all Summer; meanwhile, the others are at Panama City Beach or skiing in Vale. Yes, I know many of them do internships or work career-related Holiday jobs. As Musicians, however, it is a necessity that we not take time away from our major. An occasional weekend or two is often just what the Dr. prescribed, but it is completely unacceptable for a music student to need to get re-acquainted with their instrument the first week of classes.

Unfortunately, this is not something I practiced (pun intended) during my undergrad years. Now is a different story, though. This was the first weekday morning of my 2007 Spring Break and I spent it warming up, relishing the practice time. I even got to spend time in the front yard, warming up and waving at the neighbors!

I now look at breaks as an opportunity to put away all the distractions of classes and ensembles and focus on my instrument, cleaning up technique and intonation, learning new tunes and more ways to play a scale.

What are you doing with your Spring Break?