Double Bass and Beyond - Gary Upton of Upton Bass
Double Bass and Beyond - Gary Upton of Upton Bass
Bass Model Mastery - Customizing Your Dream Instrument with Upton Bass
Unlock the secrets behind choosing your perfect Upton bass model! Ever wondered what makes the Bohemian model so versatile, or why the 7/8 Mittenwald offers a deep sound without sacrificing playability? This episode is your comprehensive guide to understanding the unique features and applications of various Upton bass models, including the Brescian with its violin corners and the Concord, which fuses elements of Mittenwald design with ergonomic ease. We also dive into customization options like flatbacks, roundbacks, and wood choices, giving you the insights you need to match your bass to your playing style and preferences.
But that's not all—we turn the spotlight on the intricate process of creating custom basses tailored just for you. Through the lens of a current project, we explore how combining different features can produce a bespoke instrument that meets your specific desires, from aesthetic appeal to functionality. Whether you're drawn to violin or gamba corners, our dedication to craftsmanship ensures that your bass feels just right. Tune in to discover how we bring your dream instrument to life, making it an extension of your musical essence.
Hey guys, it's Gary with UptonBase. Thanks for checking out our podcast. We just wanted to let you know that a lot of these podcast audio files are pulled from our videos. So if we're chatting and talking about certain features and things about bass topics and you're scratching your head going what's he talking about, hop on over to our YouTube also our coursesuptonbasecom, and oftentimes Instagram, for partials and entire videos that will describe what you're hearing on these audio files. Again, thanks for listening and we'll talk to you soon. What's up, guys?
Speaker 1:I want to break down our models a little bit, and I've had this question and one of the things that I know that I confuse people with is I say something like all of our models do the same thing. That's not true at all. Right, some of them shine in certain places, like right here I have a Bostonian pattern that is our essentially our mitten wall. Those are the same shape of base. This is a five string. We've got some glorious ash on the back and sides, beautiful flame neck, nice medium grain spruce top. This is a five string and this bass being a bigger body, the Bostonian left with a full depth ribs and the round back, but with a harder ash, really complements what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to have a nice, nice tight, focused, pizzicato sound but then a glorious bottom end.
Speaker 1:So if you're looking for an upton bass or you're talking about an upton bass or you're investigating the different models, right down the middle is our bohemian. Our bohemian is the same model as our standard. It's the most simplistic gamba-shaped bass. That's our three-quarter bass, right, that's our. That's kind of our normal. If you called and I don't really know a lot about you and you're just like, hey, we need a good bass at a club over in California and we need something that's going to fit a lot of people and work a certain way, and we want it to be straight down the middle, you're probably going to be looking at a bohemian.
Speaker 1:If you take the bohemian and you want to kind of amp things up a bit, that's where we move over into the mitten wald, so that we're keeping it still a gamba corner bass like this, right, but we're turning up the dial on the size and the proportions of the bass. A mitten wald is simply a 7'8 version of the bohemian. Now, when we say 7'8, don't get alarmed, remember we're doing our ergonomic things. Nice, plentiful overstand, nice 10 degree, pitch in the neck, great projection, all the body ergonomics, the angle of the neck and where the neck sits. We have smaller players that are even in the 5'5, 5'6" range playing our 7'8 size basses because they are not ergonomically difficult. 7'8s to play. I can give you a 7'8 with a flat neck, non-sloping shoulder, and you're just playing an instrument that might as well be a 4'4". It's useless. So don't be alarmed by 7'8s. I like to use as much body size as I can for the player to get them as much of the top end clarity and sound they want, combined with a good bottom end. That's what our basses are all about. So we've got the Bohemian straight down the middle. That's the same as a standard.
Speaker 1:If you take the Bohemian and you turn it up a notch, you're going to the 7 8ths, which is the mittenwalled. Let's say you're not in love with gamba corners and you want a bass that's violin cornered. The Breschen is very much so the Mittenwald with violin corners. Similar bases. I'm not going to tell you they're identical, but their neck blocks are very similar. They still have the same ergonomics built into them. The Breschen, by standard, has about a six and a half inch neck block. The Bostonian has this deep guy like this. The Mittenwald has a shorter one. So I might be starting to lose you. But hang in there with me.
Speaker 1:If you take the Mittenwald or you take the Breschen and you put Bassetto corners on it and you take the upper bouts and you make them smaller, that is our Concord. So our Concord is still a nice big, proportioned base. However, it steals its upper bouts this part of the pattern. It steals its upper bouts from the car. So the car is a nice long bodied, slim, upper bouted three quarter base but it's got a big bottom end and tapered upper bouts. The Concord steals the upper bouts from the car, puts bassetto corners and nice big juicy lower bouts from the Mittenwald. So you start to see the picture here where the Bohemian lives in the middle. You go a little bit bigger to the Mittenwald. You could do it with violin corners like the Breschen, you could do it with bassetto and you get a little more ergonomic. And then over here a little bit, you get into the car land.
Speaker 1:Now all of these models. We start to play with them. They have flatbacks, they have roundbacks, they have a variety of different ways that we construct them based upon your tonal needs, and that's where I'm trying to say they all can do the same thing. They cannot. If you want the biggest, most thunderous orchestra bass with a deep, deep, creamy sound, I'm going to tell you let's make a big-bodied bass like a Mittenwald, a Bostonian or a Breschen, and let's take that bass and make it with a softer wood. We're going to use a softer wood and I might say, hey, let's go full depth, ribs higher, arching on the back. And then I'll even add another step. I'm going to add a broader grain spruce top. So the tightness of the grain in the top, I'm going to go softer. You'll see this brushing over here. It's got a fairly nice tight grain top, based upon what I'm voicing, it for the player.
Speaker 1:Again, this doesn't pigeonhole the bass to be one thing, its whole life at all. That's our job, because we are the custodians of our brand and I need to make sure that if you buy this bass, perhaps in time you decide to do something else. I wanna make sure that someone else is gonna love this bass too. So I'm customizing it and leading it and enhancing it so that when the guy that gets this base says, man, this is my dream base. It does everything I want.
Speaker 1:So we do that through poplar, different quarter sawns, rotary cuts. We do that through maple variety of hard and soft maples, big leaf, bosnian maple, american maple ash. We have all kinds of fun stuff. We've got some maples that are very soft and we've got spalted things. We've got hard things. That's where, no matter how many videos I put out there and I'm trying to give you these understandings and broad strokes of what we do, at the end of the day it's me and you talking about what you want to do and you'll notice that all of this ends up being what I put into my suggestion when I come back at you.
Speaker 1:I've had players that say, oh, I think I want the car. You know there's a certain thing about that. Then they're telling me I'm going to be playing in a section and I want a really big bottom end and I'll explain to them like the projection and the brightness of the car may actually be something they like and they say, yeah, you know what. I'm going to be playing jazz gigs and while I appreciate that I want to go this direction and entirely to contradict that, I have players with C extensions on car models that love them as jazz basses, they double as orchestra basses and they're using them everywhere. So this is getting to know you and what you want it to do and at the end of the process I'm generally going to say, hey, here's your recommendation. I'm generally going to say, hey, here's your recommendation.
Speaker 1:That's why, when we talk about making you a custom bass, you might say, well, you're using a model you already have, absolutely, because I know what they do. You know you might be saying it's not entirely custom, which we do. You can look at Santa Giuliana and Galliano and the Victor Ruttenkarkassi and Nina Bernat's bass. These are all very custom instruments. Max Zeugner's Cassini bass they're very custom instruments but they're also still founded and built upon recipes that we know already worked. Because we have the old, original Italian basses, we're able to play them. We say, wow, there's certain things about this that are magical and we use that as proof and evidence and as our framework to build a very nice instrument.
Speaker 1:Other things that we've done, but the kind of the initial framework of your bohemian, your mittenwalled, your breschen, your car, your concord, and then off into the custom patterns. I'll mention the Galeano, for example. That's a big, 7'8 size bass, long body, really big lower bouts, very deep lower bouts. It has almost a nine inch lower bout but then well-proportioned uppers where I see them in conservatories and I have people that would otherwise say I need a small bass they're playing these basses because the ergonomics are there. So I hope that helps.
Speaker 1:If you have questions, which you will take in all the videos, including this one, and I think you'll start to see kind of how I put that recipe together when I come at you and say let's do this and don't forget, I really want you to love your bass, so I'm never going to push you into. If you love the look of violin corners but you want the function of a bass that doesn't have it, let's talk about it. I'm doing one right now. I'm making a car bass for the first time with violin corners. It's going to be a one piece ash back and the player that's getting it's like listen, I want a best poke thing. I really love that pattern.
Speaker 1:But gamba corners to this particular client they just feel economical and he doesn't want something despite. You know this is a $25,000 gamba cornered, beautiful bass. He doesn't want something in his mind that feels economical. So we're doing a car model with violin corners, it's going to be a great bass. That's the kind of thing we could do. Just ask, and we're really looking to please you and make something that's very special for you. That is, at the end of the day, our favorite thing to do. Thanks, guys, for watching.