Bass guitar
From Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The bass guitar, or bass is a stringed musical instrument. It is shaped like an electric guitar, except that it is longer than an electric guitar. The bass guitar produces sounds that are lower in pitch than the electric guitar.
The bass guitar is used to play low musical sounds called "bass lines" in many styles of music, such as rock music, pop music country music, and jazz fusion music.
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[edit] How it is built
The bass guitar is mostly made from wood. It has a wooden body. A wooden neck is glued or bolted onto the body. A wooden fingerboard is then glued onto the wooden neck. Then thin metal strips called frets are glued onto the neck. Bass guitars usually has four metal strings. A smaller number of bass guitars have five or six strings. Bass guitars also have magnetic pickups mounted on the body, which are connected to a volume control. The volume control is a knob that rotates, to allow the musician to make the bass guitar's sound louder or quieter.
[edit] How it works
To hear the sounds from an electric bass, the electric bass needs to be connected with a metal cable to an electronic amplifier and a loudspeaker.
The magnetic pickups mounted on the body receive the vibrations from the metal strings when the musician plucks the strings. Then the vibrations from the strings are converted into an electronic signal which is sent with a metal cable to an electronic amplifier and a loudspeaker.
[edit] History
Before the bass guitar was invented in the 1950s, the double bass was used in jazz, blues, folk, and early rock music. The double bass was big and heavy. Musicians wanted to have a smaller, lighter instrument. Inventors tried to think of ways of building a smaller, lighter bass instrument.
One of these inventors was a man called Leo Fender in the United States. Leo Fender invented the bass guitar in the 1950s, using many parts that are similar to the parts of an electric guitar. Leo Fender called the instrument the "Fender Precision Bass."
[edit] Changes to bass guitars
The first bass guitars from the 1950s had frets. Frets are thin metal bars on the neck which are used to separate the notes. In the 1960s and 1970s, some musicans took the frets off their bass guitars. Taking the frets off a bass guitar changes the sound of the bass guitar. A bass guitar without frets is called a fretless bass guitar.
The first bass guitars had four metal strings. In the 1970s and 1980s, some bass guitar companies began building bass guitars with five or six metal strings. Bass guitars with five or six strings can play a wider range of musical notes than a bass guitar with four strings.
[edit] See also
- Bass
- Double bass, a large stringed instrument which is used to play the low-pitched bass notes in orchestras, jazz bands, jazz fusion bands, and rockabilly bands.
- Rock and Roll or Rock music almost always uses the bass guitar to play the low-pitched "bass lines"
