Jason Heath’s Double Bass Blog

One of my colleagues was over at my place a few years ago, and we were geeking out in true double bass fashion, playing duets, working on excerpts together, and getting into deep discussions about gear.
He and I left for lunch, leaving our basses out of their cases. We had a good time, got [...]

After publishing my first book Road Warrior Without and Expense Account last month, I’m hard at work editing my next book, which will feature scores of crazy gig stories and will (probably) be titled “My Car Caught Fire and Exploded!”
This amusing little story was told to me by a bassist as we were [...]

 

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Here’s episode 5 of Story Time with Contrabass Conversations, based upon a tale about an audition I did for the now-defunct San Jose Symphony.

 

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Here’s the latest episode of Story Time with Contrabass Conversations. These stories recount some of the funny, sad, poignant, and painful moments in the life of a freelance road warrior. Find the text version of this story here, and check out Contrabass Conversations for more weekly double bass content.

As I was wheeling my bass down the street the other day, I passed by a  homeless person with a shopping cart filled with all sorts of stuff–blankets, cans, old bottles, newspapers, and all sorts of other various items piled high.
I approached, carrying not only my bass but also my stool and my laptop bag [...]

Now this is a great piece of bass trivia!  Patty from oboeinsight recently posted this fascinating information on her blog:
 (via My Wedding Favors Blog)
Every year for the past 100 years, Hungarians in the city of Roma would bury a double bass to signal the end of the wedding season and also would confess their sins [...]

Reading Michael Hovanian’s recent blog story Bad Friday made me recall (for whatever reason) a tale that a Chicago Symphony bassist told me many years ago….
Sir Georg Solti, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s longtime music director, had a reputation for being fairly difficult to understand in rehearsal.  New orchestra musicians would often gaze quizzically at him [...]

After finishing a performance in a master class, the student looks up, wide-eyed and expectant, at the teacher, expecting some sage advice or pearls of wisdom.
The teacher opens his mouth and says:
"You have two problems……your left hand and your right hand!"
What wisdom!

The bass world is small, and Contrabass Conversations is quickly helping to make it even smaller! We featured double bassist Anthony Stoops on the podcast last weekend (episode 67). Anthony is a wonderful bass soloist, teacher, orchestral player, and composer, as well as chairing the string department at the University of Oklahoma, and [...]

This is a post from contributor Bill Harrison. Bill owns and operates the play-along jazz tracks company playjazznow.com , and he maintains a blog called Jazz Underneath. You can read all doublebassblog.org contributions from Bill here.
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Among the many fascinating questions I get asked while wheeling my bass to gigs or waiting for [...]