Jason Heath’s Double Bass Blog

After featuring Barry Lieberman and his beautiful Maggini on Contrabass Conversations these past few weeks, I thought that it would be a good idea to show folks a picture of this magnificent instrument. This photo comes from Barry’s first tour with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Check out part 2 of our interview to hear [...]

The following is a short excerpt from the E-Bass Line Newsletter from the International Society of Bassists. Receiving this newsletter each month is one of the many benefits for ISB members, including special rates on instrument insurance, the excellent journal Bass World, the paper edition of the Bass Line, and much more! Check out [...]

Bass Musician Magazine, the online bimonthly bass publication to which I regularly contribute, just released their one-year anniversary edition. This magazine, which is (in my admittedly biased opinion) superior in content to most print sources about the bass, was started by Jake Kot, and since its inception I’ve been contributing a column highlighting jazz and [...]

 

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We’re concluding our interview with double bassist Barry Lieberman. The former Assistant Principal Bass of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Principal Bass of the Winnipeg Symphony, Barry now serves as co-director of The American String Project, an innovative string ensemble which features arrangements of string quartets for small string ensemble with double bass.
On today’s episode, [...]

Where would we be without double bass composers? These four individuals have made great strides in promoting the double bass and innovating musically. We have more composers in our Contrabass Conversations archives–just dig through and see who else strikes your fancy:
Peter Askim
Active as a composer, conductor and bassist, Peter Askim is the Music Director [...]

The wonderfully helpful oboist Darlene Marshall has just completed her transcription of our Contrabass Conversations interview with Anthony Stoops. It’s really great to be able to offer these episodes up in text form, and I can’t thank Darlene enough for her help with this project.
So far, we’ve got transcripts from our interview with Anthony Stoops [...]

Visitors to doublebassblog.org may notice that we’ve got a new ad for The American String Project in the sidebar, and I’d like to direct people’s attention to this new sponsor. This outstanding ensemble features chamber music works arranged to include double bass by Barry Lieberman. The former Assistant Principal Bass of the Los Angeles Philharmonic [...]

We have had the opportunity to feature some of the world’s best solo double bass talent on the podcast as well. Here are a few fan favorites–remember, we have many more in our Contrabass Conversations archives:
Gary Karr
Since his debut with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic in 1962, Karr has performed as soloist [...]

Double bass blogger Cyndy sent me a link to a recent post of hers that features truly horrifying treatment of a double bass by a baggage handler. She was fortunate to capture this double bass beating on video–who knows how many times this kind of abuse happens with no documentation whatsoever.
In the video, this baggage [...]

After some time spent in Mexico, double bass luthier Martin Sheridan has relocated to Sycamore, Illinois (west of Elgin, Illinois, about 1 1/2 hours west of Chicago). Martin has worked extensively in Illinois and Iowa as a double bass luthier.
Martin writes:
I have arrived in Sycamore (just west of Elgin) and have brought my tools. Help [...]