Free Play Sound Clips

In other words - what ever the player feels like playing.
Note these are old sound clips and will be updated soon.

Jay Haser is a professional musician in Portland Oregon. His background includes studio work in L.A. and he is a former student at and then instructor for the Bass Institute of Technology program at the Musicians Institute. Jay not only plays the bass but produces, mixes, and records sound. He is a great musician and makes it all look so easy...

Fender Jazz Fretless 4 - 1998 American body all standard (except the electronics, of course) - Mex neck. Jay's bass is setup with a master volume, volume, volume controls and no tone controls.
Low-Z Walk, Mid-Z Finger, Mid-Z Walk, High-Z Finger, High-Z Walk

Pedulla MVP4 - 1989 standard. Master volume, volume/volume controls and no tone controls.
Low-Z Slap *, Low-Z Finger 1, Low-Z Finger 2, Mid-Z Finger,  High-Z Harmonics, High-Z Chords, High-Z Finger  
* slight clipping occurred during the original recording

Helms 6 Custom - 2004 - 2 Bartolini Pickups. Volume/Volume controls and 4 way tone controls (set flat).
Low-Z Finger, Mid-Z Finger, High-Z Finger

More info on the Basses used. The recording  setup is described at the bottom of the page.

Z Mode, Pickups and External Preamp Comparison

The following sound clips - the same simple 12 bar blues (ok, almost the same) - were all produced on a Helms custom 6 string bass with Bartolini pickups as played by Jay Haser. The output jack from the bass was driving all the preamps simultaneously, the preamps DI outs where recording on separate tracks of a Tascam 2488. Clips are categorized by Z-Mode, Pickup(s) used, and Preamps. No processing is performed on the waveforms other than normalization before conversion to 16 bits.

Audere Z-Mode by Pickup & External Amplifier
	Neck Pickup		Combined		Bridge Pickup
Low Z-Mode	DB680	SVT4Pro	DB680	SVT4Pro	DB680	SVT4Pro
	U5	RB1	U5	RB1	U5	RB1
	VTBP-201S		VTBP-201S		VTBP-201S
Mid Z-Mode	DB680	SVT4Pro	DB680	SVT4Pro	DB680	SVT4Pro
	U5	RB1	U5	RB1	U5	RB1
	VTBP-201S		VTBP-201S		VTBP-201S
High Z-Mode	DB680	SVT4Pro	DB680	SVT4Pro	DB680	SVT4Pro
	U5	RB1	U5	RB1	U5	RB1
	VTBP-201S		VTBP-201S		VTBP-201S

Left Channel - Tascam 2488 Guitar/Bass direct input.

Right Channel external Amplifiers used for sound clips - DI outs. Bass Mid(s) Treble controls were set to 12:00. The signal gain was taken by the external preamp. Tubes are original and all the units are in pristine shape. As a point of reference I've included common Internet US pricing for the amplifiers that were used, as of 11/05.

• Aguilar DB680 - $1595: Active input, Gain 9:15
• Ampeg SVT4Pro - $1299: Gain 2:00, Compression Min, Freq (2), Graphic EQ Off
• Avalon U5 - $539: Tone Off
• Demeter VTBP-201S - $699: Passive, Gain 10:30, Presence 10.30, Note: Bass Mid Treble controls at 12:00 do not produce a flat response
• Tech 21 NYC SansAmp RB1 - $295: Drive 10:30, Presence 2:30, Blend 12:00

 

Recording Setup - Jay was playing though an Ampeg SVT 4 PRO head driving a 4 Ohm Avatar B410 Kappa Pro cabinet with the Tweeter control set at 1:15. The recording was performed on a Tascam 2488. The right channel is recorded from the Ampeg head's DI output. The left channel is recorded directly from the Bass using the Tascam guitar/bass input. No signal processing was performed other than normalizing the outputs before converting to 16 bit waveforms and decreasing the volume at the end of the clip.

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