BASS BENCH
The Gravity of Back Pain
BY HEIKO HOEPFINGER
give it a try). You won’t
last as long as most gigs,
which explains why we
end up resting our arm
on the neck from time to
time when working the
fretboard. This simple act
turns a neck-horizontal
bass into a diver. To
counteract that tendency,
you’ll naturally press your
other arm down against
the contour or edge of
the body, and this can easily double the
overall weight resting on your shoulder.
Some will argue that you can avoid
most of these shoulder and back
problems by getting a good strap. A
wide, stiff strap with a soft inner side
will certainly help spread the pressure
When weight reduction isn’t an option,
next up is weight distribution.
quality, lightweight basses available,
but sometimes you need to stick to a
certain tool for the task, whether that’s
for sonic reasons, due to finances, or
just a matter of image. So when weight
reduction isn’t an option, next up is
weight distribution.
We’ve all read reviews that laud
well-balanced basses or critique neck
divers, but there’s more to it. When an
instrument hangs on a strap, we can
classify its three states as neck heavy,
neck horizontal, or neck angled upward
(as with classical guitar). At first, the
horizontal and upward positions might
both be considered “well balanced,”
but there’s one thing that makes the
horizontal position turn into a neck dive.
Do you recall the kid’s game that
tests how long you can stretch your
arms out from your body and hold them
horizontal? If your first thought is close
to an hour, think again (or better yet,
108 PREMIER GUITAR SEPTEMBER 2016
and not cut into your shoulder or
collarbone. This might be sufficient for
those with light back pain, but other
than that, it will in no way affect the
unequal conditions for each shoulder. It’s
this disparity that plagues some bassists
with severe back pain—especially longtime players.
One of the oldest approaches to
reducing this disparity is to wear a
secondary strap that runs over the other
shoulder. Such double-strap systems
are similar to those used for carrying
saxophones, marching drums, or tubas.
These systems are designed to be fairly
symmetrical around the instrument’s
center of gravity, which is clearly not the
case with a bass.
If you want to know whether a
double-strap design could help with
your bass, the first thing you need to do
is determine its center of gravity for the
vertical axis. Let’s make a game out of
this: Before you go any further, mark the
position where you think the center of
gravity is. Most players are surprised how
far off they really are.
To find the center of gravity, simply
balance the bass on any chair armrest or
other solid edge, as shown in the image
above. The red line shows the center of
gravity on a Fender Jazz bass, while the
green line in front of the neck pickup
indicates where the owner thought it
would be. The distance from the center
of gravity to each strap pin offers a clue
to how much of the instrument’s weight
would end up on each of your shoulders
in a double-strap design. Just as it is
here, on most basses the outcome will be
somewhat unbalanced.
This is a good opportunity to reiterate
that headless instruments have a far
better weight distribution and balance
than conventional basses with their
headstocks and tuning hardware. In case
you choose the latter system based on
its visual appearance, remember this bit
of folk wisdom: “One must suffer to be
beautiful.” But instead of suffering, next
month we’ll investigate some other moreor-less innovative solutions to relieve
shoulder and back pain.
HEIKO HOEPFINGER is a
German physicist and long-time
bassist, classical guitarist, and
motorcycle enthusiast. His work
on fuel cells for the European
orbital glider Hermes led him to
form BassLab (basslab.de)—a
manufacturer of monocoque
guitars and basses.
Photo courtesy of basslab.de
R
emember when your parents
told you to stand straight and
pull your shoulders back? Totally
annoying, right? But it turns out to be
good advice, even if most parents aren’t
fully aware of why it is so important. Bad
posture creates back problems—one of the
main causes of disablement in the Western
world. Roughly 60 percent of all adults
complain about regular back pain, but
we can expect these numbers to be even
higher among bass players, given that we
shoulder heavy instruments with unequal
weight distribution during long rehearsals
or even eight-hour wedding gigs.
While we can rarely influence the
duration of our gigs and rehearsals,
such other factors as weight and it’s
distribution on our shoulders should
be within our control. There are high-
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