Hurry up slowly

It's been a while since my last post, but that is mainly because I try to spend my time practizing to play bass rather than to update this blog :-)
I received my Behringer BXL1800 amplifier long ago and I'm so far very pleased with it.
It has taken longer than I would have wanted it to (I've been trying to practice about 30 - 90 minutes to per day), but I finally start to know my way around the the fretboard. And I feel that my fingers begins to be flexible enough to play in a fluent way :-)
I'm already (or maybe some think 'only') on the second lesson of  Teach Me Bass Guitar but in the very near future I will put in the second (out of ten) DVD in the player and see what challanges lesson three will bring.

My new red friend arrived yesterday...

Let me introduce you to my Ibanez SR300 :-)
It looks and feels very nice and it's so much easier to play compared to the Harley Benton I first had. It's also clearly of a much higher quality.
I'm now just waiting for my new amp to arrive, but meanwhile I use my wife's electric piano as a headphone amp and a metronome :-)

Bassless again

This evening I used Thomann's 30-day money-back guarantee and sent back my Harley Benton HBB400-SET 2. I decided to use this possibility to buy me a bass more suitable for a beginner. This decision came after a good friend of mine, who is a very good bass player and a (former) bass guitar teacher had a look at my bass and noticed that it was not possible to get the strings closer to the fretboard. The Harley Benton HBB400TBK might be OK to play for an experienced player, but it is too hard to play for a beginner, like me.

Since I bought it in a specially priced set it was better to send the whole package back, and I will then also upgrade to a better amplifier. 

So as soon as Thomann has refunded my money, these are now what I will go for: An Ibanez SR300 bass and a Behringer BXL1800 amplifier.

At least this new bass free time will give me a chance to learn the bass fretboard to perfection ;-)

Step 3 - Start practising

So at last I got my first bass! :-)
I had a sneak peek at lesson one of TMBG already last week, and now with a bass in my hands I can say that it looks easier than it is in reality ;-) Roy says in the first lesson something like 'the first time you play it might feel like peeling a banana while biking a mono bike and joggling', and I can agree with that.
So I just had to stop the DVD after a few minutes into the first lesson, and I have now spent an hour or two practising the very first things of Roy's instructions. It already feels like I'm progressing, but I also feel a need to rest. :-)

Joy and frustration

My copy of TMBG (Teach Me Bass Guitar) arrived this morning! :-) And a few hours later a box with the Harley Benton HB-40B, bass amp. :-)
But, what has DHL done with the bass and the rest of my gear from Thomann? :-(

I guess I'll just have to practice air-bass today...

Step 2 - Get a good teacher

The kids of today might think it is weird that neither the first nor the second step is to figure out a cool name and design the t-shirts for the band I will join once I know how to play, but I'm a geezer ;-)
My second step was to research (i.e. google) if there are any good online bass courses. One of the very first  pages I found was this: Teach Me Bass Guitar Review.
So after reading that, and some other reviews I headed over to  Teach Me Bass Guitar (from now on TMBG), checked the info there and some sample videos on YouTube .
Roy Vogt seemed to be just the right teacher for me, so I then ordered myself a copy of the course.

I also ordered a couple of Bass for dummies books online (I'll list them in a later post) and booked a couple of DVD/book bass courses from the local library. (Mainly because I fear that it will take a week or two for the TMBG course to arrive, and I want to start as soon as the bass has arrived).

I guess Step 3 is to now wait for the gear and DVDs to arrive, but I won't write a separate post for that...

Step 1 - Get the hardware

The jazz concert ended late Friday evening and one of the first thing I did on Saturday morning was to order a Harley Benton HBB400-SET 2 from Thomann :-)
Why from there? Because a good friend of mine from Sweden, who has been playing bass for over 35 years bought a cheap bass from there and he is very satisfied.
Why that set? Well, I didn't do ANY research about what kind of bass a beginner should buy, I only decided that the total price should not be over 250 Euro. When I listened online to this bass compared to others they have for sale in that price range, the Harley Benton HBB400TBK simply sounded best.
I also ordered a Thomann CTG-10, clip tuner.
As I write this the packages are on their way from Germany to Finland :-)