Has anyone changed instruments in your band?

#21
I play in a Bluegrass band where my primary instrument is mandolin. I also play bass in other groups. Our Bluegrass bass player is out of town on an extended (several month) vacation so I have switched to mostly bass till he returns. I still play mando on some songs and play guitar on others. Mando is my best instrument and I notice my skill slipping a little since I am mainly on bass for now.

Of the five band members, three are multi-instrumentalists but I am the strongest bass player when our regular guy is not there. I really enjoy the bass, but miss playing the mando a bit. Having multi-instrumentalists 7n the band is a real luxury.

Thump on,

One_Dude
 
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#22
One_Dude said:
I play in a Bluegrass band where my primary instrument is mandolin. I also play bass in other groups. Our Bluegrass bass player is out of town on an extended (several month) vacation so I have switched to mostly bass till he returns. I still play mando on some songs and play guitar on others. Mando is my best instrument and I notice my skill slipping a little since I am mainly on bass for now.

Of the five band members, three are multi-instrumentalists but I am the strongest bass player when our regular guy is not there. I really enjoy the bass, but miss playing the mando a bit. Having multi-instrumentalists 7n the band is a real luxury.

Thump on,

One_Dude
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Cool man! Sometimes it's hard to brush up on your chops when you've got a full schedule. I've always wanted to play mandolin but I didn't think a fretboard could get so damn small!!! :woot:
 
#23
blubass said:
Why did he switch if you don't mind my asking?
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I believe he originally learned drums because his father and brother are drummers. He really wanted to play guitar, but hadn't learned how when the band was first formed. We had three guitarists at one point, but no drummer, so he played drums. When the band went on hiatus for awhile due to work schedules, etc, he started playing guitar. He progressed quickly and never looked back. When we got the band going again, he stayed on guitar. His brother played drums with us for a short period of time. When his brother left, we found a great drummer, new to the area, who is a perfect fit for us. This is the best lineup we've had, and we're getting a lot done and gigging a lot, so his switching has worked out very well.
 
#24
I was doing vocals and bass in a band. The music was getting more technical, causing my performance on both to suffer. It was decided that I would switch to vocals only and we would find a bassist. We had a short tour coming up in a few months. We found a solid dude who played a couple shows with us, but he had to bail on the tour without a whole lot of notice, so the rhythm guitarist decided to take over bass duties for that tour.
 
#25
I learned bass and guitar at the same time and although I played bass in a string of bands I always had the desire to play guitar.

Fast forward about 20 years and the guitarist out of my first band (who had now swapped to bass) rang me and asked if I wanted to play lead because their lead guitarist was moving a way with his job. I jumped at the chance and played lead for 12 years but soon realised it was nowhere near as interesting as playing bass.

I got the chance to switch back to bass when my friend, the bassist, quit.

I've got it out of my system now and have absolutely no desire to play guitar in a band ever again.

As always YMMV.
 
#26
craigie said:
You have drum tracks? Record or Sequence the bass then.
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You mean play to bass tracks? I don't know why I haven't really thought of that. Probably wouldn't sequence the bass, though. I think it would be easier (and quicker) to just set up a click track and record the bass. Thanks for the suggestion. :bassist::thumbsup:
 
#27
When the band I am currently in started many years ago, I was one of the guitar players. I had played guitar in various bands. I had only ever played bass twice in any of the bands, and that was just to fill in for the bass player when he had to be gone for work. So my bass playing experience was limited to say the least. It was limited to plunking around five minutes here and there, pretty much playing in front of a crowd by sheer memorization. After a couple of years, the bass player and drummer quit. We found a drummer pretty quickly but had trouble with a bass player. I finally said that I would just do it. I wish I had done it twenty years sooner because I love playing bass. I am a waaaay better bass player than I ever was a guitar player.

Try it...you never know!

BnB
 
#28
I did a few shows with a friends' band which was 80% covers/20% originals. The main singer was a bass player who'd abandoned the bass for guitar. He also wrote songs.
When I was playing with them I would swap to guitar for the songs I'd written, and sing them. He'd play bass. It worked quite well.

I went to see 10cc in London in the early 80s. They swapped instruments all night:
Graham Gouldman played bass, and guitar, and sang
Eric Stewart played guitar, keyboards, and sang
Rick Fenn played guitar, bass, and sang backing vocals
Paul Burgess played drums, piano, and sang backing vocals
Stuart Tosh played drums, percussion, and sand backing vocals

It was musical musical chairs all night. Didn't miss a beat.
 
#30
A couple bands ago I started as the bass player. We wanted to add keys, and after half a dozen disastrous auditions they persuaded me to move to keys, though my skills were really basic. I stayed on keys with that band for the next four years through three different bass players.
I had to join a second band so I could play bass again!
 
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