Fretless guitars

I have a vocal quintet, ALMOST ACAPPELLA, which sings my original
arrangements of classical and jazz compositions (Chopin, Debussy,
Mussorgsky, Satie, Miles Davis, Chick Corea, Bill Evans, Earl Zindars). I
also play guitar in the group, often bass lines. It is often quite
noticeable how the tempered tuning of the guitar (innacuarate at that) is
out of tune with the voices. I am considering having a fretless guitar made
and would like to learn the experience of others learning to play such a
thing. I used to play acoustic bass, so I don't think I'd have much trouble
playing single lines in tune, but I wonder whether parallel sixths, at
moderate tempo, would be all that difficult? What about parallel open
triads (e.g. on the 1st, 3rd, and 4th strings: D A F#, E B G, F# C# A, G D
B, A E C#, etc.)?

John Link
New York City

[This message contained attachments]

From: Larry.Polansky@Dartmouth.EDU (Larry Polansky)

>However, there are drawbacks: My wife recently, after a gig, suggested I
>wear a T-shirt while performing which says: "They're just lines!"
>

I don't get it.

Anyway, thanks for your comments about playing your fretless.

John Link

>From: johnlink@con2.com (John Link)
>
>From: Larry.Polansky@Dartmouth.EDU (Larry Polansky)
>
>>However, there are drawbacks: My wife recently, after a gig, suggested I
>>wear a T-shirt while performing which says: "They're just lines!"
>>
>
>I don't get it.
>
>Anyway, thanks for your comments about playing your fretless.
>
>John Link
>

Lines, not frets. Got it? Don't fret. George

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>From: george zelenz <ploo@mindspring.com>
>
>>From: johnlink@con2.com (John Link)
>>
>>From: Larry.Polansky@Dartmouth.EDU (Larry Polansky)
>>
>>>However, there are drawbacks: My wife recently, after a gig, suggested I
>>>wear a T-shirt while performing which says: "They're just lines!"
>>>
>>
>>I don't get it.
>>
>>Anyway, thanks for your comments about playing your fretless.
>>
>>John Link
>>
>
>Lines, not frets. Got it? Don't fret. George
>

In this contect, lines has at least two other possible
meanings(1:lines=strings, and 2:lines=melodies), so I wasn't sure which one
Larry meant. Or maybe I was thrown off by his statement that there are
drawbacks. Or maybe I'm just slow. Anyway, thanks for the clarification.

John

[Larry Polansky:]
>I've been playing a fretless guitar pretty much about half the time
for a couple of years now (I prefer to think of the fretted as the
training wheel guitar). I do a lot of performing with it, and I use it
for certain pieces, other guitars for others. I love it.

I agree; "love" is definitely the word I'd use for it too! For soloing
or (most) written lines and riffs, or -- well for most anything but a
bunch of chording (or overly complex written parts) -- I've never felt
more liberated on any instrument than I have on the fretless guitar. I
have two (as well as a fretless baritone ukulele): One is a nerve
pinching 10+ pound Les Paul with an aluminum finger board, and the
other is a Kramer.

> The challenge has been significant, but its been a lot of fun (and
still is), and I can't imagine NOT having it as a major part of my
musical life anymore.

I couldn't put it any better than that...

Dan

"D.Stearns" wrote:

> One is a nerve
> pinching 10+ pound Les Paul with an aluminum finger board, and the
> other is a Kramer.

Do you ever have to stop a string (or "fret") with
your fingernail to get sustain? And what year is that Les Paul.

--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* xouoxno@virtulink.com
*
* J u x t a p o s i t i o n N e t R a d i o
* M E L A v i r t u a l d r e a m house monitor
*
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

[David Beardsley:]
> Do you ever have to stop a string (or "fret") with your fingernail
to get sustain?

No. With distortion I've never had much of a problem with sustain...
When I used to play with Mat Maneri he'd run his Tucker Barrett's
direct into the board through a Rat, and to me (and my ears anyway),
the heavily distorted fretless Les Paul sounds more like that than
anything else (a couple of the solo's on Betahole, which you have
archived at 6/20/99 part II at your Juxtaposition Net Radio site, were
a tip of the cap to Mat and that sound)... With a minimum of
distortion, there are certain registers that have an odd mewling sort
of sound - a damp and sometime sickly sort of thing... but I like that
too!

>And what year is that Les Paul.

Whoops - that should have read a Les Paul COPY.

Dan

> [Larry Polansky:]
> >I've been playing a fretless guitar pretty much about half the time
> for a couple of years now

> [Dan Stearns]
> I have two (as well as a fretless baritone ukulele): One is a nerve
> pinching 10+ pound Les Paul with an aluminum finger board, and the
> other is a Kramer.

Do either of you, or anyone else on the tuning list have comments about
getting reasonable sustain out of your fretless guitars? Are these all
electric instruments? What kind of fingerboard material? (I know one is
aluminum - is that a good material?) Do you use compression or distortion
when you play? Do you use special pickups? What about a sustainer pickup?

I've only had 2 experiences with fretless. One was listening to a cheap
classical guitar with the frets pulled through a cheap pickup about 8 years
ago. It was awful - sounded like rubber bands with no sustain. The other
was ripping the frets off the top octave of my Strat also about 8 years ago.
Sustain was a problem, chords were difficult, but otherwise it sounded ok -
great if I used my fingernail to stop the string. The lower octave of that
guitar was sixth tone, and I found that if I slid around the sixth tone
part, it sounded almost fretless, only with the same sustain as a fretted
guitar. I bet it would be great with a sustainer pickup.

---
Glen Peterson
Peterson Stringed Instruments
30 Elm Street North Andover, MA 01845
(978) 975-1527
http://www.organicdesign.org/peterson

I have played a wood fretboard fretless guitar. Definitely not the material
to use if you want sustain. Others on this list have mentioned a certain
kind of hard epoxy resin has been effective. I also remember a thread some
months ago about the possible of toxic properties of aluminum oxide, which
invariably rubs off on the fingers with an aluminum necked guitar.

Darren Burgess
Gainesville FL
>
>Do either of you, or anyone else on the tuning list have comments about
>getting reasonable sustain out of your fretless guitars? Are these all
>electric instruments? What kind of fingerboard material? (I know one is
>aluminum - is that a good material?) Do you use compression or distortion
>when you play? Do you use special pickups? What about a sustainer pickup?

Hey, I recently yanked the frets off a cheap yamaha bass, and applied two
coats of a two-part epoxy marine finish. Great sustain, and definitely
brighter tone. It's what JACO did. I recommend it for six strings as well,
I think it would work great. G

phv40@hotmail.com wrote:

> David B's fretless G&L is a very nice axe indeed. With the epoxy
> coating, his high strings except for the high E have pretty good
> natural sustain on the high notes. .009 E strings are just too thin
> for fretless in my opinion.

Consider the conditions you were playing it in:
at first the guitar wasn't even plugged in. When it was
plugged in, it was straight into a Fender Princeton.
I normally use a couple of pedals like a Fultone Fulldrive
and a MXR compressor to fill out the tone on any electric guitar I play.

db
--
* D a v i d B e a r d s l e y
* 49/32 R a d i o "all microtonal, all the time"
* http://www.virtulink.com/immp/lookhere.htm

>.009 E strings are just too thin
>for fretless in my opinion.

.009s are too light without distortion -- they're heavy metal (i.e., hard
rock&roll) strings. I use .010s on electric and .013s on acoustic or jazz.

--- In tuning@egroups.com, "Paul H. Erlich" <PERLICH@A...> wrote:
> >.009 E strings are just too thin
> >for fretless in my opinion.
>
> .009s are too light without distortion -- they're heavy metal
(i.e., hard
> rock&roll) strings. I use .010s on electric and .013s on acoustic
or jazz.

I agree. And with fretless guitars, switching from .009s to heavier
gauges is far less dramatic than on fretted. Why bend when you can
just slide, right? :)

Paolo