Repairs
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I have gotten plenty of practice repairing my own fleet of basses, but I have had the good fortune to have completed repairs for some very special individuals and institutions:
- The Chicago Symphony Orchestra
- The Ray Brown/Eldee Young English Hawkes Panormo
- Evanston Township High School
- New Trier High School
- Brad Opland
- Timothy Hayes
- Dennis Carroll
- Ivan Taylor
- Highland Park High School
- Northwestern University
- The Peoples Music School
- VanderCook College of Music
- North Park College
- Gurrie Middle School
- Nichols Middle School
- Roosevelt Middle School
I have benefited greatly from my repeated attendance at the Oberlin Doublebass Restoration Workshop, where I have learned tricks of the trade from some of the true masters of doublebass making and restoring, both American and International. I have taken lessons from D. Scott Henrie, who was widely considered the “Kingpin” of Chicago bass repair specialists.
My capabilities as a bass repairman continue to evolve. I have re-necked a bass; taken the tops off of at least a dozen basses; re-glued bass bars; fixed soundpost cracks, and many other things. I’ve dressed too many fingerboards, glued too many open seams, and located and remedied too many “mysterious buzzes” to count!
Contact me today with your bass repair needs. My prices are economical and competitive and my turn-around is surprisingly quick!
Exactly How I Do Things
One morning, I dropped off a couple of repairs to a music shop in another town. They’re far enough away from me that I don’t really consider them competitors and they are really nice people. I probably owe them thanks because they got me thinking along these lines.
One of the basses was a very poor Engelhardt 1/4 size. The neck had been ripped out of the neck block. Both the neck heel and the neck mortise were in rather sad shape. The proprietor told me to just glue the neck back in with hide glue; I used 315 gram—the strongest available. Ideally, I should have cleaned off all of the surfaces, removed the shattered wood shards from both the neck heel and the mortise. Engelhardts have separate wedges glued into the neck block to complete the dovetail joint. That should have been removed and new “wedges” cut to shape. This would have taken lots of time. I told the proprietor that I couldn’t guarantee the work that I did, doing it the quickest and cheapest way that he had selected.
On another bass, my directions were to simply “…find out why it doesn’t play.” I checked it out and it was actually set up rather well! The brand of strings that were on it is an inexpensive brand, two words beginning in “S” separated by a hyphen. I despise these strings! I offered to sell him a better set and share my wholesale discount with him. He politely declined, stating: “I just can’t see spending $100.00 on a set of strings for a little bass.”
Well, I can only see putting good strings on the basses in my rental fleet! I can only see providing instruments that are set up properly so that beginners don’t get discouraged the instant they try out their new instrument. I have chosen to provide my customers with quality bass cases—most are Mooradians—because, although it requires a greater initial investment from me, I reckon I profit more in the long run due to reduced damages to my basses and truly satisfied customers. And with straps located ergonomically, even a small child can pick up the case with ease.
A family just drove down to my shop from Kenosha, Wisconsin. They said that the rubber tip had cracked and fallen off their young son’s bass endpin. I couldn’t find a replacement for the mediocre Chinese endpin so, while they waited, I reamed out the tailblock and installed a Massif endpin by ULSA, a fine German manufacturer. Guess what? The customer won’t have any more problems, and neither would I!
I hope you agree that getting things right the first time and anticipating problems, “heading them off at the pass,” is a ultimately a better way of doing business. Please feel free to come visit and let me show you more about how I take care of my basses, which takes care of my customers!