Alternate Tunings

I completed the BassBuzz course about a month and a half ago. When is a good time to start experimenting with alternate tunings – another words, tuning bass strings down a half or whole step. Can this be confusing? Many cool songs use these tunings, so I wanted to try this. – Any thoughts or experience you can share on this would be helpful – Thank you. :slight_smile:

1 Like

any time is a good time! I would recommend starting with Drop D as it only requires you to tune your E down to D and there are loads of songs played in this tuning, so you can probably find a song you already know. Depending on how your bass is set up you might find that tuning down too far will leave your strings rattling so you may need to adjust your saddles and raise your action a little bit. Not a lot can go wrong, and experimenting with different sounds is always fun!

2 Likes

I think the time to experiment with alternate tunings is when there’s’ music you want to play . Like say, you want to play Stevie Ray Vaughn.

Or Another Brick in the Wall Part 2. That’s in Drop D. Just have to tune the E a step down to D.

It’s not hard or confusing to play, bass plays the same. If you tune all the strings down, you may need to adjust the neck as you have less tension on it. Other than that, it’s super simple

3 Likes

Yep. Play what you want. There is no wrong time.

1 Like

I’ve done all of the alternating tuning except for the G string. Most people would go to the e string first but the A string and even D string get a lot of use as well.