Playing Classical Music on the Six-String Bass

Hi Everyone,
I've been wanting to try this Blogging phenomenom and see if it's true that there really is "an audience" for every type of hobby.

Well, one of my favorite things to do is to play 6-string bass. I got my first 6-string bass in May of 1994, a Carvin LB-76 (thanks family for a great gift). I immediately loved the extra range and "horizontal possibilities" (range across the neck in one position) that the 6-string brought me. I had been experimenting with tenor tunings for years, so a 6-string made sense for me (and not to mention, it was easier on my 4-string Peavey Dyna-Bass's neck).

I was playing in a rock trio with vocals, and enjoyed having a little extra range to cover ground in that setting. In addition, I had been working on classical music on bass for years. My first instrument was cello actually, and I had been working on the Bach cello suites for years on my 4-string bass. More on that later.

So, while working on my approach to 6-string bass, I decided to dig into the classical guitar repertoire after hearing a fantastic classical guitarist play in the Harvard Square T stop. I began to study classical guitar repertoire for my 6-string bass.

Two years later, in 1996, I recorded a set of pieces arranged for Six-String bass including some Sor, Guilani, Carcassi and Bach. The live, no-overdub album was recorded and engineered by Nate Silas Richardson @ theLoft Studios. You can download the zip archive file at http://www.bentorrey.com/musicforthesix-stringbass.zip if you like.

Anyway, I thought it would be fun to talk people through a few of the pieces, both for me to try this blogging "thing" and for anyone that's working on things for the six-string bass.

I'll include performance comments, and MP3 links.
Ben