I had to share this bit from Deke Sharon on Basses: <\/p>\n
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I\u2019m not a person who relishes the idea of stereotypes. In fact, I consider myself a very educated, open-minded man. Nonetheless, sometimes there are just generalizations you can draw about someone based on one little piece of information: voice part. That\u2019s right. I\u2019m talking about basses.<\/p>\n I don\u2019t mean the guys who stand next to you in chorus and sing bass: those are usually baritones. I mean the guys who make your coffee table rumble when they speak, and have been known to destroy subwoofers the way Ella Fitzgerald can shatter crystal. You all know the kind: the REAL basses.<\/p>\n See if you don\u2019t agree with the following statements:<\/p>\n \u2022 Bass singers can sleep anywhere, anytime. Turn your head for a moment, and there he is, asleep on the couch or in the van. Heck, he could be sleeping on a ping-pong table or bathtub. Doesn\u2019t matter. Could this be the result of having your body awash in testosterone? Maybe they have a secret society, and they\u2019re always up late for their secret meetings (don\u2019t bother going – they speak in tones too low to be heard by the human ear), so they\u2019re always sleepy?<\/p>\n \u2022 Basses are, how shall we put it, adored by the ladies. They\u2019re not always the most handsome guys (yeah, I know, I sound like a defensive tenor), and their fashion sense is often quite questionable, but the fact remains that regardless of how good looking they are in a traditional sense, women seem unusually attracted to them. I\u2019ll bet the word \u201cpheromones\u201d is Latin for \u201clow tones.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2022 Bass singers have a tendency to be late. I don\u2019t know why; perhaps because they\u2019ve been waylaid by some alluring lass, or they\u2019re asleep. Maybe because they can\u2019t read a damned watch, which brings me to my next point…<\/p>\n \u2022 I\u2019m not sure any basses are functionally literate. Have you ever seen one reading anything more complex than a comic book? They have better things to do: when the rest of us are asleep, their secret meeting followed by at least one even later secret rendezvous. Can you imagine, night after night? I wouldn\u2019t have the concentration to read anything more complex than a street sign. And yet,<\/p>\n \u2022 They never get in trouble. Think about it. Any time they\u2019re in a jam, they just flash a smile and mumble a couple words that you can\u2019t quite make out, and yet you feel somehow relaxed. I think this is their version of the Jedi mind trick. Think about it: can you recall a cogent argument ever put together by a bass, or might it just be that the conversation took another direction.<\/p>\n \u2022 They lose things all the time: keys, passports, their sheet music. I guess the sheet music part doesn\u2019t matter, because they never sing what\u2019s on the page anyway.<\/p>\n \u2022 They have giant shoes. If you know what I mean.<\/p>\n \u2022 They can do anything they\u2019d like, and their voice only gets lower and richer. Eating, drinking, smoking, partying: perhaps they\u2019re semi-human machines sent back in time to absorb all the fun they can possibly manage and then they return to the future and release the energy, which fuels lunar colonies. That might explain why they\u2019re always late. Damn, I hate those guys! I have to go to bed at a reasonable hour, and if I have too much…<\/p>\n …hang on, I\u2019ve got to answer this call – it\u2019s from Barry Carl…<\/p>\n All done. Now, what was I saying? I can\u2019t quite recall. I feel very relaxed, and I vaguely remember being all worked up about something, but I\u2019m sure it doesn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n That\u2019s all for this week. I\u2019ve been stricken with the desire to go arrange a bass solo. Man, those basses are great guys, aren\u2019t they?<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I had to share this bit from Deke Sharon on Basses: <\/p>\n
\nYes, that\u2019s right. People shy away from drawing generalizations about individuals based on their race, religion or sex, largely because they just don\u2019t prove to be true. Not so with one particular voice part, who after 15 years of working with literally hundreds of a cappella singers I find to be remarkably predictable.<\/p>\n