Fretless

Fretted and fretless basses A fretless bass with flatwound strings; markers are inlaid into the side of the fingerboard, to aid the performer in finding the correct pitch.

Bartell’s of California made the prototype fretless instrument in the 1960s and it was brought to the show for this week’s episode from Battle Abbey in Sussex.

Violin and cello quartet The Fretless performs Thursday at The Artesian.

Alternative range approaches A seven-string fretless bass Some bassists use other types of tuning to extend the range or get other benefits, such as providing multiple octaves of notes at any given position, or a larger tonal range.

Berklee offers instruction for the four-, five-, and six-string electric bass, the fretless bass, and double bass.

Berserker moved away from the fluid, fretless sound that characterised Numan's previous three albums, featuring instead harder-edged electric bass and drum sounds.

Instruments used are: acoustic guitar (usually six strings, but sometimes seven strings), electric or acoustic bass (sometimes fretless), accordion (sometimes piano accordion, sometimes button accordion), and sometimes some percussion is used.

Music Libyan origin instruments are the zokra (a bagpipe), a flute (made of bamboo), the tambourine, the oud (a fretless lute) and the darbuka (a goblet drum held sideways and played with the fingers).

Some fretless basses have "fret line" markers inlaid in the fingerboard as a guide, while others only use guide marks on the side of the neck.