Bass of the Week: Inside Bryant Trenier’s Upright-Inspired Fretless Acoustic Bass Guitar
Bryant Trenier is one of the world’s most renowned luthiers specializing in archtop guitars. Based in Southern France, his designs draw from the ideas of John D’Angelico, Jimmy D’Aquisto, and vintage Gibsons.
This week, we’re featuring a recently finished acoustic bass guitar, which he crafted using his years of experience for a specific idea.
“The goal was to make a bass guitar which sounds as close to an upright bass as possible,” he tells No Treble.
The fretless bass has a medium 32-inch scale. Its body, which measures 14” wide and 3.5” deep, is built with a Tyrolean Spruce soundboard and Central European Maple back. Trenier put a soundhole on the front as well as a port on the side for the player to hear better.
“I’ve been including the soundport on certain instruments for over a decade now,” Trenier tells us. “It really does help direct sound to the musician’s ear. It can be a bit tricky maintaining a full, colorful tone with the port, it took some time to figure that out, but I’ve got it in hand now.”
The maple neck is fitted with an ebony fingerboard that has a extra bit on the end to reach even higher on the D and G strings. Trenier also utilized ebony for the bridge, tailpiece, and headstock. All in all, the bass achieved its goal, thanks to his use of D’Aquisto’s concepts.
“Jimmy’s design principles applied to a new set of geometric parameters, yielding punch, warmth, and character of sound in a new milieu,” he shared on Instagram.
Trenier Acoustic Bass Guitar Photos:
Trenier Acoustic Bass Guitar Specs:
| Scale: | 32″ |
| Body: | Central European Maple |
| Top: | Tyrolean Spruce |
| Neck: | Maple |
| Fingerboard: | Ebony |
| Frets: | Fretless |
| Inlays: | None |
| Bridge: | Ebony |
In his time with No Treble, Kevin has met hundreds of amazing bassists and interviewed icons like Jack Casady, Victor Wooten, Les Claypool, Marcus Miller, and more. He's a gigging bassist performing jazz in Northern Virginia and bluegrass with The Plate Scrapers up and down the East Coast. Kevin appreciates all genres of music, from R&B to metal and everything in between. Connect with Kevin on Facebook and check his performance schedule on his website.
Very nice. I made one 34″ scale archtop acoustic with 16″ wide Sitka Spruce archtop top Ebony fingerboard with maple fret lines. Michigan maple neck and body. It’s real loud acoustally. I put a Seymour Duncan pickup in the top