I ended up taking my Squier Jaguar electric bass to today’s sing around – such a pleasingly easy instrument to play. Although it is tuned the same as the upright bass, I can pull off tunes on the electric bass without breaking a sweat that would be hard to impossible for me on the upright or other instruments.

My first contribution was a fairly laid-back, jazzy version of Black Night (originally Deep Purple) and, when my turn came round again, I went for Ain’t She Sweet, a 1920’s tune that I normally do on the ukulele but it also flows well on bass. After the break, I’d been contemplating a few options but, with someone else picking a song that mentioned rain (the hopefully unprophetic Madman Across the Water by Elton John) I hit the session with a lesser-known jazz standard, Here’s that Rainy Day Again.

We were a bit down on numbers so I ended up getting a fourth number, for which I picked another jazz tune, I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free. I’d performed that one at the ‘Mini Monocle’ (formerly ‘Cask Bah Rocks’) on Wednesday evening. Although not a simple tune, it falls under the fingers very easily on a regular bass. I did it a few weeks ago on upright but it was a strong point to finish todays offerings on electric bass too.