Tala - Pengő double basses
Csaba Pengő is a professional double bass player with a thorough understanding of woodwork.
Gábor Szkórits-Tala plays the bass at a tolerable level and is qualified luthier who decided to do something else for a living.
The whole story started when Gábor decided to take double bass lessons from Csaba. The two
became friends and decided to go to BASSEUROPE 2018 in Lucca, Italy. They listened to music for
four days running and checked out many old and new basses. One of them caught Csaba’s attention.
That’s when they decided to build a bass…
If you are interested in how the plan worked out, see the photos of the bass they built together.
Csaba Pengő double bass player and composer”s website:
No.1 Tala- Pengő double bass
This instrument is based on Sergio Scramelli’s Landolfi model, the bass we saw – and fell in love with – in BASSEUROPE 2018 in Lucca. The back and sides are made of cherry, and we reinforced the sides with woven Kevlar – in Cremona, they used linen for the same purpose. We kept the back completely flat (no bevel) and used only one crossbar to make sure it moves freely and does not crack or warp. We installed a Hungarian invention, an Anima Nova soundpost in our proudly made original Hungarian double bass.
Materials
back and ribs – cherry
top – spruce
neck – maple
fingerboard and tailpiece – ebony
Dimensions
string lenght – 103,7 cm
body lenght – 111 cm
upper bout – 49 cm
lower bout – 67 cm
No.2 Tala- Pengő double bass
In our second instrument, we kept the guitar shape of the first one but drew inspiration from a very interesting French luthier, Francois Chanot. Living in the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, he came up with surprisingly modern designs. We used his soundholes that fit our cornerless bass nicely. We made the back and sides of cherry again with a spruce top. The single crossbar flatback worked fine in our first instrument, so we kept it just like the Kevlar-reinforced sides. We used a traditional wooden soundpost here, but we experimented with a Marvin tailpiece and a handle to move the bass around.
Materials
back and ribs – cherry
top – spruce
neck – maple
fingerboard – ebony
tailpiece – Marvin tailpiece
Measures
string lenght – 105 cm
body lenght – 111,5 cm
body width upper – 49 cm
body width lower – 67 cm
No.3 Tala- Pengő double bass
In No 3. we returned to the original soundholes of Landolfi’s bass and used maple for the back and sides – except for a cherry insert in the back. The top is a very nice piece of old slab-cut spruce. Otherwise, the construction is basically the same as in the first 2 instruments but aesthetically, we tried to achieve something more rustic with to meet the looks of the slab cut top. Hence the antiqued lacquer and the textured scroll.
Materials
back and ribs – maple
top – spruce
neck – maple
fingerboard and tailpiece – ebony
Measures
string lenght – 106 cm
body lenght – 112 cm
body width upper – 49 cm
body width lower – 66,5 cm
Alberto Bocini tries the No.1
Csaba Pengő – Bitangos
Norwegian Wood
‘Album of the Year’ 2023
Email: talapengobass@gmail.com