Bass Frequency

There is a place for all God’s creatures and their myriad of growls, squawks and screams in the frequency spectrum. At 20hz you will hear the voice of your doom and 20khz is good for teasing your house pets. By the way hz stands for hertz and khz stands for kilohertz.

20hz = well, 20 hertz

20khz = 20,000 hertz or 20 kilohertz

And, of course, the electric bass has its special place, too, and that address is 100hz. Give or take a few notches 100hz is the bass player’s own personal spot. 

Now, there are other spots that improve or ruin a good bass tone. It’s good to know what these are to keep you sounding your best.

80hz is where the kick drum lives. If you start hanging around down there you will likely run into conflicts even though bass and kick drum are such good friends.

100-180hz is bass heaven. This is power and you should boost it here, to taste, of course.

200-300hz is a quagmire, a swamp. Stay away from here and if you get stuck in the muck, cut until you are clear again.

500-600hz is for aggressive mid range that works well for bass especially in hard rock. Warning: there is a big crowd hanging out here filled with guitars and other instruments. Try to be nice and get along with others. You can sometimes clean up the mix by cutting here, too.

1-2khz  attack, attack, attack. The click of a pick or the pluck of a fingernail is accentuated by this range.

Now, most bass amps have generic controls like bass, low mid, high mid, treble and then maybe a couple of boost/cut buttons. These usually have a set frequency that you raise or lower but cannot change so it can sometimes be impossible to hand pick your frequency points to suit your needs. You would have to consult the owner’s manual to really know what you are working with.

The frequencies listed above are only a good starting point. If you mix your own recordings then you probably know it is always better to make your instrument sound good as part of the whole. But since you are a guitar player by trade, I feel obligated to remind you.