Hello to all,
I have lurked here on and off for a while as the idea of a stick, specificaly the NS Stick has been gnawing its way into my head.
My biggest question is; how well does the NS Stick handle using a pick or fingerpicking/standard left hand fretting? I'd like to be able to play it in a "normal" guitar fashion, and switch to tap style and back as needed. If the pickups catch the sound of your left hand fretting as normal tapping, it kind of defeats the pick/strum I would think. If you have to set the action really high or "deaden" the pickups to keep from sounding the string while fretting, doesn't that take away the tap style possibilities?
I realize I'm kind of asking one instrument to be a Jack-of-all-trades/Master-of-all-trades, but the NS Stick seems to almost be that already. I'm more interested in the extended guitar/baritone nature of the instrument rather than the guitar+bass aspect really.
Plus its just a way-cool instrument

All of the sound clips and videos posted by the pro's and amateurs alilke are very inspiring; so it's all your fault I want one of these!

Thanks for any input you may have.
Bruce

I don't use a pick too often, but I often strum a few chords with my fingers. I don't experience the problems you describe with the LH affecting the picking. I have never found any NS player who has raised the action without setting it back. With the bass-guitar scale length, you cannot fret chords like you can with a guitar, which sometimes forces me to strum and tap to get more notes in - or skip strings if you use the damper to mute them - don't forget that the damper can be of some use for muting. The NS doesn't have the percussive effect my grand has when tapping bass notes, however what makes the NS unique in my opinion is how such thin "bass" strings have such a solid tone; can't obtain the same results with a standard bass guitar with the same gage. Hope what I'm saying makes sense.

In some aspects when I do use a pick, I prefer the NS over a standard bass as the distance between strings is easier for me.

I've used my NS Stick as a bass guitar I also two hand tapped with a few songs a night for about a year as a "cover rock bass player." I found the most confortable set up so i could play the bass strings comfortable (Like a traditional bass guitar) without adjusting my plucking hand technique TOO much was to raise the bridge screws a half turn. I kept the melody strings as low as possible because I tapped them exclusively. Even with the bass strings raised, because my left hand fingers are strong I was still very comfortable tapping the bass strings with higher (Higher in stick terms) action. The nice thing about the instrument is raising and lowering the bridge or nut screws just takes a second and doesn't require loosining the string, just a slight retune depending how much you change the hight.

Right now I'm not gigging, I've "retired" from live performance for a while so I've lowered all the strings to as low as possible hight and it works very well as a two hand tapping instrument. I've never tried playing the NS Sticks as a "guitar" in chord strumming fashion. I think the strings may be too far apart for MY comfort using the instrument in this way but I suppose the adjustment could be learnt and you CAN tune the last strings like a guitar rather than straight 4ths so you could play the last 6 strings using all the traditional guitar chord forms. (The actual string tuning will be to different notes than a 6 string guitar) So the instrument is VERY flexable. And even though it's made so you can two hand tap you DONT get unwanted tap sound if you pluck a string. Think about it ... you can TAP strings on a guitar and bass and don't get unwanted tapping sound when you pluck or strum. The difference with the NS Stick and Stick is it's designed to optimize tapping however it's still a fretted neck instrument with a pickup ... same as a guitar or bass.

Anyway I hope my input helped and I addressed some of your concerns. The NS Stick is not a bass or a guitar, it's a unique instrument in the fact you can pluck it, strum it or tap it. Jack of all trades master of none? .... Well ... it depends on the master playing it!

Hi Bruce,
One guy that you'll want to check out as far as using a pick goes is Don Shiff. From what I have seen he alternates between using a pick and two handed tapping.
I have stopped using my bass altogether. When it's time to do a traditional bass part, I reach for the NS. Whether I pluck or use a pick or tap depends on the song and what works best.
The only thing I haven't tried is finger picking, which is not to say it can't be done. I use the Guitar Lower Octave tuning on my NS. I tried the straight 4th tuning but it didn't click for my. When I changed to the Guitar Lower Octave tuning the fretboard landscape became instantly familar to me. The bar chords and the open chords are to very practical but, yes I use a lot of chords and a very light struming technique. And like MichNS, I have not had the issues that you discribed.
One thing that I like about using a pick on the NS was that not every note had to be picked. I discoved this quite by accident. I can play a passage and pick the string where it felt natural to do so and 'tap' other notes. It just sort of happened. One other thing to consider is that when you use a pick, or pluck the string for that matter, you can sound the note twice, once when you fret or tap the note and again when you pick or pluck the note. Perhaps this is just the situation that you're trying to avoid, but it opens up lots of creative posibities, at least it did for me.

Get one, you'll love it, no matter how you play it!