Music and Musical Influences
Because of his association with the Windham Hill label Manring often was seen as a New Age musician. He doesn't see himself as belonging to a certain style or genre and often jokes about categorising his music. His album Thonk he termed for example "... the first New Age–Death metal–Fusion–album“.
Manring has a solid musical knowledge and uses the bass as a solo instrument usually in alternate tunings, with additional possibilities and patterns invoked on the fly with lever-activated de-tuners and bridges, somewhat like a pedal steel guitar. He wants to show that the electric bass can be used in a musically rich and expressive way. Manring occasionally plays on two (or even three or four) basses at the same time during live performances. Manring is also a composer of experimental music, mixing technology and fretless bass with the sounds of kitchen implements and cardboard boxes, evidenced on his "Book of Flame" solo album.
He is a technical virtuoso, generally using his bass in very different ways. Mostly he plays a fretless bass, which gives him ample possibilities to change tone and pitch just like on acoustic bass. Manring is rhythmically very versatile and often uses polyrhythms. He's said to do "... things on the electric bass that haven’t been done before, are nearly impossible, and (are) illegal in most states.". A very special technique used by Manring is the tuning change of single or several strings in the course of playing a piece.
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