Dingwall's Prima Artist basses are the pinnacle of build and design from the Dingwall Custom Shop is Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. These exceptional instruments are limited to a total production of 4 basses per year.

The Prima Artist is designed without compromise, fueled by Dingwall's desire to present the best bass guitar to the world. It takes bass-building art and engineering to a whole new level. 

BODY & NECK

The traditional way of combining body woods to control tone has been to laminate horizontally. For example, laminate a thick maple top on a mahogany core to increase the brightness of the mahogany.

This system works well to alter the tonal response of all the strings as a group, but what if we could take this concept one step further by focusing on the needs of the bass and treble strings separately?

Dingwall turned traditional thinking on its side by laminating across the body’s width. This allows Dingwall to use a higher density wood such as Walnut for the bass side to accentuate the highs and give power to the lows without affecting the treble strings. They then use a lower-density wood such as Soft Maple for the treble side to bring out to warm up the highs without affecting the bass strings.

Prima Artist necks are laminated from 5-7 pieces of exotic wood. The woods are chosen primarily for strength and tone, and then try to come up with a combination that either blends or contrasts nicely with the top and back woods.

PICKUPS & ELECTRONICS

The Prima Artist pickups feature an FD-3 treble coil with a custom-wound bass coil. The coils are noise-symmetric/tone-asymmetric, which means they maintain near-perfect noise rejection with increased low-end clarity. They feature 4-lead wiring, which enables the internal coils to be wired in either series for strong mids and high output or parallel for scooped mids and normal output.

The Prima Artist also features individual series/parallel switches so that the player can access these tones at the flick of a switch. The pickups are installed into wooden shells cut from the actual top wood and a contrast layer of the body in which they will be installed.

The tone can be best described as a convergence of the warmth and familiarity of vintage tones. They are genuinely one-of-a-kind pickups made in our shop in Canada.

HARDWARE

The traditional way of combining body woods to control tone has been to laminate horizontally. For example, laminate a thick maple top on a mahogany core to increase the brightness of the mahogany. This system works well to alter the tonal response of all the strings as a group. However, our experience with the Novax Fanned-Fret ® system has opened up a whole new way of thinking about an instrument. What if we could take this concept one step further by focusing on the needs of the bass and treble strings separately? At the time, this had never been done before.

To achieve this naturally equalizing body, we turned traditional thinking on its side by laminating across the body’s width. This allows us to use a higher density wood such as Walnut for the bass side to accentuate the highs and give power to the lows without affecting the treble strings. We then use a lower-density wood such as Soft Maple for the treble side to bring out the resonance and warm up the highs without affecting the bass strings. The results are dramatic for such a simple idea – warm, punchy treble strings with solid snappy bass strings. without affecting the treble strings.

We then use a lower-density wood (Alder) for the treble side to bring out the resonance and warm up the treble strings without making the bass strings sound muddy. The results are pretty dramatic for such a simple idea – warm, punchy treble strings with solid snappy bass strings.

Specs:

• Model: Prima Artist
• Pickup Configuration: 3x
• Number of Strings: 5
• Body Wood: Dual-Density Walnut/Flame Maple
• Contrast Layer: Flame Maple
• Top & Back Wood: Premium Buckeye Burl, Music Loft Select
• Color: Natural
• Pickup Type: PA5, Buckeye Burl Covers
• Electronics: Neve Preamp w/ Mini Toggles
• Neck: Prima Artist 5pc Flame Maple/Wenge/Maple
• Fingerboard: Pale Moon Ebony, Music Loft Select
• Inlay Style: None
• Side Dots: White Pearloid
• Headstock: Matching Buckeye Burl
• Cavity Covers: Buckeye Burl
• Scale Length: 37"-34"
• Knobs: Buckeye Burl
• Tuning: Standard
• Tuners: Hipshot/Dingwall UltraLite
• Bridge: Dingwall Z Bridge
• Weight: 10lb 1oz
• Case: Dingwall Custom Gig Bag Included