The deep, thick "Original Series" voice in the 4-string MusicMan® shape. A common passive upgrade for active basses. 

• INFO
• DIMENSIONS
• TECH
• MUSINGS

• Bartolini’s Music Man® Original series pickups bring you the timeless tone that started it all. No other pickup can deliver the gigantic, luxuriant lows of Original Barts. But not only do they provide for bottomless lows and low-mids, their dual coil construction eliminates the noise and muddiness that vast amounts of low-end can create. The Originals are full and warm for that vintage tone you've been craving, enhancing the natural voice of your bass. You'll never find lower tones produced with higher clarity!
  
  Made for pro-level bass players, they are fully sealed and shielded making them sweat-proof, quiet if you touch them, and immune invisible noise from stage lights and studio power supplies. The cables are shielded too.
  
  Artists:  Adam Payne, Pennal “PJ” Johnson
• Size: 
  3.5" [88.9mm] Long
  1.91" [48.5mm] Wide
  
  
• Bartolini MMC wiring diagram
  
  
  Coil Structure:

  Dual Parallel Humbucking

  
  

  Cable Type:

  4-Conductor Cable with shield and bare drain

  
  

  Magnetic Circuit:

  Carbon steel, brass, and copper powered by ceramic (ferrite) magnets projected shallow for wide aperture
  Neck coil South and Bridge coil North for both positions

  
  

  MMC Coil Specs

  • DC Resistance: ~4.4KΩ each coil
  • Resonant Frequency: ~4.2KHz
  • Sensing Width: 2.36" [60mm] Max

   

  

• Below are some general impressions and anecdotal thoughts gathered over the years about Bartolini's Original Series. Some are our own and some are from customers.

  • Most players will hear these pickups as giving their bass a fuller tone, typically a very significant improvement over stock pickups.
  • While the tone is not vintage, the Bartolini Original Series pickups are  on the warmer side of the spectrum.  These are not the pickups for you if you are looking for a bright or airy top end.
  • Regularly, players will comment that these pickups fattened or thickened-up the tone of thin sounding basses.
  • Output is medium, some see it as a bit quieter than others.  Having used these a lot, it isn’t as if these are uber-quiet, but you may need to turn the master volume on your amp a bit, depending on the rest of your signal chain.  
  • Bartolini’s corners are nice and rounded over, so if you play with your thumb hooked on the top corner, these will probably feel a bit better than a traditional pickup shell (referring mostly to Jazz® and Precision® Basses.