How important is bass to you?

Tostadosunidos,
In my area Ifrequently visit jazz clubs that rarely boost or reinforce the sound. It is a pure acoustic sound. The stand up double bass has a beautiful tone, bloom and warmth. Actually a number of speakers/home systems add more bass energy than I hear live from the real instrument. With home audio systems one can have too much bass as well as too little if the reference is unamplified bass.
Charles.

I'm with you 100% Tostadosunidos. Getting the low bass out of the main speakers improves their sound (less doppler distortion, for one thing), as well as the sub being better at bass to begin with (assuming it's a good one!). It's getting the integration between the speakers and sub(s) right that's the trick.

One musician who is surprisingly (to me, anyway) a critical listener with a real good system (big Wilsons, VTL electronics, VPI table with Lyra cartridge) is Henry Rollins. I wonder what he listens to on it (I know he's into Jazz), and if he uses his system to listen to rough mixes of his own recordings? He's a customer of Brian Berdan at Audio Elements in Pasadena.

Yes, too much bass can be even worse than too little, unless you like tremors and earthquakes.
As for 'to sub or not to sub', I am open to the debate. In any case, two subs please.

Inna

...In any case, two subs please.

Four are even better.

Two high, Two low.

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Yes, too much bass would be bad. That's why you tune your subwoofer frequency and volume. I never intended to suggest that the bass should be in excess of a natural sound.