Tempered scales - fretted vs fretless

[AdamF]

I play fretted and fretless basses. Research on music theory shows that a compromise tuning - such as on the fretted - will be up to a quarter tone 'out' in some keys. So far as I can tell, setting my intonation by ear on the fretless (playing jazz with a singer) I am 'in tune'.
I also play blues and I found it hard to play (this is in a trio) with a Fender, but was not so sure why, and shifted to a $$ Warwick that allows me to bend notes, and with its humbucker tone I think it makes the bent notes audible.
Also, I am finding the fretted bass increasingly 'dead' in musical terms, and I am wondering why. It does not 'sing' as it used to. This makes me think that what may be happening is perhaps due to the fact that, in some keys and in some scales, some notes on the fretted will be 'out', whereas they are probably not on the fretless. The latter 'sings' more. Of course there are other factors, such as the note production. And I have not researched this (eg by playing with a tuner, though I wonder how much that would help - 'E' in Cmaj in not necessarily the same as 'E' in all other keys, such as C#mi - to guess).
I wondered if anybody else had had similar experience?
Adam

[bwv1013]

you're spot on bro. certain notes "sing" on your fretless because they are more or less exactly in tune with the music, as opposed to the compromise fretted instruments and pianos offer in terms of pitch. because you can tune each note individually, the overtones match up better thus reinforcing whatever key you are in. that's why big open chords on a guitar with overdrive can sound like poo sometimes, yet power chords (root and 5th) sound awesome. really interesting phenomenon, i'm always trying to learn more about it...

[AdamF]

But then what to do? What seems to be happening is that my ear is finding the fretted harder to accept.
??
Live with it?
Adam

[Ramsy]

Equal tuning is set so that every key can be played with a minimal amout of dissonance. There are other tunings such as Pure Major, Pure Minor, Pythagorean and many others. Most detunings aren't more than 20 cents (25 cents is an eighth of a tone) even for the more extreme Balinese and Arabic tunings. The problem arises when you have to play in many different keys. If you play in Pure C major you can only play the notes of the scale, no sharps or flats because they are drastically out of tune. To tune a fretted bass to an alternate tuning you would need to choose a key and then place individual frets on each string at slightly different places. And I can't imagine many luthiers would be willing to build a bass with a fret for each note. For a standard P bass that would mean 88 different frets.

You could try and learn the alternate tuning on a fretless but you have to be a robot to nail each and every intonation.

And then comes the problem of finding other musicians to play exactly in Pure Major for every song.

Can you imagine the pain and anguish of trying to explain that the singer is exactly 4 cents flat when they sing an F but 6 cents sharp on A?

[Marcury]

I can relate to an aspect of what you're saying. I have played only fretless for years, but your basic assumptions are wrong. Even if you are playing fretless, you are still playing in that "compromise" tuning unless you are playing with instruments that are in just temperament or some other non-equal tempered system. While different keys may be a cent or so sharp or flat relative to others in situations without fretted or keyed instruments it will still be music in equal temper.

Fretless instruments are much more responsive to touch and they are distinguished by their singing sound. But those notes that you speak of as out on the fretted are not in an equal tempered situation. Bending notes is an expressive device and it is part of the blues, but the blues is still a music played in Equal Temper and fretless intonation is equal tempered as well.

[AdamF]

I am not sure about this and whether I have it wrong. Yes and no. I see your point, but what you say about the other instruments applies to fretted or keyboard instruments. I play my jazz in two quintets (v/d/b/sax/keys) with keys, yes, but apart from the drums (and he tunes them ...) the other two instruments are voice and sax. She likes Db a lot. So I would not be able to say that the voice, and the sax as played (I assume that the scale centres are the concert Bb and Eb scales) - since he will change pitches with his embrouchure - are in the well-tempered scales.
Adam

[AdamF]

Also, if pitches in well-tempered tunings are not infrequently 'wrong' by 1/4 of a semitone, then this is about 1/4 of the way between frets (or fretmarks - I have them ...) and that is a lot.
Adam

[koricancowboy]

Switch to string bass

[Marcury]

Your playing Jazz, that's a western Equal tempered form. Your playing with Piano that's an Equal tempered instrument. Your singer likes Db, okay, every key has it's own qualities and every singer has certain keys that sit more in their vocal range. But if you are playing in tune you are playing Equal temper regardless of key. As far as what scale your band is using; many different scales depending on the key center, I say key center because most Jazz tunes modulate through more than one key over the course of the tune.

[AdamF]

"But if you are playing in tune you are playing Equal temper regardless of key."
I am not sure of this. I will research it. What defines playing in tune? My current understanding of the theory is that the ear can and will hear various notes as intervals above a root, and these will not necessarily be the same as those in the well-tempered scale. Thus if there are fretless instruments or voices around there will be a tendency to 'debate' which note is the 'E' (for the sake of argument), especially when the chord progression will suggest modulations and so on towards certain scales, and these need not be the same as those of the well-tempered scale. What my experience may be suggesting to me is that this is what is happening to me, so that I increasingly experience fretted basses and keyboards (in the well-tempered scale) as being 'out' in certain contexts, which they are, in some sense.
Thanks, though.
Adam

[elros]

If all instruments were tuned to the twelve-tone equally tempered scale (12TET) there would be no "out" anywhere, because the 12TET is the "perfect compromise" that's only a tiny bit off in every key.

However: The wind instruments are naturally inclined towards the natural scale (just intonation) which the musician have to compensate for when playing.
And the piano is usually stretch-tuned to compensate for the non-ideal string - in other words, to make it sound more in tune with itself. This causes it to be progressively out of tune when playing notes farther from the center of the keyboard. There isn't any easy way around this.
And often the guitarist will tune the guitar to suit the key of the tune being played.

So: intonation is a bit of a mess. To be more in tune every musician must know the instrument and its deviation from whatever you agree to use as your standard tuning (usually 12TET), and be willing and able to compensate for this deviation.

[Blues Cat]

Fretted instruments are the most imperfect instruments. As soon as I read this I was relieved and switched to fretless.

Don't overlook the fact that if you're playing w/2 different guitarists using 2 different tuners and YOU have a 3rd tuner, that that's the start of the problem.

Blues guitarists also have a bad habit of tuning really gently and then totally hammering their strat live, which makes their guitar sharp out of the gate. Then take in to consideration the strings heat up and the guitar goes sharper and you're thinking what is wrong w/my bass's intonation.

I play a fanned fretless and use a Peterson tuner. When my intonation is off... it's me.

[AdamF]

Thanks. Informative.
Adam

[mongo2]

Originally Posted by Blues Cat

Don't overlook the fact that if you're playing w/2 different guitarists using 2 different tuners and YOU have a 3rd tuner, that that's the start of the problem.

Yes. I've been having our guitar based band tune to the same tuner for several years.

[Marcury]

Originally Posted by AdamF

"But if you are playing in tune you are playing Equal temper regardless of key."
I am not sure of this. I will research it. What defines playing in tune? My current understanding of the theory is that the ear can and will hear various notes as intervals above a root, and these will not necessarily be the same as those in the well-tempered scale. Thus if there are fretless instruments or voices around there will be a tendency to 'debate' which note is the 'E' (for the sake of argument), especially when the chord progression will suggest modulations and so on towards certain scales, and these need not be the same as those of the well-tempered scale. What my experience may be suggesting to me is that this is what is happening to me, so that I increasingly experience fretted basses and keyboards (in the well-tempered scale) as being 'out' in certain contexts, which they are, in some sense.
Thanks, though.
Adam

In theory yes, intervals are out of tune from key to key, perhaps you're becoming sensitive to this. But in practice the amounts that things are out of tune compared to Just temperament is minimal. In Just systems you can't modulate with any freedom. "In tune" is the agreement we make to play in Equal Temper.

As far as the debate in most bands the Piano wins. in orchestras it's the clarinet unless there's a piano.

[spade2you]

Originally Posted by Marcury

In theory yes, intervals are out of tune from key to key, perhaps you're becoming sensitive to this. But in practice the amounts that things are out of tune compared to Just temperament is minimal. In Just systems you can't modulate with any freedom. "In tune" is the agreement we make to play in Equal Temper.

As far as the debate in most bands the Piano wins. in orchestras it's the clarinet unless there's a piano.

Exactamundo.

[Angus]

I do research on scale temperaments at a University.

The only thing worth saying is that if you don't know which notes are "out" in which keys, then you can't hear it, and it's not the issue. Most people can't hear it at all, because Westerners have been trained and brought up to understand that that is how things are supposed to sound.

So I would say that I'd put my wallet on this not being the problem you perceive it to be. At all.

[Angus]

Originally Posted by elros

And the piano is usually stretch-tuned to compensate for the non-ideal string - in other words, to make it sound more in tune with itself. This causes it to be progressively out of tune when playing notes farther from the center of the keyboard. There isn't any easy way around this.
And often the guitarist will tune the guitar to suit the key of the tune being played.

No, pianos are NOT 'usually' stretch tuned. Some do it, some don't. I don't let my piano tuner do it.

I've never met a guitar player who tunes their guitar to "suit the key" of the tune. If they're playing in equal temperament, which is obvious since there is a piano involved, then there is nothing to tune to. You don't tune to compensate for stretched tuning- you'll be out everywhere.

[AdamF]

I do research on scale temperaments at a University.

The only thing worth saying is that if you don't know which notes are "out" in which keys, then you can't hear it, and it's not the issue. Most people can't hear it at all, because Westerners have been trained and brought up to understand that that is how things are supposed to sound.

So I would say that I'd put my wallet on this not being the problem you perceive it to be. At all.

This is useful. If a semitone is 100 cents and differences in notes between tunings (see an earlier comment in this thread) may be as much as 10-25 cents, in other words 1/10 to 1/4 of the gap between fret-markers, then that is significant. This starts suggests to me that what may be happening is that what I can 'hear' is changing as I cope with playing the fretless. This is not an academic process, nor one that is cognitively 'higher level'. My band-members say I play 'in tune', so I conclude that I can clearly hear well enough to hear differences of a few cents (or less).

It does not seem to follow from me that there is nothing amiss simply because I cannot point exactly to specific 'wrong' notes (ie discuss concretely the pitch of an Eb in a particular context); as you may know the first violin in an orchestra will often play a few cents sharp, it is said to gain projection, and these are not 'heard' as being out of tune.

Of course there are aspects to the differences between fretless and fretted to do with the nature of the sound, how one produces it and also how one projects it (though this is often in part I think selection of a particular pitch - I think the two ladies I play with do this all the time, as chord substitutions under them change).

More food for thought! One thing this suggests to me is that it is better to practice one's jazz with some chords around rather than solo. But I note what has been said about the dominance of the keys in the band's 'internal debate'.

But thanks again.

Adam

[AdamF]

Some research (wiki) tells me that, expressed as a % of a semitone, the gap between the keyboard interval (in semitones) and the same interval in 'just' intonation (the scale you get starting on the tonic and working up in intervals - same as where you get the harmonics on a string) is as follows: 1:+12%; 2:+4%; 3:+16%; 4:-14%; 5:-2%; 6:+ or - 10%; 7:+2%; 8: +14%; 9: -14%; 10: -4%; 11: -12%.
These are the differences in the interval expressed in cents, not as a % of the entire interval.
If playing a fretted, where one can sharpen the note by bending it, this means that one may tend to adjust the ninth, minor third, flat five (not the sharpened fourth), and minor sixth. The others cannot be corrected as the 'just' note is below that the keys are playing (but see below).
The theory also says that the so-called harmonic minor seventh is 31% FLAT (nearly 1/3 of a semitone), suggesting that one may look for it by bending up the major sixth. This note is said to be important for blues - a different minor seventh altogether ... this can make one's head spin (does to me).
I started a parallel thread to this on a fretless bassist forum that others may find interesting - another bass player who gave up fretted is mulling this over - see http://forum.fretlessbassist.com/index.php?topic=136.0
I will now head for the bass and the tuner and my piano.
Regards
Adam