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Double Bass Bow vs. pizz.

Steve Clark

Steve Clark

Jan 9, 2004
2,492
91
60
London ON
www.steveclarkonbass.com
#1
I just started to play a bit more with the bow and came across an odd problem. If I play pizz and play a G on the E string and compare with open G my pinky is in a certain spot. If I do the same thing with the bow I have to 'sharpen' the pinky position.

I have not looked/listened to the rest of the bass but what is going on here? I double checked this using the tc electronics Polytune tuner.

Thanks for any input.
 
#3
What Bill said is probably the case. Also, if you have a very light or very heavy touch with the bow, you can actually change the pitch of your note up or down. Think of it as a good thing, because it's what allows the instrument to be so expressive.
 
#4
Intonation is a funny subject in general because I'm finding that more and more, despite what an electronic tuner may say, what sounds "in tune" to our ear varies quite a bit depending on the situation. Lots of times I've practiced something like crazy with a piano to get it perfectly in tune, then when I go play with a group of string players things sound a little off and I have to adjust.

I think that the pitch is in our ears more than in our hands.
 
#5
There's multiple things going on here...

Where you put your finger is about getting the intonation that you want. There's no correct place to put your finger for a particular note, because every note exists in a musical context and what sounds best can vary rather a lot; it's even a matter of opinion because slight variations in intonation can be used to musical effect.

Now, it is true that a pizz note has an evolution in time; they start out high and decay flatter. Arco, on the other hand, you find that playing louder is sharper. In both cases, this is because the string is a spring, and the more energy you put into it the tighter the vibration pulls it. And in either case, unless that natural behaviour is exactly what you want (unlikely), you should be expecting to do something to create the effect you do want. Vibrato gives you the ability to slightly alter the pitch center during a note to achieve... well, whatever effect you're after. But you should be able to achieve that without vibrato too.

Now, practicing with piano... well, you need to be able to play in tune with pianos, but in doing so you have to understand the way pianos are tuned. They're set up in equal temperament, so they can be played in whatever key you want without being too far wrong, but also the octaves are shortened a little so the (rather flat) overtones of the piano strings line up with each other better. This makes the piano sound much better, but it also gives bass players in particular a problem: the bass notes of a piano are very sharp.

So, you can't assume that a piano is the the essence of good intonation, because a correctly tuned piano is quite deliberately slightly out of tune! In fact, this is true of all keyboard instruments.

The only way around all this is to practice: practice making intervals sound the best you can, just within the internal logic of your own instrument, and practice with an electronic tuner (best to use a strobe tuner, needles are too slow) to get control over your pitch, and practice with accommodating pianos because you need to be able to do that, however awful piano intonation is for strings.
 
#6
Andrew,

Just wanted to provide clarification on what "equal temperament" actually means for the piano. You are right that it's awful for strings.

Equal temperament does not involve shortening the octaves of the piano. You might be thinking of stretch tuning, which is the process of tuning higher strings sharper so that they sound more in tune with the harmonics of the lower strings. This is more of a problem with smaller pianos, and less of a problem with big concert grands.

In true equal temperament, if you were to play the C notes in every octave on a piano at once, they should sound perfectly in tune. Same for all the G notes, A notes, etc. What equal temperament does is divide the octave into 12 equal half steps. So this means that, in the key of C, there's an equal distance between the 3rd and 4th (E and F) as there is between the 7th and octave (B and C). The same is true for the distance between F# and G, and so on.

The problem for us fretless string players is that, in order to sound in tune, we have to shorten or lengthen certain half steps. For example, the 7th note of a major scale needs to be much sharper because our ears want it to resolve up to the tonic. Likewise, the 3rd will sound in tune when it's flatter, and the 5th when it's slightly sharper. However, when you're playing with a piano or guitar, it's not always possible to do this and still be in tune with the other instrument. Also, since most tuners are set to tune for equal temperament (100 cents per half step), you can be playing a 3rd that sounds perfectly in tune, but the tuner will tell you you're flat.

You can do a few things to work on your intonation. I think the best is to practice with a drone. If you have a tuner or a metronome that can sound a note, set it to the tonic of your piece and play against it. You'll be able to hear all the places where you are going out of tune, and you can practice correcting. Alternatively, if you have a tuner that can tune to the just intonation system, it can help to play against that.

Above all, intonation needs to be flexible! It depends on the context of the music, but also on the humidity, temperature, air pressure, how nervous you are, arco vs. pizz, etc. John Clayton told me to think of intonation like someone had pounded nails through the tips of your fingers. The points of the nails go down where you think the note should be, but then you can (and should) rock your finger around the point to get the correct pitch.

Anyways, hope that helps.
 
#7
Oh, I'm quite aware that true equal temperament has perfect octaves... I had the stretch backwards though. Anyway, equal temperament is not very nice for strings, although as a practical matter you have to be able to do it.

Just intonation isn't quite right for strings either, ordinarily, it's really a matter of figuring out what intonation structure works best for that particular piece of music... which is a real challenge if you're playing, say, Bartok or Stravinski
 
#8
A quick example, if my maths is correct.

A *perfect* perfect 5ths should be 1.5x the fundamental or reference frequency.

But in equal temperament it is 1.4983070768766814987992807320298x the fundamental or reference frequency

2^(7/12) = the above number.
 
#11
Have you heard Rinat Ibragimov's version of that? He does a pretty good job of it. :D

I would say that the expressionist pieces in general are hard to tune. Anything without a tonal center is difficult, because we're so used to hearing things relate to a key. At least the Hindemith is fairly musical - it's the stuff like Schoenberg's that makes no harmonic or melodic sense that is the hardest.
 

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