Double Bass Cello doublers?

[chuck norriss]

3/4 cello available strad copy
http://www.talkbass.com/threads/vintage-1965-kizo-suzuki-3-4-cello.1098149/#post-16338029

 

[pnchad]

Funny this thread came up just as I was reading about Percy Heath in Bass Player. It seems he plays a cello, tuned EADG, and his cello is equipped with geared DB tuners. Doesn't that kinda make his cello a tiny DB? If not, why? It seems to me that he's now playing something like at 1/4 sized DB?

I recently bought an old 1960s Kay Jazz Cello (like Percy plays) - I'm not any good yet but what I did was buy the D'Addario 5ths strings to tune EADG - the cool thing is it has proper tuners not friction pegs

this solves the reading problem but many cello parts are difficult fingerings with this tuning - standard cello tuning allows much larger range in one position