Double Bass Clarification required, please

[AndyMopley]

Hi all

Attached notation I take to mean a tremolo. However, my understanding is that is played between the written pitch and the pitch just above it.
The second bar in the attachement looks correct to me, however not sure about the first one?

Thanks!

 

[AGCurry]

That's rather confusing. Do you have a section leader or conductor you could ask?

It's my understanding that tremolo is a bowing instruction, having nothing to do with pitch; so, if it is a tremolo, both measures are equally correct or incorrect. However, the notation in your attachment doesn't look like any tremolo I've seen, in that it is elongated and placed between two notes.

 

[Eli Brockway]

It's written a little clunky but that's not a very non-standard notation for a fingered tremolo (rather than a bowed tremolo), assuming the person notating it knew what they were doing. Think of it like a trill—a trill for string players is essentially an unmeasured fingered tremolo, with the specific interval being either a whole or a half step, given that normally they're done diatonically, and you normally don't get told which note to start on for the trill, but there are conventions that determine it. When written out like this, the direction that the notes are placed in for the interval is the direction you alternate—higher or lower depending on which note is written first.

For the first measure, you'd be alternating between the A# and the G# as 32nd notes over the D pedal, for the second you'd be alternating between the A# and the B as 32nd notes over the E pedal.

 

[AGCurry]

Eli, thanks for the lesson!

 

[Co.]

Actually, this kind of notation is very uncommon for a bowed instrument. Looks more like piano notation to me.
If you want to notate the pitch, starting the trill, you can write the alternating pitch in brackets before the main note.
You can combine trill (left hand) and tremolo (right hand), by writing "tr" for trill above the notehead a the tremolo dashes on the stem of the note.

Tremolo - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Mark_T]

Actually, this kind of notation is very uncommon for a bowed instrument. Looks more like piano notation to me.
If you want to notate the pitch, starting the trill, you can write the alternating pitch in brackets before the main note.
You can combine trill (left hand) and tremolo (right hand), by writing "tr" for trill above the notehead a the tremolo dashes on the stem of the note.

Tremolo - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

We have something like it in the Kalmus edition of La Mer that we're playing right now. It looks more "normal" in this case because the durations are shorter, but I think the idea is the same. It's not common, but it's not unheard of. I'm sure I've seen it before, too. Anyway, it's definitely a fingered tremolo, unless the conductor thinks otherwise.

 

[Co.]

We have something like it in the Kalmus edition of La Mer that we're playing right now. It looks more "normal" in this case because the durations are shorter, but I think the idea is the same. It's not common, but it's not unheard of. I'm sure I've seen it before, too. Anyway, it's definitely a fingered tremolo, unless the conductor thinks otherwise.

View attachment 7167941

It is not a tremolo. This is a trill. Specifically a measured trill. Tremolo is right hand.

 

[Eli Brockway]

A rapid alternation between two different pitches is another type of tremolo. On bowed string instruments, this is referred to as a fingered tremolo to distinguish it from the bowed tremolo discussed above; but once again it may be performed on any instrument. It is notated by writing the pitches to be alternated as a melodic interval, with both notes receiving the rhythmic value of the total duration of the tremolo (e.g. two half-notes for a tremolo lasting a half-note), and then either connecting them with beams, or else interpolating strokes, with the number of beams or strokes corresponding to the speed of the tremolo (e.g. a tremolo in thirty-second notes lasting a half-note would be written either as two open noteheads connected by three beams, or as two half-notes with three strokes interpolated).

Literally right out of the wikipedia page you posted.

And an image right out of the article, of which the last one looks just like what the OP posted minus the fact that OP's shows a slur.

And, for bonus points, while we talk about trills, also from that same wikipedia article:

This type of tremolo includes the trill as a special case: a trill is simply an unmeasured tremolo between two notes separated by the interval of a major or minor second (whole- or half step). Thus, a tremolo in this sense is a generalization of a trill to any interval, and to include measured durations.

Fingered tremolos are a thing. OP's example is a fingered tremolo, and while it isn't written in the best looking way, it's still clear enough for us as players to do what we're supposed to.

 

[Mark_T]

I wasn't trying to get caught up in terminology, but pragmatically address execution - I was just quoting the term used earlier. I stand by the term anyway [1]. In the OP's example because of the 3 bars, I would treat it as an unmeasured, fingered tremolo (or trill if you must). In the La Mer example I posted, that technically probably should be measured as 16ths in cut time, but at that dynamic and speed, I'm not working too hard to make sure I'm playing exact 16ths.

[1] https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=fingered tremolo

 

[Co.]

There are differences in notation for the different families of instruments, like keys, bowed strings,plucked strings, percussion, woodwind, brass. Proving your point out of context with a wikipedia article won't change that. I guess, the best thing you can do, is to spend a couple of years with different kinds of written music and then make up your own mind.
Context is everything and never trust someone on youtube, who actually can't play.

 

[jj.833]

8 seconds of fingered tremolo sul ponticello going from p to ff? Sounds like a task of its own. I'd like to try that too. Could you @Andy Mopley share what it is from?

 

[Mark_T]

There are differences in notation for the different families of instruments, like keys, bowed strings,plucked strings, percussion, woodwind, brass. Proving your point out of context with a wikipedia article won't change that. I guess, the best thing you can do, is to spend a couple of years with different kinds of written music and then make up your own mind.
Context is everything and never trust someone on youtube, who actually can't play.

I have been playing music for 40 years. I have played violin, piano, cello, timpani, trombone, banjo, but mostly double bass for about 35 years.

 

[Eli Brockway]

I have been playing music for 40 years.

And I like to think my degree might mean something, even if I don't have that much life behind me, let alone experience!

There are differences in notation for the different families of instruments, like keys, bowed strings,plucked strings, percussion, woodwind, brass. Proving your point out of context with a wikipedia article won't change that.

And this notation isn't completely unexpected for us. Uncommon, sure, but still perfectly cromulent to read. If you want to see more of it, pick up the violin.

And, regarding the Wikipedia article—in the future, if you're going to bring in evidence to support your position, make sure it actually does, rather than immediately contradicting it.

 

[Co.]

And, regarding the Wikipedia article—in the future, if you're going to bring in evidence to support your position, make sure it actually does, rather than immediately contradicting it.

You mentioned yourself, that the example you took from the wikipedia article misses the slurs. If you really think, this doesn't matter (right hand?), I can't help you.

 

[Co.]

A little bit of evidence from a credible source:
I am sure you get the idea, even without notation.

 

[Eli Brockway]

You mentioned yourself, that the example you took from the wikipedia article misses the slurs. If you really think, this doesn't matter (right hand?), I can't help you.

What an astoundingly unserious way to avoid addressing the actual point made.

Have fun with whatever it is you're arguing here, I guess, the OP's question has already been satisfactorily answered and Mark has already shown a fast way to find a lot more than that wikipedia article that you linked that immediately contradicted your argument.