Classical Pieces...

[RCMJ Bass]

Not sure if I am posting in the right forum, but anyway, I have found playing some classical pieces on the bass really helpful. It's improved my reading no end, and things like this duet really help with focus, as well as being a great piece to play....Bach was a master!

I do occasionally go though the Bach Cello Suites too.
..anyone else like to play classical stuff on bass guitar? Any recommendations?

 

[SteveCS]

With you all the way. Mainly 'cello and string bass things, but the odd clarinet/sax studies thrown in for good measure. Here's a few...

 

[Boogiepop]

Gavotte #2 from Bach's Cello Suite #5 practically transcribes itself. Wonderful as a hammer-on/pull-off study. The B part gets a little tricky.

Working on the prelude to #1 now.

B.

 

[IamGroot]

Sax, horn and guitar is about 70% of what I play thes days.

 

[RCMJ Bass]

Thanks for the recommendations SteveCS...!

Here's my rendition of Bach's Bouree in E Minor as a bass duet:

 

[QweziRider]

Any recommendations?

Russian Christmas Music by Alfred Reed. Got my rear end absolutely kicked by this one this past Christmas, getting convinced to join the Reno Wind Symphony for their Christmas shows. I had three weeks to learn how to read all over again (hadn't since '84) and play a genre totally out of my musical world. I started off on electric just to see if I could get it there and then translate everything to double bass. It was a brutal three weeks.

 

[Bass Momma]

I just got the Bach Cello suites, and for the moment I'm using them for sight reading practice on electric. (My double bass playing is a LOOOOOONNNNGGG way from being ready for Bach!) The even tempo and repetitive phrasing make for good reading practice. I am not going to give my tempo, which is ridiculously slow. There's the occasional place where I have to bring a low D or C into 4-string bass register. I'm determined to get my sight reading functional, so I need a fair quantity of daily material at a reasonably constant level.
Apart from anything else, I love Bach. One of the first books I worked through was the University of Miami Electric Bass Volume 1, which had some Bach chorales, and a gigue and an allegro. Just found out that it's out of print. Guess the material isn't "modern" enough. Oh, well, me neither!

 

[Reg Braithwaite]

I returned to bass a few years ago, and naturally, the Prelude to Bach’s first Cello suite was my first project. It’s something of a “standard,” isn’t it? In addition to working the reading, phrasing, and what-not, it’s interesting to try different tunings and techniques to capture some of the sound that would naturally work on Cello (or a bass tuned in fifths).

I like the sound of that piece on an acoustic bass guitar tuned ADGC or dropped to GDGC, but the destination is not the point, it’s all about finding our way, isn’t it?

I’m now on an even simpler piece, the Prelude to the Well-Tempered Clavier, but learning to play it with two-handed tapping. Back to square one, but that just means more to learn.

 

[IamGroot]

Wohlfahrt!

 

[RCMJ Bass]

I am not going to give my tempo, which is ridiculously slow.

Ridiculously slow is a great way to practice! So slow that you really absorb what you are practicing and also just can't get it wrong! Speed can wait I reckon!

 

[Mushroo]

There's the occasional place where I have to bring a low D or C into 4-string bass register.

The first 5 Bach Cello Suites can all be played on a 24-fret 4 string in standard tuning. Only the 6th suite goes beyond the range of the standard tuned 4 string electric bass.

Don't forget that bass is an octave transposing instrument (and cello isn't). Cello low C is at the 3rd fret of your A string (or the 8th fret of your E string). It's one octave above the low C on a 5 string.

tl;dr basses are tuned lower than cellos.

 

[Reg Braithwaite]

basses are tuned lower than cellos.

and thus, they are Double basses, because the cellos perform the bass role, and the double basses often “double” the cellos, but an octave lower.

 

[RCMJ Bass]

Right here's something else I've been working on, Telemann's Canonic Sonatas for Cello, this one is in F major:

 

[J_Bass]

Subscribed.

I am very curious about this. Just yesterday was thinking about this.

I was thi king of trying the left hand of the Goldberg Variations, particularly the 2nd Variation, to start with something less complicated.

Do you guys play this stuff with 4 stringers? Or do you use 5 or 6?

 

[RCMJ Bass]

Do you guys play this stuff with 4 stringers? Or do you use 5 or 6?[/QUOTE]

I am strictly a 4 string player, nothing wrong with extended range basses, but after a bit of trial, I don't think they're for me...!
For some of the cello parts I've been practicing recently there might be a low C or C sharp, which I'l transpose up an octave....if there's a lot of low D's going on probably I'll detune.
I think it's quite a good thing to play music that isn't so bass guitar specific, it gets you out of the usual patterns we can all fall into. Plus the fact there's so much great material out there!
But yeah practicing the cello parts has really helped my reading, and the Telemann duets are great as any mistakes are really obvious, so it really helps with accuracy.

 

[RCMJ Bass]

Cello is higher-pitched than bass. If you transpose cello music up an octave, then cello low C is at the 20th fret of your E string!

What you are actually doing is transposing down by one octave. Which is fine; you are "allowed" to do that if you like. But in my experience, some of the chords and double-stops can sound "muddy" if I try to play them down an octave.

..you're correct of course..but for practical purposes, and bearing in mind the fact that bass guitar music is written one octave higher than it would be on a piano, the range of notes in a typical cello part is within the range of a standard 4 string bass, with the exception of a few notes written lower than the E string.

 

[Rocket Queen]

I haven't been entirely though it, so I hesitate to endorse it, but at the TalkingBass site
Solfeggietto Practice Diary - TalkingBass, Mark Smith has an extremely detailed, 13-part tutorial on learning C. P. E. Bach's Solfeggietto on bass, which I think has been a keyboard exercise staple for forever. As I recall, it calls for a 22-fret 4-string bass, but Mark also transposes down the most extreme high bits. What's also useful is that he teaches it as he would practice it himself; so he walks through it at a reasonable pace (~4 bars per part or session), and also talks a lot about getting the music off the page and into your fingers as quickly as possible.