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Double Bass Do you Use Alternate Tunings on a Double Bass?

Do you use alternate tunings for DB?

  • Never

    Votes: 32 59.3%

  • A few times

    Votes: 11 20.4%

  • Regularly

    Votes: 8 14.8%

  • Vive le difference!

    Votes: 3 5.6%
  • Total voters
    54
D

Dave R

Sep 21, 2007
647
46
Boise, ID USA
#1
I am doing so for the first time. Accompanying a church choir, playing "Star Bright" by Lorin Wheelwright. Arranged by the director for DB and clarinets.

The song is in "D." The director had everything in a higher register. I used "Drop D" tuning, and played everything in the lower register, and asked the director if she liked it better. She did.

So I am using drop D on the double bass for the first time.

I can't be the only one...
 
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#4
Dis guy…

1734417533767.jpeg


Glenn Moore CADC-low to high
 
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#7
PBandJazzBass said:
Red Mitchell and Joel Quarrington immediately come to mind. Both tune in fifths (C-G-D-A) like a cello but an octave lower.
Click to expand...
I'm thinking @CaseyVancouver tunes this way for some instances... I seem to recall having that conversation a good while back.
 
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#8
Before I had a C-extension I’d use drop D pretty regularly, still do for HP stuff (and, I mean, if we’re talking about early stuff there’s tuning to all manner of values for A, which sort of counts). I’ve also played around with fifths and CGDG and I think I like them, I just don’t have either a spare bass to leave in that tuning, or enough time off to really figure out how to effectively sight read in it.

Did a lot of solo tuning in school, including my last year in grad school when I spent the whole time in Edgar’s aforementioned tuning and transposed in ensembles (it mostly worked, Also Sprach went predictably poorly).
 
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#9
I have a detuning lever for drop D on a few 4-string bass guitars; I could see getting the DB version for my Kay. My brain is fairly well acclimated and the low D sounds awesome on the odd occasion where I detune manually.
I tried tuning in 5ths very briefly and it didn't take. Neither did the mandolin first time I tried it, and now I can sort of get around on that. I like the vibe of 5ths, and the concept of extended range with 4 strings. OTOH I get why 4ths is the norm for bass. Even on a more manageable bass guitar, 5ths really makes for an awful lot of shifting.
I suppose could keep trying to acclimate, but I went the 5-string route instead.
 
#11
I have solo strings, so I very often tune my G up to A, I can do accurately in the middle of a piece. I also often tune the E down until it is super slack.
Ra Kalam Bob Moses has a little metal tuned drum called a Hapi drum, it is in A minor. I use a tuning low to high: CAEA for that:


Fairly often I use DADA.
In the project I was just doing with Weasel Walter and saxophonist James McKain, it was heavy free jazz with James playing mainly baritone. I used EbAEbG. Since I was using so many open strings just for stamina, it was better that I could meet him at his low Eb and also the harmonics lined up better.
Getting access to a new overtone series is often the best reason to do it. When I was working a solo by the composer Scelsi, the tuning was FAFG and the high went to Gb and F during the piece. I kept one bass in that tuning and worked on the piece and also improvised in that tuning each day. I still go back to that one.
 
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#12
Jefenator said:
... Neither did the mandolin first time I tried it ...
Click to expand...
Maybe it's a left-over from my elementary school orchestra violin nightmares, but I've never connected to 5ths tuning. I tried hard with mandolin in the 70s and 80s and eventually stopped trying -- some people really get into the math of 5ths tuning on mandolin, but for me it just seemed to be illogical. When I got back into mandolin successfully in the next century, it was with an alternative tuning which I continue to use today.

Similarly, I've avoided 5ths tuning on DB, although I congratulate folks who like it and I obviously have nothing against alternative tunings. Although I'm by no means an expert at it, EADG does seem like a logical tuning for such a large scale length.

What I can say from my current experiences with alternative tunings is that there are some general disadvantages that people should be aware of. As it relates to double bass:

1) You can't just pick up and play any other DB if you are used to playing full time in an alternative tuning.

2) Other people also cannot play your DB unless they also know that tuning.

3) Teachers and learning materials are rare or non-existent for alternative tunings, so a person learning to use them has to be very autodidactic.
 
Last edited:
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#13
I'm fairly new to owning a DB, but since I've been consequently playing all my bass guitars in D Standard (DGCF) since at least 2018, the first thing I did to my DB – already while still testing it at the previous owner's home – was to tune down to D Standard.
No plans to ever change that. For me it works perfectly. ;)
 
#15
I am not interested in tuning bass in 5ths.

My #1 BG since about 1995 has been a 6-string. Back when #1 was a 4-string, I occasionally used drop D. Basically I temporarily detuned to cover one song and then retuned to E standard at the earliest opportunity. Sometimes this involved playing 3 or 4 songs before retuning was feasible.

It's possible I have used drop D on upright, but I don't specifically remember doing so. I would expect it impact the setup.

I own a 6-string EUB that sounds very similar to a fretless bass guitar.
 
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#18
My main tuning in music school was "Drop E" - regular E string under solos. I would just tune down the solos for orchestra and other ensembles.

Now I have my EUB tuned in fifths, like my bass guitars. But, I mostly play DB in standard nowadays.
 
#19
Dave R said:
Wow, that sounds like it would leave the strings in a really floppy state...
Click to expand...
Not an E dropped down a fifth—it's the normal A, D, and G and then a high C on top instead of the low E underneath.

As for the rest—fifths tuning is fun. Red Mitchell and Joel Quarrington were already mentioned, I'll also add on Larry Holloway for another one who does that, because he's from McPherson and went to high school with my stepfather, and also because Paul Warburton isn't around anymore to jump in here and mention him instead.

James already posted in here, but in every other discussion he gets into about Spirocores he'll mention playing the drop D game.

Coming into my own little fix with the historical performance stuff, if I had the money to get a fourth bass after the one I've got getting worked on in KC is done, I'd go for Viennese tuning just for fun.
 
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