Fingering on a fretless

[Fernando Costa]

The point where the string starts ringing, i.e. the edge of your finger, is what is supposed to be on position – not the center of your finger.

This! His finger is much thicker than a fret, you should approach the fingerboard so that the edge of the finger (not the center) matches the line or dot. Anyway, it's better to get used to hearing more and looking less.

 

[etnoo]

With proper intonation setup my SRF705 is in tune right above the markers, but I don't look over them anyway

BTW.. I recommend you to look at this video, Rich is an awesome musician and a great teacher:

 

[Turnaround]

Please explain this to me. I believe the opposite. You can't play in tune unless you put finger in the right place and there are only 2 ways to do that:
1. Muscle memory & hand form. With one finger on a note you know just how far to reach with another finger to hit the second note.
2. Visual - you look at the neck and pick your target. With big jumps this is the way to do it (as Jaco said in the video linked earlier). You need either the lines or the edge dots to provide the reference info so you can find the target position.

What am I missing?

Clearly you are not a double bass player.

 

[Eric Swaim]

If the intonation is correct and all being as it should, the bass should be in tune when your finger in on top of the side dot or line if it is a lined fretless. If it is tuned up and that's not the case, then you need to have your intonation set on the bridge. That's the theory behind it. I am a string orchestra teacher and I use very thin black tape on beginners instruments because the note is not the width of the finger but more precise and a smaller area. If your action is too high you will also notice a problem and need to reset the intonation and finally if you change to a much smaller or larger guage string you may have to reset the intonation.

 

[dpbass66]

Fingering on a fretless

The video is about finger placement on a fretless, which is often on the fretline.

 

[Lenny JG]

I don't think the previous poster meant that you should play a harmonic at position X and then finger a normal note at that same point on the same string, I think they meant that you can use various harmonics at various locations as reference pitches for comparison purposes.

You can get harmonics in lots of places, but the ones that are very easy to get consistently are the ones at frets 12, 7, 5, and 4. If you're actually aiming for one of those you're not likely to get one of the in between ones by mistake.

Yeah I get that, but literally barely moving your finger by a few mm makes the difference in harmonics in a lot of cases which, again, makes this statement inaccurate.

 

[Savage_Dreams]

I don't quite understand because a fretted instrument you normally try to put your finger right on the fret.

what? no.

 

[Sam Evans]

I believe that OFPF means one finger per fret and 124 means using the index finger (1), medius (2) and pinky (4). The ring finger (3) is just for show, I guess.

That's probably right, I'm guessing the author of that post had the Simandl method in mind. 3 would get some use as you get higher up the fingerboard.

 

[darwin-bass]

Clearly you are not a double bass player.

I am not. Care to enlighten me (us)?

 

[lordradish]

As close as possible to what? On top of the fret? Participating in forums can be unnecessarily exhausting.

Right behind it, not on top of it.

 

[lordradish]

Fingering on a fretless

I was

This is the first time the poster has heard of placing one's finger on top of the frets on a fretted bass as Jaco recommends.

Fingering on a fretless

Yeah, it's the first time I've ever heard that, and I've still never seen anyone do it other than Jaco in that video, and it sounds like crap every time I've ever done it.

 

[SteveCS]

View attachment 4637398

No, new. And they're on the top side of the fretboard. As far as I know, all Portamento bass guitars are the same that way.

Yes, all of the Prortamento I've seen and played were like that.

 

[Ric Vice]

I began on Double Bass so my technique is based on 1/2/4 fingering covering
3 1/2 steps. Double Bass finger boards have a more pronounced radius than EB’s do. This along with the vertical neck actually makes them easier to intonate IME. Fretless intonation is not IME exactly about playing each individual note in isolation, perfectly in tune. It’s more about micro adjustments within the interval relationships from note to note. Scales, Chord, and Intervals along with simple melodic exercises around each key center will help you to play better in tune. This is why practicing against a drone pitch is helpful

 

[Acoop]

I found the best practice for fretless bass is a one finger per fret approach. ... And practice that up and down the neck. ... You have to train your hand and your brain to reach for and nail the pitch or you'll always be chasing it and second guessing your playing. ... You'll want to be at the point where you are not constantly watching the fretboard and to do that you need to train your hand. ... Upright players don't slide into every note they nail the pitch. ... A good fretless player knows how to not just make it sound like a fretless and that's the real beauty in the instrument.

 

[Gustopher]

With all this talk about putting your finger directly onto the fret (on fretted instruments)... I just had to go try it. Wow, just as I thought, it sounds like crap. I've played guitar for 30 years and bass mostly for the past 4... never in any of that time have I ever played with anyone that fretted like that and I have never seen any instructional material suggesting it would work... I can TOTALLY understand if that is a technique that someone might employ for a specific dampening type of sound... but for normal playing? Never would that sound better than pressing directly behind the fret wire.

 

[Sid the Kid]

I am not. Care to enlighten me (us)?

I’ll help, but I’m no double bass player.

One finger per note is not exactly feasible on an upright due to the physics of the bass, but trying is a great way to injure yourself. The double bass has no lines or side position markers, so you can’t look for the note at all despite how big the jumps are. The visual/tactile point of reference is where the neck meets the body, and that’s where things start to get tricky.

Somehow there are many great double bassists who manage to play in tune. Are they perfect? No. Nobody is perfect, even Jaco.

 

[Gravedigger Dav]

I don't quite understand because a fretted instrument you normally try to put your finger right on the fret.

On a fretless instrument there are a bunch of nuances though.

Like what temperament do you chose to use. If you use even intonation like a fretted instrument everything will sound slightly out of tune. If you use just intonation, everything will sound better by yourself but sound slightly off when playing with a band using keys or a fretted instrument.

Also, one of the reasons many people don't like fret line markers on fretless instruments is you eventually ignore them and just play the correct notes which may or may not be at the fret marker.

You could also be inadvertently bending the strings.

Lastly, as with any stringed instrument, the higher your action, the more sharp notes will sound when fingering at a given position.

On a fretted instrument, your finger should go as close as possible to the fret, but not on top of it.

 

[legalbass]

This is the first time the poster has heard of placing one's finger on top of the frets on a fretted bass as Jaco recommends.

Fingering on a fretless

Jaco's wrong.

Edit: Let me amplify that a bit.

Jaco was exceptional.

Almost without exception, bass players on TalkBass are not.

It's like the whole, "Paul McCartney couldn't read music so I don't have to either" bit people bring up here.

Just, no. Stop it.

 

[KenD]

It's only "proper technique" if you think that full sustain and full overtones are proper, for every application, always. However, they rarely are, IMO and IME.

Firstly, the damping effect is slight. It's audible, and important...but not major. You aren't turning a "ring" into a "thud" by doing it. You're just creating a more controlled, cleaner sounding ring.

Secondly, you speak of that damping as if it's a bad thing across the board. It isn't. It makes you sound better in many applications – most, IMO. It's just that most people have never learned to use this technique, and use only right hand damping.

So, what you describe is not simply "proper technique." It's "a technique." It's a technique that you use if you want zero damping whatsoever. That's something to be used as called for, but it's not a character of note that I want to employ as the default whenever I play. Quite the opposite; it's a rare exception when I want that.

To my feeling of what a "standard bass note" sounds like, full sustain and full overtones are dialed back, as the baseline. I.e. there is a mild degree of damping as your "home base," and you can either damp more or damp less, as called for. But the baseline is the ever so slightly slightly damped character that you get with finger on fret. This creates an effect that is very "normal" for an instrument that is playing a rhythm role in an arrangement. It is preferable to dial back the full sustain and full overtones, in a great majority of applications.

I play on the frets, and deliberately control my left hand pressure, and position to some degree, constantly, in order to control the level of built in damping, especially on my basses that don't have bridge mutes. I even do this on open strings whenever possible, playing in 0 position, fingering at the nut to provide that slight damping. If I am playing open strings along with notes higher on the neck, and can't make it down to the nut to do this, then I drag my thumb a bit to help accomplish a similar effect. If I want full sustain and overtones, I fret as you describe...but in 30+ years of playing bass, very few gigs and compositions have called for that "totally wide open" sound.

Oh, please.

 

[Turnaround]

Please explain this to me. I believe the opposite. You can't play in tune unless you put finger in the right place and there are only 2 ways to do that:
1. Muscle memory & hand form. With one finger on a note you know just how far to reach with another finger to hit the second note.
2. Visual - you look at the neck and pick your target. With big jumps this is the way to do it (as Jaco said in the video linked earlier). You need either the lines or the edge dots to provide the reference info so you can find the target position.

What am I missing?

There are no lines or edge dots on a double bass. You find the "target position" by muscle memory alone, except for the thumb position where you reference the body joint. But even then it varies between D and E flat necks. And your point #1 is good so long as you are not changing positions.

You really need to be reliant upon muscle memory and your own ear when playing double bass, especially if you are reading music. For me the same is true when playing fretless electric. I often have to read a part and I don't have the option to be watching my hands.