Double Bass Lightness of touch (DB forum thread)

[Jazzdogg]

This subject is a fascinating one if you are an upright player in the modern era, because there are these two totally opposing ideas and most of us grew up embracing just one side of the equation: Big tone = pulling hard. It seems so natural to try and get the most sound out of your instrument to compete with the others in the band who are louder naturally. But virtuoso players who employ speed and lyricism and complicated rhythmic concepts understand the #1 principle of technique: all of these are attributes of effortless playing. And Effortless playing on the upright involves lightness of touch and the right kind of bass and set up to get there (something almost none of us have:luthier bias)

I studied with Charlie Haden, whose right hand stroked the strings so soft it was like they were a lover's nipples, I took master classes with Dave Holland whose daily exercises include lifting/recocking work to touch the string and then lift the fingers immediately so that once the string is engaged the fingers reset (effortlessly). This new masterclass of Geoff's with Marc Johnson is so clear about just how light his touch really is. Just look at his right hand fingers kissing the strings, which allow him to execute sensitive vibratos and dynamic rhythmic patterns and extensive pulloff/hammers. Marc says that when he was with Bill Evans he was playing solo stings tuned down a step, in case you wanted to know how that young virtuosity was achieved.
And then there is Cole with his 2 foot long fingers that have such massive fulcrum that he can blaze the strings with almost no effort. (but with low action and really getting his hand over to the side so that he is glancing in his attack)

For most of us we grew up playing SOOO much harder that it is almost impossible to conceive of playing that light. It just seems and feels wrong. Retraining involves a complete reexamination and reset of our hands (both hands) to counter years of bearing down too hard.

Most of us have been YELLING on our instruments since the beginning. SCREAMING every note, at the top of our lungs (volume/pull). But screaming is not nuance-full. And it sure aint fast or lyrical or rhythmic or musical, it's just yelling to be heard.

In reading over this thread it seems like most people just frickin play way too hard and are having a hard time believing it. How can you develop speed and sensitivity and accuracy and grace while screamingly tense and over bearing? The trade off of course is amplifying the bass in such a way that it will allow for the lighter touch. BUT and this is in MHO the big one, if you amplify for a light touch, you absolutely CANNOT over play the strings anymore less you blast out your band and freak yourself out. Super hard to do and most of us who grew up with this acoustic bias (you don't ever hear your sax player who arguably makes twice as much sound acoustically as you do saying , "Oh I am just going to play this gig acoustically because I don't need any stinkin extra amplification"...he is aimed straight out at the audience with his bell in a sexual embrace of the microphone head. Most of us think we have to yank on the goddamn stings to make them sing, but really we need to train ourselves out of that, and into a more nuanced lighter relationship with the vibrating string.
In my opinion, on my bass, listening to the music I listen to, admiring the players I do etc....

In my case, the ideal sound of double bass was created by Ray Brown, and I wouldn't have believed it if anyone had told me when I started fifty-odd years ago that Ray Brown had a light touch. It wasn't until I got an Azola a few decades ago that I first played a double bass relying entirely on an amp. When I discovered that my sound, when amplified, got worse the more I dug in, and my facility improved when I stopped diggin in, I eventually re-thought my approach to the instrument. I am a sometimes doubler (on Azola) who plays mostly electric, and never gigs my 3/4-size double bass. That said, I sure enjoy learning from those of you who so willingly share your hard-earned expertise with the rest of us.

 

[BassFalcon]

This subject is a fascinating one if you are an upright player in the modern era, because there are these two totally opposing ideas and most of us grew up embracing just one side of the equation: Big tone = pulling hard. It seems so natural to try and get the most sound out of your instrument to compete with the others in the band who are louder naturally. But virtuoso players who employ speed and lyricism and complicated rhythmic concepts understand the #1 principle of technique: all of these are attributes of effortless playing. And Effortless playing on the upright involves lightness of touch and the right kind of bass and set up to get there (something almost none of us have:luthier bias)

I studied with Charlie Haden, whose right hand stroked the strings so soft it was like they were a lover's nipples, I took master classes with Dave Holland whose daily exercises include lifting/recocking work to touch the string and then lift the fingers immediately so that once the string is engaged the fingers reset (effortlessly). This new masterclass of Geoff's with Marc Johnson is so clear about just how light his touch really is. Just look at his right hand fingers kissing the strings, which allow him to execute sensitive vibratos and dynamic rhythmic patterns and extensive pulloff/hammers. Marc says that when he was with Bill Evans he was playing solo stings tuned down a step, in case you wanted to know how that young virtuosity was achieved.
And then there is Cole with his 2 foot long fingers that have such massive fulcrum that he can blaze the strings with almost no effort. (but with low action and really getting his hand over to the side so that he is glancing in his attack)

For most of us we grew up playing SOOO much harder that it is almost impossible to conceive of playing that light. It just seems and feels wrong. Retraining involves a complete reexamination and reset of our hands (both hands) to counter years of bearing down too hard.

Most of us have been YELLING on our instruments since the beginning. SCREAMING every note, at the top of our lungs (volume/pull). But screaming is not nuance-full. And it sure aint fast or lyrical or rhythmic or musical, it's just yelling to be heard.

In reading over this thread it seems like most people just frickin play way too hard and are having a hard time believing it. How can you develop speed and sensitivity and accuracy and grace while screamingly tense and over bearing? The trade off of course is amplifying the bass in such a way that it will allow for the lighter touch. BUT and this is in MHO the big one, if you amplify for a light touch, you absolutely CANNOT over play the strings anymore less you blast out your band and freak yourself out. Super hard to do and most of us who grew up with this acoustic bias (you don't ever hear your sax player who arguably makes twice as much sound acoustically as you do saying , "Oh I am just going to play this gig acoustically because I don't need any stinkin extra amplification"...he is aimed straight out at the audience with his bell in a sexual embrace of the microphone head. Most of us think we have to yank on the goddamn stings to make them sing, but really we need to train ourselves out of that, and into a more nuanced lighter relationship with the vibrating string.
In my opinion, on my bass, listening to the music I listen to, admiring the players I do etc....

Lovers nipples?
Kissing strings?
Sexual embrace?

lol, you need to calm down guy it’s a family website…

 

[crd]

Some of us much prefer Charlie Haden's sound pre-Quartet West. I know he physically wasn't able to keep going with the type of physical approach he was using on Science Fiction but I love that sound.

Give me Gary Peacock on Spiritual Unity over ECM era Peacock any day of the week....

There are lots of players who get a big acoustic sound that are full of nuance. Wilbur Ware comes to mind. Pick any of the Ellington bassists.

There is no way to be reductive in talking about the physical approach to double bass playing. It's never as simple as light touch all the time or whatever. When it comes to amplifying your sound, it really is as simple as garbage in = garbage out. The better your internal conception is of what you are playing is, the easier it is to translate that to your instrument and an audience/band. I play gigs where I can hear myself well and gigs where I can hear myself at all on stage and I like to think, I sound and play the same on both. I try to verifying this by recording most of what I do.

Great drummers have a lot to teach bassists about dynamics. Phrasing is everything. Often times when I hear a drummer who is young and maybe doesn't have it all together yet, they hide behind being soft/uncertain/lack of clarity. It's murky inside so it's murky out front. They mistake being quiet for being musical or they are trying to hide a lack of technique behind an aesthetic of tastefulness. (The lowercase fad comes in and out style every 5 or 6 years.) The first time I played with a great drummer I told him I loved how specific he was when we were done and he looked at me like the baby I was and said "of course man, what you think this is your high school jazz band and I don't know exactly what I'm saying, ALL THE TIME?"

The bass is not like piano where you can take a couple days off and come right back to it with the same chops you had the last time you played. I'm coming back from a couple weeks flat on my back with covid and am gradually increasing my playing time every day similar to the approach Rabbath recommends in book 3 for scale work. It amazes me the amount of young musicians that don't seem to know to hang on a long gig you have to uh, be able to play that long at home without breaking a sweat.

 

[flatback]

Just riffing man

 

[Kaspar Vadsholt]

^^^ Physics is physics.

 

[Chris Fitzgerald]

This thread is certainly providing some interesting reading and perspectives. I think that sound and technique exists on a spectrum, and that the issue I keep running into is not accepting the upper end of the spectrum as the upper end of the spectrum. When it happens, it’s never in the practice room; it’s in response to collective energy and volume.

I love playing on the quieter end of the spectrum and brushing the strings when that sound is appropriate, and I enjoy digging in when that’s appropriate too. In the recording world, this issue could be approached with a limiter to keep the signal in a healthy range. I think I need to implement something like that in my technique, a point beyond which I don’t try to dig deeper even when the energy from the other musicians seems to call for it. I don’t really want to use more volume from the amp as a normal thing. I just need to learn that the ceiling is the ceiling, and that beyond that it’s a matter of very diminishing returns and the risk of injury.

 

[Kaspar Vadsholt]

This thread is certainly providing some interesting reading and perspectives. I think that sound and technique exists on a spectrum, and that the issue I keep running into is not accepting the upper end of the spectrum as the upper end of the spectrum. When it happens, it’s never in the practice room; it’s in response to collective energy and volume.

I love playing on the quieter end of the spectrum and brushing the strings when that sound is appropriate, and I enjoy digging in when that’s appropriate too. In the recording world, this issue could be approached with a limiter to keep the signal in a healthy range. I think I need to implement something like that in my technique, a point beyond which I don’t try to dig deeper even when the energy from the other musicians seems to call for it. I don’t really want to use more volume from the amp as a normal thing. I just need to learn that the ceiling is the ceiling, and that beyond that it’s a matter of very diminishing returns and the risk of injury.

 

[Kaspar Vadsholt]

This thread is certainly providing some interesting reading and perspectives. I think that sound and technique exists on a spectrum, and that the issue I keep running into is not accepting the upper end of the spectrum as the upper end of the spectrum. When it happens, it’s never in the practice room; it’s in response to collective energy and volume.

I love playing on the quieter end of the spectrum and brushing the strings when that sound is appropriate, and I enjoy digging in when that’s appropriate too. In the recording world, this issue could be approached with a limiter to keep the signal in a healthy range. I think I need to implement something like that in my technique, a point beyond which I don’t try to dig deeper even when the energy from the other musicians seems to call for it. I don’t really want to use more volume from the amp as a normal thing. I just need to learn that the ceiling is the ceiling, and that beyond that it’s a matter of very diminishing returns and the risk of injury.

 

[bassically_eli]

Most of us have been YELLING on our instruments since the beginning. SCREAMING every note, at the top of our lungs (volume/pull). But screaming is not nuance-full. And it sure aint fast or lyrical or rhythmic or musical, it's just yelling to be heard.

Wow, if this is what you're (not you specifically, what one is) doing, that's a problem. Definitely NOT what I'm thinking of when I say or hear "dig in," though. I know diddly squat about singing, but I'm pretty sure singing powerfully in opera is completely different than yelling (hope that metaphor makes sense).

I played trombone all through middle school and high school, switched to bass in orchestra in college. All my classical teachers and conductors were nuts about dynamics, accents, articulations, etc., but especially my HS band director. I think that attitude should apply to jazz and pizz playing too. Seems like a lot of players here have gravitated to the extremes. Why not default somewhere in the middle and work out from there?

 

[dylanjohnson]

This thread is certainly providing some interesting reading and perspectives. I think that sound and technique exists on a spectrum, and that the issue I keep running into is not accepting the upper end of the spectrum as the upper end of the spectrum. When it happens, it’s never in the practice room; it’s in response to collective energy and volume.

I love playing on the quieter end of the spectrum and brushing the strings when that sound is appropriate, and I enjoy digging in when that’s appropriate too. In the recording world, this issue could be approached with a limiter to keep the signal in a healthy range. I think I need to implement something like that in my technique, a point beyond which I don’t try to dig deeper even when the energy from the other musicians seems to call for it. I don’t really want to use more volume from the amp as a normal thing. I just need to learn that the ceiling is the ceiling, and that beyond that it’s a matter of very diminishing returns and the risk of injury.

When I was young I saw Ray Brown Trio and sat so close to the stage that I was unable to hear the FOH speakers, only the stage volume. It was a smallish club. I think the band was Keezer and Hutchinson, and I remember that they were playing a fast Milestones. Greg and Geoff were going at it. Digging in hard and building energy- playing off each other. Ray played completely relaxed, and just let them bury him. He gave them a quick look like, "Hey, I'm right here, guys." They rained it in, still doing what they were doing energetically, but pulling back the bashing.

That moment really was a turning point for my approach to amplification. Ray's amp volume was minimal, and I'm sure there were times when he couldn't really hear his amp, but it didn't seem to really matter to him, as it kept his band in check.

 

[crd]

I love playing on the quieter end of the spectrum and brushing the strings when that sound is appropriate, and I enjoy digging in when that’s appropriate too. In the recording world, this issue could be approached with a limiter to keep the signal in a healthy range. I think I need to implement something like that in my technique, a point beyond which I don’t try to dig deeper even when the energy from the other musicians seems to call for it. I don’t really want to use more volume from the amp as a normal thing. I just need to learn that the ceiling is the ceiling, and that beyond that it’s a matter of very diminishing returns and the risk of injury.

Top volume for me is when I stop trying to play louder and I back off and check out what the drums are doing. It usually happens about once a night.

 

[Kaspar Vadsholt]

First of all, sorry for my reply-less quoting in a couple of posts before. My iPhone acted out.
Secondly, Cole’s video is interesting. I’m 100% certain that digging in sounds louder up close, but at a distance, I think he has a point. I was speaking to my wife, who’s a classical pianist about (classical) singers. She said, that in order for their voices to carry out in the concert hall across an orchestra, they have to have a round sound with a lot of overtones. That’s very much what I find on the bass. Digging in gives a middy, hard sound, whereas lightening up gives a full, warm sound.
Wonder if it carries as well as Cole claims.
In the 90’ies Charlie Haden taught a big band of young musicians in Copenhagen. He played a couple of tunes with them in a safe distance due to his notorious sensitive ears. He wasn’t plugged in, and the drummer afterwards commented that it sounded as if he were right beside him. Huge sound with a soft touch!

 

[ctrlzjones]

Fellow Damon Smith was saying something interesting in a recent thread, comparing physical stress when playing BG and DB: that the DB is easier to play because all the energy resides already in the instrument. A statement that most would not approve. I believe the metaphor was “an arch under tension”. A different perspective that for me opened a bag of possibilities for changing the approach of sound production. You really have to give the strings some room to vibrate and build up the vibrations, instead of dampening them with too much force, with both of your hands.

 

[Bruce Calin]

Recently I've been playing a gig that has two locations in the same venue. In one we play a blues-based repertoire pretty loud and the other is much quieter. The sound of the bass and the whole band is very different in the different situations. I do find myself using different levels of attack, and this thread has made me want to explore a lighter touch in the first and see what happens. The other thing that's interesting to me is how much louder people seem to expect music to be on a regular basis compared to years ago. We have been told to "turn up" on the first part of the gig. It seems too loud to me, but I'm old. Are people going deaf?

 

[bassmanbrent]

The other thing that's interesting to me is how much louder people seem to expect music to be on a regular basis compared to years ago. We have been told to "turn up" on the first part of the gig. It seems too loud to me, but I'm old. Are people going deaf?

This is a really interesting point to me and it's something I've noticed too. A bunch of years ago, somebody mentioned their theory that, as technology improved and pa systems became capable of higher db levels before distortion, sound people pushed the volume level because their gear was capable of it. In recent times, I think it has something to do with there being (canned) music everywhere with remote speakers throughout venues and restaurants. People have gotten used to everything being loud all the time and have come to expect it. I had a brunch gig for a while where the venue liked the volume so loud that it was uncomfortable for many of their patrons. Very strange!

 

[Don Kasper]

(Is there a "throwing gasoline on a fire" emoji?)
In the mid 80's I asked a friend of mine (who was/is a successful freelance jazz bassist in NYC) why Michael Moore was not on more recordings/gigs based out of NYC - he responded that not everyone on the scene was fond of his "light touch" , esp. with regard to his quarter notes/time feel. I was shocked, as I had thought that his approach was beyond reproach. (I have since come to an understanding of their point of view - I say that out of the utmost respect for M. Moore's career and recorded output, which speaks for itself.)
My takeaway (over time), is that the pulse/feel of a bassist is directly connected to how much energy is utilized in the attack of EACH (quarter) note - too much is not physically healthy or productive, and too little is sometimes not what others (drummers? band members?) may respond to.
It's my belief and practice, that a certain amount of raw energy is necessary for my sound (whether amplified, or non-amplified) to clearly communicate my feel/pulse to the music.
IMFO, of course.
Call the Fire Dept.
Thanks.

 

[Jazzdogg]

Recently I've been playing a gig that has two locations in the same venue. In one we play a blues-based repertoire pretty loud and the other is much quieter. The sound of the bass and the whole band is very different in the different situations. I do find myself using different levels of attack, and this thread has made me want to explore a lighter touch in the first and see what happens. The other thing that's interesting to me is how much louder people seem to expect music to be on a regular basis compared to years ago. We have been told to "turn up" on the first part of the gig. It seems too loud to me, but I'm old. Are people going deaf?

Virtually every gig I've attended as an audience member has been too damned loud for at least a decade - especially bass and drums fed through subs. Same for restaurants and bars without live entertainment: too loud, and too much emphasis on the bottom octave!

 

[Jim T]

(Is there a "throwing gasoline on a fire" emoji?)
In the mid 80's I asked a friend of mine (who was/is a successful freelance jazz bassist in NYC) why Michael Moore was not on more recordings/gigs based out of NYC - he responded that not everyone on the scene was fond of his "light touch" , esp. with regard to his quarter notes/time feel. I was shocked, as I had thought that his approach was beyond reproach. (I s have since come to an understanding of their point of view - I say that out of the utmost respect for M. Moore's career and recorded output, which speaks for itself.)
My takeaway (over time), is that the pulse/feel of a bassist is directly connected to how much energy is utilized in the attack of EACH (quarter) note - too much is not physically healthy or productive, and too little is sometimes not what others (drummers? band members?) may respond to.
It's my belief and practice, that a certain amount of raw energy is necessary for my sound (whether amplified, or non-amplified) to clearly communicate my feel/pulse to the music.
IMFO, of course.
Call the Fire Dept.
Thanks.

Rodney Whittaker nicely articulates and demonstrates the difference between light touch and attack here for a walking quarter note feel:


Cole may largely be referring to fast, lyrical playing which he is known for as well as his thumb position approach (never using 2-3 LH fingering). I think of Michael Moore as good at everything, but particularly his soloing and thumb position work and method.

 

[crd]

Have you seen this advice from this young monster? Like petting a cat, he says. I haven't been able to reproduce his results -- digging in always seems louder than petting the cat -- but he's also a much better player than I. I suggested he try to prove this concept with a decibel meter, which he thought was a good idea, but I haven't seen this test conducted yet. I'm really having fun trying to get his great sound by playing really light, though. It's a very interesting exercise.

It's amazing to compare that video to the Rodney Whitaker video posted above. They are playing similar notes. One I can tap my foot too and feel, and the other, uh,...

 

[Dm7b5]

It's a misconception that you need to 'dig in' to get power or speed.
Think Tai Chi as adverse to Karate. Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.