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Double Bass string spacing at nut

#21
Simplified Higher Technique lays out three basic thumb position orientations:
  1. 1 – Chromatic. Each finger is spaced one half step apart, resulting in a minor third frame.
  2. 2 – Semichromatic. This position has a whole step between T-1 and half steps between 1-2 and 2-3. ...
  3. 3 – Diatonic.
 
#23
Notaluthier said:
Simplified Higher Technique lays out three basic thumb position orientations:
  1. 1 – Chromatic. Each finger is spaced one half step apart, resulting in a minor third frame.
  2. 2 – Semichromatic. This position has a whole step between T-1 and half steps between 1-2 and 2-3. ...
  3. 3 – Diatonic.
Click to expand...

This is the main contribution of the Petracchi book, but he also gives some quality exercises that start lower than the octave harmonic. Some of them aren't thumb position at all, but others start to apply thumb position technique much lower on the bass. I don't have a historical perspective to know how commonly this was done before Petracchi, but I always got the sense that he was one of the first to advocate for doing it in a systematic way. We're getting way off "Setup & Repair" but I'll have to go look in my Nanny and Simandl books to see if and how they talked about the thumb below the octave.
 
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#24
That arpeggio exercise towards the end of Petracchi is the best one I know. It's like ten Rabbath exercises boiled into one. BTW isn't he alive? I thought I saw a recent picture of him with his amazing student Chi-chi Nwanoku.
 
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#25
garrett2 said:
That arpeggio exercise towards the end of Petracchi is the nest one I know. It's like ten Rabbath exercises boiled into one. BTW isn't he alive? I thought I saw a recent picture of him with his amazing student Chi-chi Nwanoku.
Click to expand...

The wikitron suggests he is still with us. Born 1937.

I don't know if I know that exercise. My Petracchi book is on loan to my teacher at the moment but when I get it back I'll dig it out.

I didn't know Chi-chi Nwanoku studied with him. I got to hear her once when I went to an opera festival on a trip. She was playing Don Giovanni in the pit on a baroque bow! I couldn't see her during the performance but I went down at intermission to gawk at the instruments and recognized her.
 
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#26
It’s a great way to learn/remind yourself of all the myriad ways you can go up and come down a fingerboard.
 

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#27
pmad_bass said:
On my Kolstein Fendt (currently for sale) I had Mike Shank narrow the spacing on my nut and build a new bridge on which I had him install the Fishman Full Circle. I had the string spacing ever so slightly narrowed on the Bridge when he made it. It is subtle but helped.
Click to expand...

That's great. Do you find that you needed to thin/narrow the neck at all?
 
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#28
Mark_T said:
This is the main contribution of the Petracchi book, but he also gives some quality exercises that start lower than the octave harmonic. Some of them aren't thumb position at all, but others start to apply thumb position technique much lower on the bass. I don't have a historical perspective to know how commonly this was done before Petracchi, but I always got the sense that he was one of the first to advocate for doing it in a systematic way. We're getting way off "Setup & Repair" but I'll have to go look in my Nanny and Simandl books to see if and how they talked about the thumb below the octave.
Click to expand...
Petracchi's book was the first method book I encountered that started thumb position exercises below the octave (I believe at Rabbath 3rd position/Simandl 4th position) and placed a lot of emphasis on it: I was certainly accustomed to drop thumb, but it was never codified in any way.

I think there's definitely a lot of shared DNA between the 3 approaches (Petracchi, Rabbath, Moore) and even though there are many differences between them they're very complementary.
 
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#30
Petracchi's orange book sat on my practice stand all through university. My teacher studied with him in Italy and said he developed a routine of going through the entire book cover to cover in one hour each day - I could never handle that!
 
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#33
crd said:
One of my favorite things about playing a 5 string is the tighter spacing between strings. It makes jazz pizz and string changes with the bow easier once you get used to it.
Click to expand...
Hitting the low “E” with a German Bow is much easier with a five-string. The low “H” is slightly harder to reach while seated though.
 
#40
Calvin Marks said:
Did the neck have to come off in order to shave off some of the sides?
Click to expand...

Sorry....we didnt shave off the sides of the neck, just narrosed the spacing at Nut and Bridge. I did have him thin the depth of the neck just a tad.

So aside from the depth thinning, the work is essentially reversible by just putting the original nut and bridge back on.
 
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