TECHNIQUE FOR DOUBLE BASS

No. 1) Progressions on G major scale.

Note: if you use 123 fingers the number "3" must be naturally changed into " 2 ". For the Thumb Position I think there are no great questions. 

A very useful exercise in three octaves (also a good warm up)

At the neck you can change the number " 3 " with " 2 "

Advice: remember that " Cr " means Chromatic position;

" s.cr " means Semi-Chromatic position and " diat. " diatonic position

The basic different bowings - by M.° M. Cellaro

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ARPEGGIO by maestro Michele CELLARO

... always an interesting technical exercise by maestro Michele CELLARO

p.s.: Remember that when you aren't in Thumb Position the number " 3 " has to changed into " 2".

Bottesini with Arditi

GARY KARR

An easy exercise to develope your tuning - Play it also on the other strings

Little by Little we will study always different exercises. 

Fernando Grillo - from SUITE I by SCHOTT Edition

This is a piece taken from Suite I (Ed. Schott) and I hope maestro Grillo doesn't kill me.

We were talking about technique: this is an extreme example! But there's much more.

It's always difficult to talk about Fernando Grillo. But his Music has known

everywhere and this is an objective and important aspect. Probably this work represents the "Summa" of what someone (Double Bassist) has defined "The Buddha of Doublebass". I hope Maestro can appreciate this little and insignificant review.

Something else

OT: Miscellaneous

OTHER "daily" TECHNIQUE EXERCICES - very good Imho

These four pages of daily technique are very important (originally there were written from the italian great maestro Gino Mucci).

If you need brief explanations or more don't hesitate to contact me. Remember that my English is really terrible, my Italian is only a little better ... 

THE THUMB POSITIONS (Cr.- s.cr.- diat.)

cr. = Chromatic (+G#AA#) ; s.cr.:Semichromatic (+AA#B) : diat.: Diatonic (+ A B C)

Exercises by maestro MICHELE CELLARO

FINGERINGS and FOURTHs

COMMENTS:

Photo 1)

Playing with "four fingers". With a correct doublebass is much easier to play with all the four fingers. The question is: how useful it might be?!? Perhaps in the future it will be normal to play like a cellist.

Photo 2)

"idem" !!

Photo 3)

Traditional 1-2-4 fingerings.

Photo 4)

Italian 1-3-4 fingerings. Imho, there's no difference with the previous one. Sometimes I personally use the previous one in the horizontal way or in other situations.

Photo 5)

"Thumb position on the neck".

In the classic or traditional litterature this position has never used.

By the way, in contemporary works or in transcriptions It can be very useful.

Photo 6)

"The little finger in Thumb Position"

+ 1 2 3 4

I don't Know! We might write a hole book about it.

Photo 7)

"The Fourths with the Thumb"

A very useful tool to play tuned fourths. In the site there's the hole description.

Photo 8)

"The third finger ... "Here it might be the correct position, expecially to obtain a good vibrato.

Photo 9)

"The third finger position"

Here it's stretched!

The use of "Glissando" ??

In my opinion we should pay attention when we use the "glissando" effect.

In brief words.

In the ancient times, the use of glissando expecially in the thumb position has been very used. It was a very good help to find the correct tuning for each note. Everyone of us knows it.

We also know that in this position doublebass players didn' t push the string on the fingerboard but they were able to "pull" it in the left part. Who was the first to decide that it was better to push them? I don' t know!

But today there are a lot of great doublebass players which use the "glissando" expecially in "cantabile" phrases. Is it correct or not?

It's no easy to provide a definitive answer.

Sometimes the glissando in the thumb position (in the ancient repertory) can be a very useful tool to mask our mistakes in tuning. Sometimes it might be considered

like "philology" (if today we can too use this term).

But one thing is sure: in a "cantabile" phrase,

we should think to a "singer" in the Opera.

Singers don't use "glissando" in Bellini, Verdi, Mascagni ... and so on .... operas. It would be very unpleasant.

Probably, if we would think in this direction,

the use of glissando should be avoided or limitated. But I also know that it's easy to tell

but it's often difficult to realize.

TECHNIQUE

NEWS

EXERCISES AND STUDIES BY ITALO CAIMMI

Sorry for this no good scanning. It's no easy to find this book. Let me know.

THE DOUBLE STOP or the double stops

IMHO, the best exercises about the double stop I have ever studied

Realized by maestro Enzo Ferraris. One of his CD !!

OLD MARVELLOUS PHOTOS

Chromatic scales on single string

Simple but very important

BRIEF OBSERVATIONS

1) Study very slow every single exercise and repeat it three times without stoppin'.

2) Study on every string (I,II,III,IV)

3) Little by little and day by day you have to

study all them faster ... two numbers on the metronome.

4) Study towards the frog.

5) You must study also with the main variants you know, or the ones you find in this site.

At the end your left hand will be very fast and if you work a lot on the III and IV strings

your hand will very strong.