Next Level Bassist Left Hand

eventual performance. I try to imagine holding the bass and preparing
to walk out onto the stage. (Or whatever setting I know I will be in) I
feel my nerves relaxing as I place the heavy bass and end pin securely
into the floor. I imagine getting the stool into position. I ask myself
some questions: How does the bow feel in my right hand? How does
my left hand lay into position on the board? I then create in my mind
a confident performance while all along breathing in a controlled
manner and enjoying the unfolding phrases. Finally I will see the
finish of my performance and feel the satisfaction of ending on a good
note, including hearing the audience applause and then walking off the
stage. This mental exercise can be very powerful in relieving yourself
of any anxiety from what is about to happen.
Every time I pick up the bass, I am attempting to manage the challenges
in my playing. I think that if you have a strategy for dealing
with them, you are much less likely to view them as challenges. It’s all
about body management. A good example is nerves. Everyone out
there deals with nerves. If you have a plan to deal with them, there’s
a much better chance you can control them. Whether the problems
manifest mentally or physically, or both, being clearheaded, being
focused on the task at hand, and having lots of preparation are vital.
As a young player in high school, playing bass came easy to me, and
like a lot of professionals it spoke to me early on. But at a certain point
in everyone’s career, you eventually hit a wall. This is usually because
you’ve seen someone else do something incredible with the bass and
you want to do what they’re doing and find that you can’t. Hearing
Hal Robinson or Edgar Meyer play often left me wondering how they
do that!? The light bulb moment comes when you realize that they
worked their asses off, they had a strategy, and went through a lot of
preparation to get there.
Having an organized approach to daily practicing is the most
important thing. There is dumb, bad, excessive practice, but for the
most part people simply need to practice to grow. They need to learn
the notes, have something to say with the music and ultimately be
prepared to present that music in a setting outside the practice room.
That was a big challenge I overcame as a high school and college
student, trying to get to the next level where I could start taking on
the traits of what we call a “seasoned or professional player.” In other
words, having control in as many out-of-the-practice-room situations
as possible.
One of the things that has really helped me with intonation is working
with a drone. In high school my orchestra teacher told me that I needed
to work on my intonation. She used to hammer a single note out on
the piano while I played my scales against the pitches she played. She
would yell, “Flat!” Or “Sharp!” at the top of her lungs until I adjusted
properly. These things hurt to hear, but I took it as a challenge. I
worked and worked until I got it so she would never have to say that
again. Nowadays, I’ll play a pitch on a tuner that is relevant to the key
I’m playing in. Sometimes I have to change it as the piece modulates.
If you really want to geek out you can have two tuners playing tones a
fifth apart to strengthen that key foundation. It’s especially important
in playing scales and really learning what playing in tune sounds like.
Not only do you train your ear, but you hear the tendencies of where
certain notes want to lie in a given key. When you start applying that
to pieces, you begin to contemplate which step in the scale you are
playing in a melody and what instrument you are accompanying (or
being accompanied by). Having a drone on is basically recreating the
effect of playing with another instrument, and when I started to do
this I would find my ability to adjust pitch in ensemble playing was
much stronger. That is one thing I really push on my students - it’s not
just about playing the notes, it’s about knowing what’s going on around
you. If you reduce bass playing to “1 on the D string in first position is
E,” and you ask 10 students to execute that, it could potentially sound
like 10 different pitches. Put on an E drone (or an A or a B) and given
that you have decent pitch to begin with, you can find exactly where to
put that note. The students of mine that have a good ear can solve a lot
of intonation issues this way. The other advantage is teaching one how
to play in tune when your strings go out of tune, because you’re not
always basing your idea of a note on its distance from the nut or some
other landmark on the fingerboard. It helps train your left hand and
your ear simultaneously.
Approach to a good position is so crucial. My goal is to make playing
the bass as easy as possible. Even at its easiest, playing the bass can be
uncomfortable and problematic. The human body wasn’t meant to play
the bass. Starting with stance - if you stand, find a comfortable stance
with feet shoulder width apart and knees not locked. If you are sitting
on a stool, position your butt towards the edge of the stool on your sit
bones. Stool height at the highest should allow your right leg to place
the entire sole of your shoe on the ground comfortably without cutting
off blood circulation to your feet. Knees should be 90 degrees apart
with left foot grounded like the right foot or grounded comfortably
on a foot stool or well-placed rung. Begin relaxing your body piece by
piece - relax your shoulders, neck, chin, tongue, eyelids, chest, even
your butt. I think a lot of people carry stress in their butts. Let your
arms hang and analyze what you look like in this resting moment. I try
to point out to my students the gentle curve in the fingers, slight bend
at the elbow, relaxed wrist, thumb that isn’t actively bent or straightened
- these are the features of a healthy approach to the bass. If you
can keep your thumb relaxed when you put it behind the neck, or onto
the frog of the bow, keep curves in your fingers and joints so you’re at
least starting at zero tension. I know people have wildly different bow
grips but I think a good starting point is the same relaxed posture as
your resting hand.
I always have my students thinking of ways to make bass playing
easier. What’s easier than the body at rest? Take what our body does
naturally and lay it on top of the bass. Control over the bass and
consistency all stem from this sense of relaxation - from there, the
priority can now become practicing. These are simple concepts that
perhaps add up to a philosophy. The students I’ve had with a lot of
success have listened to these ideas, but the work they put in and
rewards they have received were really their own.
Someone who plays completely relaxed like Francois Rabbath is an
inspiration as well as virtuoso, but may have trouble doing orchestral
work exclusively. The fundamental of relaxation is not practical in all
settings - you couldn’t play a true orchestral fortissimo spicatto stroke
with spaghetti arms. If you aren’t approaching the stroke with extra
tension, you can activate the muscle where necessary to make the
sound you want. This is where Hal Robinson is such a great example
- he has eliminated any extraneous tension and can also provide as
much power as is necessary for a particular passage. I would never call
Hal’s playing rigid in any regard, but there are certain parts of his body
that at the moment of a stroke become firm, and then release when
they’re no longer needed.
Figuring out how to torque into the string, using the rotation of your
forearm along with hand and index finger (pronation), applying your
bow and arm weight to the string, using your left hand and forearm
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