Double basses usually play pizzicato when playing with jazz groups. For example: in a waltz the cellos and violas might be accompanying the tune with an “um-cha-cha, um-cha-cha” while the double basses just pluck on the “um” (the first beat of the bar). ![]() Double basses often play pizzicato to give extra rhythmic and harmonic support. ![]() Pizzicato notes on the double bass sound much more resonant (big and boomy). The player can get different sounds by plucking in different parts of the string. Pizzicato notes sound short and detached (staccato). This is fine so long as the player has time to pick the bow up again when it goes back to arco. If there is a long pizzicato section then it is more comfortable to put the bow down instead of holding it in the right hand all the time. It can take a little more time to go back to bowing again because the player has to get the bow back into playing position. If the bowed note finishes near the tip the player needs a moment to get the hand ready to pluck. It is easy to play a bowed note and then immediately a plucked note if the bowed note finished near the heel of the bow (the end where the bow is held). Very often players have to change very quickly from bowing to plucking and back again. This is normally when they are deliberately imitating a guitar. Very occasionally violinists may be asked to pluck their instruments holding them down in their laps. Stopped strings are harder, and the brilliant violinist and composer Niccolò Paganini wrote some virtuoso pieces with extremely difficult left hand pizzicato. It is not difficult to pluck an open string with the left hand. The ability to perform spiccato was facilitated by the development of the Tourte bow – the modern bow, in which the bow had a concave curve, developed by François Tourte partly in collaboration with Giovanni Battista Viotti.It is also possible to play pizzicato with the left hand (the hand which is normally doing the fingering). Although it was an important technique for 19th-century violinists, its use increased significantly in the 20th century. The distinctive use of the term spiccato for the bouncing bowstroke emerged in the later 18th century. Spiccato meant, they write, "simply detached or separated as opposed to legato." They cite, for example, Sébastien de Brossard's Dictionnaire de musique, 1703, and Michel Corrette's L'École d'Orphée, 1738. When using the full bow hair, the bow bounces more and has a shorter character, while when the bow hair is angled, the character of the spiccato becomes more mellow and longer.Īccording to David Boyden and Peter Walls in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, the terms spiccato and staccato were regarded as equivalent before the mid-18th century. ![]() The character of the spiccato can be varied by altering the tilt and placement of the bow to use more or fewer hairs. The speed can also be controlled by varying the height of the bow above the string: the higher the bow bounces, the longer the time required for the bow to return to the string, and therefore the slower the resulting spiccato. At the balance point – about a third from the frog – the spiccato will be slow, while above the middle of the bow the speed will increase. The speed with which the spiccato is performed depends on bow placement. ![]() In slower tempos, a spiccato can also be manufactured using the fingers and wrist to deliberately manipulate how the bow falls to the string. The ability to create the effect is largely tempo-dependent. This occurs because of the elasticity of the string and the natural springiness of the bow. In typically consistent rhythms (of quavers or semiquavers, or quicker repeated sounds), the bow is held in a more relaxed manner and allowed to bounce, resulting in a series of short, distinct notes. Problems playing this file? See media help.
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