Next Level Bassist SPRING 2015

SPRING 2015

Contents 

Spring 2015 

FEATURED 

Interview with Bob Oppelt 5 

Pirastro Bass String Review 12 

Art of the Bow | Hans Sturm 13 

CONTRIBUTORS 

Ranaan Meyer 

Publisher/Founder 

Brent Edmondson 

Editor/Sales 

Karen Han 

Art Director/Designer 

Publisher’s Note 

I 

n our previous issue on left hand technique, Next Level Bassist explored 

some very young and new ideas on thumb position and the fingerboard 

navigation. It’s really surprising when you make the leap from left to right 

hand, just how drastically different the discussion becomes and how 

subjective the viewpoints seem. When we talk about the bow and the right 

hand, we are talking about the sound we put out into the world, the way 

we communicate with our audiences. Whether you play primarily with the 

bow or without, whether you use German or French grips, the objective is 

to create a sound that is unique to yourself and one that enhances the music 

you are playing. 

When Hans Sturm came to grips with this problem, he resolved to create 

something that had never existed before, an objective reference for bow strokes, 

which have always been transmitted from teacher to student in the past. By 

using video of one of the great arco bassists in the world, Francois Rabbath, 

Hans created “The Art of the Bow” as a lasting monument to the great 

pedagogue and a vastly in-depth study on the mechanics of motion involved 

in playing with the bow. His DVD pushed the boundaries of technology at the 

time and set the stage for the Youtube generation of bassists who derive a great 

deal of information from watching great bassists play, on a scale that has never 

existed in history. 

Bob Oppelt, Principal Bass of the National Symphony, encountered a problem 

early on in his career - as a German grip player in the United States, he spent 

15 years matching his bow strokes to the other members of his bass section 

before another German player came along. In the midst of what seemed like 

a decline in German bow playing, he created a website to explain and codify 

the many practical approaches with which he had come in contact. This 

page became wildly popular and widespread and has survived many different 

incarnations, proving itself to be a lasting resource for German bow players 

the world over. 

In each article, you will find discussion on the musical implications of many 

bow techniques. No matter what technical information you find useful in this 

issue, the guiding principle behind your practice and exploration should always 

be the music you make when playing the bass. As much as we all love exciting 

new techniques, or learning to bounce the bow for the first time, the endgame 

of our study is to make music with no technical barriers. As you explore these 

pages, remember that your musical voice grows with each technique you 

assimilate, but your musical imagination grows with each experience in life, 

good or bad. Take a moment to walk in a park, to travel to a new place, or try 

a new cuisine - you’ll be surprised at how it shows up on a page of music 

when you least expect it! 

RANAAN MEYER 

Publisher Next Level Journals 

Ranaan Meyer 

Time for Three Founder and Bassist 

Education We All Deserve Foundation 

Founder 

Ranaan Meyer Entertainment 

Indianapolis Symphony Artist in Residence 

Sun Valley Summer Symphony Artist 

and Composer in Residence 

Charley Creek Arts Festival Artistic Director 

2 NOV/DEC SPRING 2015 2013 NEXT LEVEL BASSIST 

SPRING 2015 NEXT LEVEL BASSIST 3

Next Level Journals is made possible in part by Robertson and Sons Violin Shop 

Can you talk about your website of German bow grips 

and what you were hoping to accomplish? 

CARLO CARLETTI WILLIAM TARR PAUL TOENNIGES SAMUEL ALLEN DANIEL HACHEZ 

PIETRO MENEGHESSO LORENZO & THOMASSO CARCASSI PAUL CLAUDOT GIOVANNI LEONI 

ARMANDO PICCAGLIANI GAND & BERNARDEL STEFAN KRATTENMACHER JAMES COLE 

FRATELLI SIRLETTO ALASSANDRO CICILIATTI AKOS BALAZS SAMUEL SHEN G.B. CERUTI 

PAOLO ROBERTI CHRISTIAN PEDERSEN PAUL HART CHRISTOPHER SAVINO JAY HAIDE 

ANDREW CARRUTHERS GUNTER VON AUE BARANYAI GYORGY CARLO CARLETTI WILLIAM TARR 

PAUL TOENNIGES SAMUEL ALLEN DANIEL HACHEZ PIETRO MENEGHESSO LORENZO & 

THOMASSO CARCASSI PAUL CLAUDOT GIOVANNI LEONI ARMANDO PICCAGLIANI GAND 

& BERNARDEL STEFAN KRATTENMACHER JAMES COLE FRATELLI SIRLETTO ALASSANDRO 

roBertson reCital Hall 

www.RobertsonViolins.com 

Tel 800-284-6546 | 3201 Carlisle Blvd. NE | Albuquerque, NM USA 87110 

2013 Bass ColleCtion 

partial 

Interview with 

BOB OPPELT 

Around 2006, I created a website to promote a recording 

I had recently released, called “The Double Bass,” which 

featured the bass in a variety of performance settings. 

I wanted to get the word out about the album, while at 

the same time take the opportunity to share some of the 

knowledge I had accumulated from playing in orchestras 

over 30 years. One project involved presenting what 

were, in my opinion, all the practical ways of holding the 

German bow. I used photographs with captions to show 

the pros and cons of each. That webpage turned out to 

be the most popular on the website! After I discontinued 

the website about four years later, emails kept coming in 

from people around the world asking for the information 

on the German bow page. I was trying to effectively 

furnish that to them on the side but I didn’t have an 

organized way to do it. As a result, I recently decided to 

reconstitute a smaller website, making the German bow 

grips article available on the internet once again. 

I think the German grip issue is worthy of discussion 

because there are quite a few valid approaches to holding 

the bow that are in use by very successful bassists. In 

five minutes on YouTube, you can scan the bass sections 

of the orchestras of Berlin, Vienna, and Czech Republic 

for their basic grip of all the players. I find that very 

interesting. And you’ll also catch soloists from Asia, 

Europe, Canada, and the USA who play very well, each 

with their own style of holding the bow. 

French bow players who are trying to teach the German 

bow, as well as dabbling with it themselves, can certainly 

benefit from a better understanding of how to grip it. 

There are even some who have completely discounted it 

and would rather it become a relic of the past. Well, it’s 

clear that’s not going to happen any time soon, and 

perhaps I can help stave off its demise. 

The whole argument of whether French or German bow 

is not new, of course, and not likely ever to be settled. 

But I think there’s still room for discussion of how to grip 

a bow. And it should be understood that the grip has 

implications for the entire arm function and position 

as well. For instance, there is a certain degree of bend 

at the elbow with the French bow and the arm is quite 

elevated. Some might automatically conclude that it 

should be identical for German bow. However, with the 

more supinated position of the hand for the German grip 

the arm will drop and be less bent, more extended. This 

is a key difference that often goes overlooked. As for the 

German grips, I try to make it apparent on the webpage 

that the best grip is one that is relaxed, powerful, and 

provides dexterity for all types of strokes. 

4 SPRING 2015 NEXT LEVEL BASSIST 


GET A GRIP 

GERMAN 

STYLE 

1. Two fingers on top, free thumb: A 

sense of the arm weight hanging on the 

two fingers, along with full bow weight. 

Wrist is relaxed. Works well. It's only 

as strong as the two fingers, however. 

2. Like the previous, but only the first 

finger applies the weight: A lot to ask 

of that one finger. Good in conjunction 

with the two finger grip when less bow 

pressure is needed (even less when using 

only the third finger). With a small frog, 

the third finger will rest against the lower 

inside near the ferrule and may be able 

to assist in applying weight to the string. 

3. Two fingers on top, assisted by the 

thumb on the stick: The added thumb 

stabilizes and increases hold on the stick, 

improving the ability to manipulate it in 

off-the-string (spiccato) playing. 

Not necessarily stronger than two fingers 

only, because the thumb robs some 

power from the two fingers while not 

applying much itself. There's more of 

a sense of whole-hand weight. 

4. One finger on top and thumb on top: 

The thumb applies most of the pressure 

while the first finger stabilizes. The 

second finger on the side of the stick 

adds sensory perception. 

5. Fingers on top, thumb buried under 

first finger: Produces a strong, heavy 

spiccato at the frog. This is because 

the fingers are further back toward the 

frog, moving the balance point in that 

direction, and the hold on the stick is 

very good. Most of the arm weight is 

applied by the fingers, while the thumb 

is pretty much sandwiched against the 

stick. The drawback seems to be not 

enough feel of the stick and not enough 

power over the length of the stick. 

6. Side of the thumb on top along stick, 

fingers on side (or tip of first finger on 

top): Good transfer of weight to whole 

stick. Heavy spiccato is a little weak. 

Thumb feels a little strained. 

7. Similar to (6), but the thumb is less on 

its side, more on its tip: The hand feels 

more relaxed than (6), with good overall 

stick feel. Not real powerful. 

8. Thumb on top along stick, frog deep 

in hand: Good heavy spiccato. Overall, 

it feels weak and strained because the 

wrist is forced into bending. 

9. Thumb along stick, frog very deep in 

hand, wrist very bent: Very on-the-string 

feeling, because the arm and wrist are 

totally tense. I can't recommend this. 

10. Straight thumb, bow further out in 

fingers and thumb: Bow arm is longer. 

Good direct transfer of arm weight to 

stick through thumb. However, it seems 

weak for two reasons: it's held further 

out in the fingers, and there seems 

to be little ability to apply leverage 

through pronation. 

11. Thumb wraps over stick at about 

45 degree angle, stick not completely 

deep in the hand. This provides strong 

and direct weight transfer from arm to 

thumb, along with good pronation power 

and a mostly straight wrist. Good hold 

of stick enables excellent manipulation 

for spiccato strokes. A callous should 

develop where the stick presses against 

the side of the first knuckle. This is my 

favorite and what I have adopted. 



Do you think there is any stigma towards the German bow? 

I did think the German bow was in trouble for a while! When I got into the National Symphony, I was the only 

German bow player in the section for 15 years. (Now there are three of us.) I do think the method has re-gained 

some ground, and I’m glad players seem to be more willing to try “the other”, not just play the bow their teacher 

handed them at their first lesson. I would never proclaim one grip is better. At the many auditions I have judged 

behind a screen, it was never discernable whether a player was holding a German or French bow. It seems to me if 

you are a talented musician and practice assiduously, you can make it happen with either “stick”.some ground, and 

I’m glad players seem to be more willing to try “the other”, not just play the bow their teacher handed them at their 

first lesson. I would never proclaim one grip is better. At the many auditions I have judged behind a screen, it was 

never discernable whether a player was holding a German or French bow. It seems to me if you are a talented 

musician and practice assiduously, you can make it happen with either “stick”. 

Can you talk about some of the essential tools someone needs when aspiring to be a professional bassist? 

Bass players need to know the same techniques that are taught to violinists, violists, and cellists. A good resource 

which I recommend for learning the fundamentals of bowing is Principals of Violin Playing and Teaching, by Ivan 

Galamian. There is much variety in music and whether notes are very short, very long, on or off the string, there 

should be no limitations in executing them. As a player you need a variety of bow techniques at your disposal in 

order to be a successful artist. 

Take Brahms’ First Symphony, Movement 1, Letter E, which was asked at our most recent National Symphony 

Orchestra audition. A lot of students have trouble choosing an appropriate tempo, which can also effect the 

technical execution. The danger is in being too slow. And for it to sound right, you need to “get air” (spiccato) with 

the bow for the shorter, heavier notes. One might find with a slow tempo that the spiccato doesn’t respond the way 

it should, which could feel uncomfortable and lead to forcing. A major issue for bassists seems to be that they don’t 

understand when to use spiccato, but this is certainly one passage that requires a heavy spiccato at the frog. 

E 

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Strauss requires virtuosic flare, with clarity and crispness for all the short notes. I prefer spiccato for the triplets in 

the well-known Don Juan excerpt (letter A). The bow should be held above the string for each group of six 8ths, 

thrown down into the string, and then rebound. Seems simple but if you don’t start from above the string you won’t 

get enough rebound for all of the notes. 

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A great example of an excerpt used 

to judge legato technique comes 

from Bartok’s Music for Strings, 

Percussion, and Celeste. It requires 

effective control over bow speed 

and placement, good intonation, 

regulation of the dynamics and 

vibrato, and good phrasing. It’s 

amazing to me that single-part 

excerpts can be so musically 

satisfying to play, without the full 

orchestra, as this one has a definite 

eerie quality. If you can feel that way 

it will help yours odds of succeeding 

at auditions. 

I think uniformity is very important 

in a bass section. I would tell a new 

player coming in to lay back and 

focus on blending with his/her stand 

partner. This also means paying 

attention to whether a stroke is 

off the string, at the tip, at the frog, 

matching dynamics, etc. Eventually, 

a new player learns the section’s 

performance habits, as well as 

that of the greater string section. 

How did former Music Director 

Mstislav Rostropovich influence 

your music-making within the 

National Symphony? 

Rostropovich was a great genius 

on the cello and on the podium was 

equally dynamic with his musicmaking. 

Working under him for 

13 years had a huge effect on my 

concept of musical projection - 

that it must be extremely clear and 

committed. Of course, our cello 

section was in awe of him, and 

somewhat intimidated - in a good 

way. There was care for every single 

note, nothing happened by accident, 

and the spectrum of emotions 

was huge. I pass this along to my 

students now, asking, “What is the 

musical product you are after, and 

3 

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œ œ ˙ œ œnœ# œ œ œ ˙ bœ 

bœnœbœnœbœ 

n˙ 

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ff 

can you play it a thousand times 

more convincingly?” Don’t simply 

take what comes out when you 

draw the bow, but take command 

over every millisecond of sound 

you produce. 

This concept went through the entire 

orchestra during Rostropovich’s 

tenure. It came first from the way 

he played, how he drew such an 

intense sound with the utmost 

control and emotion. It was like 

being in a masterclass every day. It’s 

3 

3 

3 

not that he was a perfect conductor, 

as there were certainly some sloppy 

moments, but you could forgive 

those things easily in light of what 

was happening musically most of 

the time. 

As a teacher, what are you looking 

to find in a student? 

Well, of course, I’m trying to sense 

if there is a realistic possibility for 

the person to have a career in music. 

I am looking for someone who 

˙ 



demonstrates musicianship, but just as important, is 

willing and able to absorb new ideas. If a student wants 

only to hear what they’ve already been told by other 

teachers then I am probably not the right person to 

instruct them. Having a new idea take hold is very 

rewarding for both the teacher and the student, and 

without that there can be no creative spark of learning. 

How does that differ from what you are looking for 

professionally, or in an audition setting? 

I think it’s important for a professional bassist, whether a 

substitute or regular, to feel comfortable with what they 

have to offer, desire to contribute, and have some fun 

in the process. They should love playing with a full and 

rich sound when required, but be able to play extremely 

quietly as well. They should strive for a high level of 

precision in everything. And as I said before, play with 

the group and enjoy it. 

The story of how I came to be a member of the 

National Symphony is kind of unusual, and it might 

support the idea that the audition process (at the NSO 

at least) is fair. My first professional audition was the 

Can you talk about how you would build right hand skills? 

Assistant Principal position in the Boston Symphony, 

which has since been occupied by Larry Wolfe. 

I was happy to have made it past the first round. My 

second audition was for a section position in the Detroit 

Symphony, which came down to me and another player. 

They took neither of us. The next one was for the 

National Symphony bass section. I was initially rejected 

for a live audition on the basis of my resume, so I sent 

some letters of recommendation from prominent figures 

in the music world. The orchestra reconsidered, allowed 

me to audition, and I was fortunate to be offered the job. 

Since then, a similar situation played out in two of our 

NSO auditions. In the most recent case, we received a 

high number of applicants (232) so had to screen the 

resumes for the most qualified individuals. Those we 

didn’t invite outright were requested to send several 

recorded excerpts from the audition list. An eventual 

winner, Alex Jacobsen, was among those asked to 

furnish a recording. The same scenario occurred with 

Dennis Roy, who later left the NSO to become a member 

of the Boston Symphony. The lesson is if you are a very 

good player, you have a chance even if your resume 

is thin. 

You need to feed the student good practicing techniques and methods. For spiccato, you might break down a 

passage, take it slower. It’s important when slowing down a spiccato passage that you try to maintain the same 

height over the string and the same speed of throw, otherwise, you’re changing the technique rather that fine-tuning 

it. There are three parts to a spiccato stroke: the drop, the hit, and the rebound. A lot of players have trouble with 

the concept of initiating a note from off the string, and it’s a very insecure feeling for them the first time they try it. 

Once they get the hang of it they realize it’s really not that difficult. 

In the case of the Trio excerpt from Beethoven 5, the 8ths should start from off the string. If necessary, play just one 

quality note, then two, then three, etc. Also, it’s a good idea when learning running passages to alter the rhythms to 

triplets or sixteenths (both slow-fast and fast-slow). When you get back to playing it as written it often seems much 

easier. That’s a brain game that really works, not only for this passage but for any fast passage. 

2 

8 

15 

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I also think a daily warm-up with scales and simple 

bowing variations is a great way to keep the bow arm 

fresh while working on intonation. I suggest staccato, 

Œ 

yourself to a real piece of music, and you don’t 

ever want an exercise mentality to creep into your 

music-making. 

Œ 

œ œœœ œ œœœ œ œœœ 

 

spiccato, ricochet, short stroke with full extension at the 

Most students need to go through a period of slow-bow 

Is it possible to teach someone to be 

tip, at the frog spiccato, and slurs. But one should also 

study to learn to control bow speed, placement, and 

musical? 

guard against wasting precious energy on too many 

tone color. This is what Galamian refers to as Son Filé. 

bowing exercises. There’s nothing better than applying 

Certainly, to some degree. We as 

It’s when a legato note is drawn first over the finger- 


SPRING 2015 NEXT LEVEL BASSIST 11 

? "long-short" duple-triple conversion 

"short-long" 

2 2 

2 2 2 

board, then toward the bridge, and 

back. (This can be reversed as well.) 

What are some right hand 

techniques that you find yourself 

reinforcing throughout your career? 

I don’t really work on the right hand, 

or really, any techniques, apart from 

making music with them. I’m mostly 

problem solving, and learning what 

to do as I go. There’s no way to just 

maintain a static level of proficiency 

as a musician - you can only try to 

go beyond where you are. I certainly 

apply due diligence in preparing to 

play the orchestra parts, and I’ll work 

on solo passages quite far in advance. 

I also like to put other challenges 

in front of me, such as playing the 

Hindemith Sonata at the Kennedy 

Center recently and learning the 

Tubin Bass Concerto. At this point 

in my career, I feel I have sufficient 

mastery over techniques so that I 

don’t ever think, “Today, I’ll work on 

spiccato.” I guess I feel more like an 

accomplished painter. Seurat would 

never have said, “Today, I’ll practice 

my pointillism”. He would get out 

the paint and start splashing (or 

dabbing) it onto the canvas. 

As a teacher, I find one of the 

challenges is to understand what I 

do and explain it to someone else. 

I’m often amazed, even perplexed, 

that I do certain complex things 

automatically and I wonder how I 

learned them. In the end, it really 

doesn’t matter, as long as I’m able 

to isolate them and show them to 

a student. 

There’s a danger in copying a 

teacher or another player. A good 

teacher will not be dogmatic but 

encourage discussion of musical 

and technical ideas. Together they 

explore what’s possible and determine 

what’s most appropriate for the 

music at hand. And as hard as 

anyone may try to copy another 

player, it’s never possible anyway. 

We all have different sized fingers, 

bone structures, instruments, 

and personalities. 

musicians are becoming more 

musical every day, and so can 

anyone. You have to build on the 

foundation that is there and lead a 

student along by showing how they 

can communicate more effectively. 

I ask myself where my musicality 

came from, and why I developed 

rapidly as a bassist. Part of the 

answer probably is how I was raised, 

grown up in a musical household and 

absorbed the musical language from 

infancy. I should also give credit again 

to Rostropovich as an influential 

musical mentor. But I do believe 

that musicianship is innate to some 

degree as well. One thing is for sure 

– unless you’re willing to do the hard 

work, you will not reach your potential. 

Tell me more about how you might 

teach a student to be musical? 

I want to stretch their imagination 

and encourage them to explore 

emotions. Important as well is a 

sense of proportion in what I might 

term “musical energy”. It’s an awareness 

of the give and take, the press 

and release of intensity that occurs 

in music, and something that we all 

mysteriously relate to. 

I like to push students way beyond 

where the music should be in terms of 

emotional content. As an experiment, 

I might have them play a passage as 

though they are completely bored, 

then maybe with enthusiasm. This 

makes them more aware of what 

they are creating, and hopefully, 

helps them find the slot they need 

to be in with a particular piece. 

A student of mine was recently 

working on the final movement of 

the Bottesini second concerto, and 

I thought he was too serious and 

literal with it. I compared the movement 

to a polka, and put us in the 

role of 19 th century ballroom guests, 

milling about and having a good 

time. The music isn’t serious, and 

you can’t afford to be daunted by 

the technical difficulties of playing 

the notes in a piece like that. It needs 

a sparkling, champagne feel to it. 

I like to challenge the student by 

taking the imagery too far, and 

leaving it up to the student to bring 

it back to the right place which 

works for him/her. 

In our sectionals and rep classes 

at UMD, I try never to say that 

something is done only one way. We 

typically experiment with changing 

bowings and fingerings and find 

together what works best. It’s not 

about simply consuming what the 

teacher says, but putting things 

to the test, discovering what is 

most effective. 

What would you prescribe for 

gathering musical ideas? 

Going to concerts, listening to 

recordings and having a good 

mentor all help. Your teacher 

should assist you in unlocking your 

imagination and emotions. This was 

one of the things Rostropovich was 

so great at. The metaphors were 

apropos to the music and conveyed 

a special way of playing a passage. 

He’d say, “Play it like your dreaded 

your mother-in-law is coming to 

visit!” Crazy things like that captured 

a certain feeling, and we all got it. 

(Even those who were not married.) 

It’s important to stretch the imagination 

and get better acquainted with 

the emotions that we all experience. 

At the same time, become skilled 

with every conceivable left and right 

hand technique. Finally, listen well, 

not just at concerts, but to yourself 

in the practice room. ■

Once upon a time, there were three choices in 

bass strings: gut, Pirastro Flexocor, or Thomastik 

Spirocore. If you specialized in a certain genre of 

music (broadly, jazz or classical) these weren’t 

so much 3 equal options as one choice based on 

your chosen style. Flash forward to the modern 

day, and bassists are inundated with dozens of 

choices from companies ranging from industry 

titans to artisanal upstarts. How does one set cut 

through the noise? 

Pirastro’s newest offering for the double bass, 

the Flexocor Deluxe, is the German-based 

company’s attempt to improve on an orchestral 

bass playing mainstay, the Original Flexocor. 

Much has been written about a string’s 

performance depending on the bass, but as 

these strings spread throughout the country 

and the world, we have seen them on an ever 

expanding variety of basses. Though striking a 

balance between the high tension of the Original 

and the smoother feel of Thomastik’s Bel Canto, 

the Deluxe does not compromise on power and 

edge. A new set of these strings produces a loud 

and powerful sound rich in mid-range overtones. 

On one reviewer’s bass, an open C string caused 

the bass to resonate with a C Major chord, complete 

with the third. 

There are two things that the Deluxe does 

extremely well - articulation and a variety of tone 

colors. With the ability to sink the bow in, 

these strings can bite and bark savagely, or pop 

stylishly with less effort and fewer accidental 

stuck bow issues than the Original series. An 

advanced player will find dozens of nuanced 

shadings at his or her disposal under the bow, 

with a large dynamic range and the ability to 

play from mellow and covered to very bright 

and penetrating. The Deluxe pizzicato concept 

is towards the booming and short sustain of 

most orchestral strings, and on the right bass the 

sound is right at home in a great orchestra. It is 

possible the selection on offer will not appeal 

to all players, and less experienced bassists could 

find the dizzying array of tone colors to be a 

disadvantage when compared to the relative 

stability of the sound of Bel Cantos. If you happen 

to prefer the Bel Canto sound and playability, 

Pirastro’s Passione set is a great option that has 

the added benefit of helping tight basses to 

speak more freely. 

The Deluxe can be a powerful tool in the 

hands of a skilled craftsman, but in our opinion 

it is helpful to have experimented with some 

comparable sets to form the best perspective. 

The Original Flexocor, Bel Canto, and Kaplan all 

share some characteristics with this new set, but 

once again, Pirastro has brought forth something 

that feels good under the fingers and projects 

well in a large room. 

Art 

Bow 

of the 

Hans Sturm 



Next Level Journals is made possible in part by Robertson and Sons Violin Shop 

You created an extremely elaborate and comprehensive DVD 

with Francois Rabbath almost 10 years ago. The Art of the Bow 

not only pushes the boundaries of the educational DVD genre, 

but it pushes the limits of DVD technology. Can you describe 

the origin of this project? 

I became aware of François Rabbath and his “Nouvelle Technique de 

la Contrabasse” relatively early on because of my long-time interest in 

pedagogy. The first volume came out in 1977 and I was in high school 

at the time. But by the time the third volume came out in 1984 I had 

attended the International Society of Bassists Convention in Evanston, 

read the reviews, and I purchased all three volumes and went through 

them on my own. I was motivated to study with Rabbath years later 

after hearing Sandor Ostlund, a former student, play the Fourth Bach 

Cello Suite as part of “Suite Week” at the ISB Convention at the 

University of Iowa. Sandor was studying with Paul Ellison and had 

just returned from several months of studying with Rabbath. He 

encouraged me to contact him, but I was very intimidated to just 

call him – so I started with small steps. 

First, I flew to Houston and met with Paul Ellison, Rabbath’s first 

student. Then I sought out George Vance and applied to study at 

the Rabbath International Institute in Washington DC as a student. 

George knew I was the professor at Ball State University at the time 

(I was using the teal blue paper versions of his Progressive Repertoire 

Methods) and offered to have me attend as a guest teacher, but I 

wanted to experience the act of studying with Rabbath personally. As 

a result of our interactions, Rabbath invited me to come study in Paris 

with him. For years I made twice-annual trips to study with François. 

The genesis of The Art of the Bow project happened while I was 

working through the third volume of Rabbath’s bass method with him. 

When you look at a page of sheet music edited for the bass, you are 

frequently given information beyond simply the notes on the page. 

Below the staff, you often have the string indications with Roman 

numerals, or sometimes with the letters of the string you’re being 

asked to use, and the number of the finger appears above the staff. 

From these markings you can begin to gain a sense of the gymnastics 

that your left hand is being asked to do just by looking at the page. 

However, one of Rabbath’s innovations at the very beginning of his 

third volume is a three-page foldout list of bowing variations, two 

hundred or so patterns, for use with the vast scale and arpeggio 

section. The problem for me is that there is a kind of disconnect 

between the notations of bowings and the sounds you are being 

expected to produce. There’s no way of knowing what each symbol 

is to supposed to sound like from a paper score - how do you execute 

a slur with dots or lines under it in the physical world, based on 

notation or even description alone? Even after a few years of working 

with Rabbath, I still wasn’t always sure what was expected by looking 

at the score. 

The one thing I say often about Francois’s bow arm is that it must be 

made of rubber. What he can do is so fluid and relaxed and amazing 

– any sound, any technique is effortless. When I was in a lesson with 

him, I was often overflowing with questions about the subtleties of 

how my arm should move and the qualities of the resulting sound. 

One day Rabbath shared with me that his fear was being unable to 

pass his bow arm along to future generations as he had his left hand 

approach. At the time I remember joking about cloning his arm, but 

his comment had made a lasting impression. I was on the plane to 

head home, but we wound up being stuck on the runway for a rather 

long time due to a delay. I asked for something to read during the 

delay and I was handed an old golf magazine that happened to feature 

an article about Tiger Woods. The article was about the development 

of a new video game and they showed several photographs - Tiger on 

the golf course and Tiger in a skintight suit with reflective markers and 

high-speed cameras all around him. An image taken from the new 

game showed how Tiger Woods’ actual swing had been recorded by 

the cameras and became a part of the game. At that moment I had an 

epiphany. I felt sure that it would be possible to adapt this technology, 

here used to transcribe a golf swing, and apply it to the motion of the 

bow arm. Once I got back to Ball State University I immediately made 

a cold call to the Human Performance Laboratory. They explained 

that the Lab had mainly been involved in walking studies, weightlifting 

and geriatrics, but they were interested enough to keep the 

dialog going. 

I brought my bass into the Lab and we started to flesh out a strategy 

for how bow strokes might be recorded and created a demo. The next 

time I went back to Paris, I approached Francois about the possibility 

of embarking on this journey. It’s important to understand that 

Francois is very interested in gadgets. He has always had the top of the 

line phone, and travels with two computers, so this sort of project was 

intriguing to him. His initial reaction to my rough footage was 

‘Why your bow arm move like that? Yes we must do this so we can 

fix it for you!’ I managed to get a grant to bring him to Ball State and, 

after five years of work, we completed the animation and the DVD. 

Fifteen years ago there were more technical challenges than there are 

today to produce something like The Art of the Bow. Three high-speed 

cameras are needed to ‘see’ each reflective marker in order to create 

a 3D image. At the time, we were capturing motion at approximately 

100 frames per second (normal cameras work at about 29 frames 

per second) with approximately twenty cameras hanging from a 

scaffolding surrounding Rabbath. For anyone who has worked with 

video, you can imagine the enormous amount of data. Imagine not 

just one camera but twenty cameras using 3 times the normal speed. 

It took an immense amount of storage just to house the raw footage 

for the DVD! The disc itself is a dual layer DVD to allow for all of the 

material we wanted to share. 

At that time, we were primarily interested in capturing the subtleties 

of motion, and we soon realized there wasn’t a way to capture audio 

simultaneously. Because the cameras were designed for motion 

capture only, we couldn’t find a way to sync audio with the high-speed 

video because the video frame rate was so high. The result is a silent 

motion study – Rabbath’s body and arms are depicted by colored 

dowels and you can clearly see the motion of the arm from many 

different perspectives. The power of these animations is that they 

present multiple perspectives on Rabbath’s back, left arm, wrist, and 

finger motions - several that would be impossible to see outside of a 

virtual world, such as being able to looking through Rabbath’s back 

as if it were glass and still observe the motion of the bow. 

One of the sections in The Art of the Bow DVD that I am particularly 

proud of is the lecture-demonstration area. We shot these segments 

with four cameras simultaneously and, after months of editing, were 

successful in stacking them to create user-selectable camera angles. 

This means as you watch the lecture-demonstration of a particular 

stroke, you can press one of the buttons on your remote control that 

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you never touch, the ‘change angle’ button. The DVD will change 

from one camera angle to another, so you can investigate Rabbath’s 

bow arm with audio from four different camera angles. So, while the 

biomechanics animations are silent, you have an additional area with 

audio and explanation and have the ability to choose from four angles. 

An additional feature for any of the strokes (we go through the seven 

families of bow strokes and multiple variations within each family) is 

the ability to set A and B repeat points. For instance, you can choose 

an angle, place your video screen next to a mirror, and check your 

physical motion against Francois Rabbath’s! 

In addition to biomechanics animations and lecture demonstrations, 

The Art of the Bow DVD features several live performances, 

instructions on how to teach a beginner, and interviews. The live 

performances were shot in France, one featuring a chamber orchestra 

conducted by Frank Proto. There’s a segment where Francois teaches 

one of the biomechanics engineers, who had no prior experience, how 

to play a basic detaché stroke. The interviews cover a range of topics. 

He talks about performance adrenaline, how to teach, and shares all 

kinds of philosophies about the bass, bow, teaching and performing. 

The total running time with all the angle variations comes out between 

3.5 and 4 hours. 

One of the interesting things Francois says in the DVD is that he does 

not let his beginning students play with the bow outside of lessons 

until they can make the proper motion. This originated when he 

accepted the son of a well-respected conductor as a student. François 

wanted to see how far he could go with this young man, and set a goal 

for him to play the Prelude to Bach’s First Cello Suite after only a year 

of lessons, with a correct bow motion. This philosophy runs parallel 

to the Suzuki tradition. One of the Suzuki ideas is that you don’t take 

the instrument home until you learn how to tune it. The idea being, 

you should always have the template of what sounds good. If the 

instrument goes out of the tune and you don’t know how to tune it 

correctly, you’ll be fingering the notes but the sounds you’ll be hearing 

will not be correct (or you’ll wind up making an inappropriate motion 

to find the pitch). I feel that at the present time the best example of 

this teaching method for the double bass is the Progressive Repertoire 

series by George Vance, who studied with Shinichi Suzuki in Japan 

and married the Rabbath technique and Suzuki training philosophy. 

Students move from piece to piece, starting with something as simple 

as a single harmonic at a very comfortable place and develop all 

the way through the first movement of the Dragonetti (Nanny) 

Bass Concerto. 

What are the skills that are necessary to be 

a successful bassist? 

To be a successful player means to play without impediment, to play 

freely, to have a perfect alignment of artistic imagination, physical 

movement, and range of technique. You must have a vast buffet of 

tools to choose from. The determining factor is how you want the 

music to sound. Your choice of shifts, string-crossings, bowings, 

vibrato - everything must be in alignment with this goal. My primary 

focus is “interpretive intention.” If I were to add another ‘i’ to the 

two, it would be “inspired interpretive intention.” The goal is to have 

the freedom to play in an inspired way exactly what you intend to, 

as François might say, to “communicate with the public.” 

To create such a vast buffet or vocabulary, you must challenge yourself 

to try new ideas to extend your technique. For instance, you need to 

practice scales with one finger. Play an A Phrygian scale with your 

first finger up the G string. Why would anyone want to do that? Well, 

play an F Major scale now, in thirds, and your first finger will play an 

A Phrygian scale because your second finger will be on F, fourth on G, 

etc. If you can imagine a way to practice or play a passage – try it, 

don’t dismiss it because you have a second thought that it might be 

ridiculous. You have imagined this for a reason and you don’t know 

where this thought and the experience of working with this idea might 

take you. 

The reason we study technique in isolation 

and work on a concept level is so we have a 

choice of fingerings and bow techniques to 

be able to apply techniques freely based on 

the sound we are trying to create. The sound 

will be different if you play across two strings 

or if you play the same passage on one string. 

You can make the D string sound somewhat 

similar to the G string if you drop your bow 

and you know how to manipulate the tone, 

but you may want to have what you’re playing 

on one string – to have a more lyrical sound, 

for instance. Perhaps you want a vocal character, 

like the beginning of the Bloch Prayer, 

for instance, which prompts you to play only 

on the D string. Then, when you go over to 

the G string, the sound becomes brighter 

and more dramatic. Where you decide to go 

to the G string is important. It’s part of the 

musical landscape. In order to play only on 

the D string, you need to consider the pivot 

technique so that you don’t shift between 

two notes under a slur – unless you intend 

it. If you shift under a slur, you’ll get what I 

refer to as an “ooyat,” a slide sound. You can 

work to hide that with different techniques, 

take the weight from the bow if you want, but 

it’s much better to play with a fingering that 

doesn’t force compromises and aligns with the 

bow changes. The point is – to play what you 

actually want, your interpretive intention – do 

not make a sound on the bass that you do not 

intend. When you are choosing the fingering 

you will use, it’s married to the bowing, which 

ultimately means the bowing needs to come 

first. The bow is creating the sound, it is 

your voice, and the fingering is subservient. 

You can choose to use a pivot to make a 

clean sound, or you can choose to insert a 

portamento (slide) between two notes if the 

music calls for it, as in a more Romantic work 

by Bottesini or Koussevitzky. Everything is 

possible – but what do you intend? 

As François would say, “The more choices 

you have, the richer you are.” If you only have 

one way to play, you are limited. If you’re a 

master of that one way, it might not seem like 

a big deal, but our job as artists is to draw 

on an infinite number of ideas. I want my 

students to have access to a wide variety of 

technical solutions and an understanding of 

their function and ramifications. We study 

and practice scales and arpeggios using 

techniques like the pivot, the crab, and using 

the thumb below the octave harmonic, 

combined with Rabbath and Sevcik bowing 

variations, so that when any musical moment 

is presented, we can choose from the buffet to 

create the flavors we want. I have found that 

when you give a student the possibility 

to engage in this process (rather than force 

feeding them fingerings and bowings), they 

will frequently come up with innovative 

solutions to the musical and technical 

challenges of a piece - solutions that make 

sense and cultivate a sound that is unique to 

them. To me, that’s the most effective way 

to empower a student to create and convey 

the interpretation of music. 

The old model of teaching was that a teacher 

would fill a student up with knowledge. If 

that were true, then the best a student could 

hope for was to become a copy of the teacher. 

This unfortunately still happens all too often, 

with teachers who prescribe fingerings for 

every scale. Always beginning a scale on the 

root fails to take into account the majority 

of musical situations, where scalar passages 

begin and end on another scale degree. When 

a bass student understands what I call the 

‘tetrachord fingering’ (the Simandl concept 

of one hand position occupying a whole step 

on one string), and pivots (which expand that 

position to various sizes depending on the 

location on the neck), a player can decide to 

structure a scale passage fingering by mixing 

the two approaches together based on the 

musical situation. If you give a student the 

means to understand these different systems, 

they will make unique decisions without 

duplicating someone else’s personal decisions. 

You’ll hear a violinist every now and then cite 

their lineage and talk about how they use the 

same fingering as a historical violinist. Even 

Joachim had to make some kind of decision 

based on his instrument, the prevailing 

style of the time, and his own body. It’s 

very important to have a personal, core 

understanding – why are you playing this 

passage in this way? 

Fingerings are objective, and can be 

written down and recorded, but for 

the most part recording a bowing only 

documents the direction the bow is 

moving, and not the nuance of sound. 

Besides The Art of the Bow, how can 

these decisions be taught to students? 

This is a very big, very challenging question. 

Francois Rabbath says “The bow is your 

arm,” and he’s right. The bow is how you sing 

something, and it’s why we have so many 

versions of pieces. In the case of the Bach 

Cello Suites, we have a tremendous number 

of editions with the same pitches and rhythms 

- the distinguishing factor is the bowings, 

because each musician approaches the music 

differently. The way the music is sung and 

presented is deeply personal. Even using the 

same fingerings and bowings, two players 

will still sound very different. There are 

infinite variables - elements such as vibrato, 

dynamics, and the elusive rubato, each make 

an enormous impact on how a performance 

is perceived. 

When a student approaches a new piece 

of music, I start with asking the biggest 

philosophical question on the planet: How do 

we know what we know? Of the 5 senses we 

use to experience the world, we use 3 in music 

making: visual, aural, and tactile. To begin, 

I don’t like focusing on the visual except at 

first, as the aural and the tactile senses are 

central to music making. Our memory is like 

a super wide tape, and it captures everything 

simultaneously from all of our senses. 

Something as subtle as the smell of a dish 

can conjure a vivid memory. When you 

are preparing a piece, I believe you should 

envision it like preparing a gourmet 4-course 

meal. You start looking at the music with your 

eyes, listening to what you are playing, and 

assessing the sensations as you play. Take care. 

Take time. Your initial experience will 

influence your whole time with the piece – 

as Jeff Bradetich likes to say, “First in the 

computer, first out.” 

The most effective way to learn a new piece, 

from my perspective, is to go listen to the 

piece. Don’t watch a performance on Youtube, 

but listen only - to a recording, get multiple 

versions by established masters, and try to 

understand the piece by hearing alone. Learn 

and understand it to the point where you 

could sing it, where you know what each pitch 

and rhythm should be. Then go back, look at 

the score, and listen again. You can hear when 

the musician deviates from the score in some 

way, and make an assessment of why they 

made that decision. You can begin to develop 

ideas based on what suits your taste, and work 

out, based on the bowings, what the fingerings 

should be. If you don’t know the composer, 

read about him or her. Try to understand 

more about the composer, the work, the 

context. If you go through this process, 

you will be creating a unique informed 

performance because the variables are all 

internal, personal. 



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Each person brings a different understanding to a work based on 

personal experience and imagination. Finally, once you have a 

template for the piece in mind, you can begin to practice the music by 

going to the places you know will be challenging and working them 

out. Go back and listen again. What is the sound the performer is 

using for this phrase? How did they achieve that sound? Engage in 

the feedback loop – listen, feel, record yourself and listen back. Your 

interpretation will then begin to evolve. And, most importantly, you 

will have avoided the process most students use, which is to begin at 

the upper left hand corner of the page and bulldoze until you make a 

mistake and then restart from the beginning. 

That sort of preparation creates a result where 

the doorknob is very shiny but the back of the 

house doesn’t exist - the music is developed 

more highly at the start of the piece than what 

follows. Listening is extremely important to 

understanding the shape and trajectory of 

the music. 

When you apply this kind of teaching to 

learning bow strokes, you must engage both 

the visual and aural senses. I don’t think 

it’s possible to get around modeling these 

concepts for the student. Having a live 

representation or at least a video resource 

will help reinforce the techniques over a long 

period of time. I wanted The Art of the Bow 

to present as many different angles as possible 

to simulate the real-life flexibility of a lesson 

and create a reusable reference. When you 

have a 60 minute lesson, you’re still only 

seeing these techniques demonstrated on one 

day, and there’s a lot of subtlety going on that 

you could miss in that short span of time. I 

like to think that as a teacher I’m very clear in 

articulating what I’m trying to share with a student (my students may 

not always agree), but different ways of explaining things, different 

analogies, resonate differently with each student. You need a variety 

of ways to convey a concept, because even describing the way it works 

for you might not be what the student needs to think about in order 

to execute the same idea. Barry Green uses both photographs and 

pen-and-ink drawings to demonstrate 3D information in a 2D space 

in his Advanced Techniques of Double Bass Playing. You can also see 

this in the Gerhard Mantel’s Cello Technique: Principles and Forms of 

Movement. Any two-dimensional way of sharing is visual, and yet 

any acquisition of musical concepts takes place in the physical and 

aural realm. Of those three senses, the visual is the least effective in 

determining ‘how it goes,’ or ‘how it sounds.’ The dream is to have 

a way to know what it’s like to be inside a great artist’s body - to be 

inside Gary Karr’s body as he plays the Koussevitzky, for example. It’s 

science fiction and of course we can’t do this. We can hear the sound, 

but we need to arrive at our own internal understanding of how to get 

that sound using our tools and our physical beings. 

Interpretation in classical music is a dance between you and the 

composer, and in jazz it’s a dance between you and your own 

imagination. The way we hear music in our minds and the way it 

comes out in reality are two different things (never mind how it is 

perceived by an audience). We will never succeed in playing exactly 

what we want, which is the ultimate goal, but we seek to transmit 

the sounds, to communicate, without any obstacles. We can develop 

historical perspectives on what musicians may have sounded like at 

various periods in history by relying on texts like Joachim Quantz’ 

On Playing the Flute and developing our knowledge of vibrato and 

bow speed. We can listen to musicians who have studied HIP 

(historically informed practice, such as at an ISB Convention), who 

have experience playing on older instruments, and interpolate their 

sound concepts into our own. When you’re the soloist, you’re the 

chef - it’s different when you are in a bass section and your job is to 

match the sound the conductor wants with the 

bowing the principal wants, while blending 

with the entire section. In the process, you’re 

still making musical decisions of embracing 

or rejecting certain ideas to get the sound you 

want in that moment. 

Can you discuss the elementary principles 

of tone production? 

Very simply, there are three variables in tone 

production that control how you sound on a 

given note: weight, speed and location. Each of 

these components is intertwined, but each one 

has a primary function. Location, where you 

put the bow, is the first determinant for tone. 

The closer the bow moves to the bridge, the 

more you engage the upper partials, and the 

brighter the sound. For each location, there 

is a combination of weight and speed. Weight 

is the first determinant for dynamics. Greater 

weight leads to a bigger sound because the 

amplitude of the string will be wider, and will 

create a more robust sound. Speed has to do 

with the concentration of the sound. The more 

speed you apply, the more air is injected into the sound. With less 

speed, the sound becomes denser. At each location there is a balance 

of weight and speed. The idea is that you should experiment with 

these at length. An analogy is I use frequently is “What color is grey?” 

You have discreet black and white end points, but there are an infinite 

number of gradations of grey between them. For any given note, you’ll 

have a fairly narrow range of acceptable locations to get the best tone, 

and a nearly infinite number of shadings achievable by manipulating 

the speed and weight of the bow. It’s the balance of all three 

components that determines the character of the sound. 

Thus in the right hand you have location, weight, and speed; for the 

left hand you have movement, space and time. When we speak and 

converse, we’re improvising all the time and applying nouns, verbs, 

and other elements of speech without conscious thought. Your bow 

strokes will achieve that level of fluidity if you take the time to 

experiment and internalize them. When you find a place where 

you want a sound you’ve created in the past, you can drop that into the 

piece at the appropriate moment. You move closer to speaking a language, 

and the piece becomes fresh - almost as though it was written 

yesterday - and you share it while subconsciously employing all the 

techniques that you have assimilated. 

DaXun Zhang has a terrific analogy for understanding the importance 



of emphasis and how it changes meaning. 

Take the phrase “I like my dog” as an example: 

I like my dog - I like my dog but you don’t. 

I like my dog - I like my dog but don’t love it. 

I like my dog - I like my dog but not yours. 

I like my dog - I like my dog but not my cat. 

If we fail to apply this subtlety to the music 

we make, we’re reduced to a sort of data-entry 

task, playing notes but not directing them 

towards meaning, towards intention. In order 

to be able to reach this higher level, we have 

to spend a significant amount of our practice 

time experimenting to learn what is possible 

and what we like to produce with our 

instruments. Heifetz talked about taking a 

year to learn a piece of music. He explained 

that he would have the fingerings and 

bowings mapped out in complete detail; the 

exploration, the interpretation took place on 

stage by playing the piece. He was discovering 

the music and meaning within the piece without 

the hindrance of technical difficulty, and I 

believe that is what we all should aim for. 

I don’t have an issue if someone plays a piece 

for me and the interpretation is not to my 

taste. In an audition setting, a candidate 

with great tone, pitch, and sound may have a 

concept the committee doesn’t agree with. In 

that case, by asking for something different, 

the player has an opportunity to demonstrate 

flexibility in the music-making, a quality you 

really want from someone in your section. 

The conductor on a given week might ask 

something that is completely the opposite 

of the players’ instincts, so it falls to the 

individual players to give that interpretation 

their all, that hint of nutmeg that elevates the 

dish to a special level. It might not be to their 

personal taste, but in this case the music 

making is communal, we’re all coming 

together in a shared vision. 

Talk a bit about teaching 

The process of learning continues throughout 

one’s career. I am always striving to use 

old techniques in new ways, finding effective 

ways to share ideas, and discovering how 

each student learns and how best to help 

them. I learn something from every interaction 

and often find things to help my own 

playing. Having to explain the subtle details 

of a concept requires thinking it through, and 

finding a way to discuss it often leads to new 

discovery. Music is intangible and sometimes 

it is difficult to put abstract concepts into 

words. Every person I’ve ever worked with 

has had a different temperament, and you 

learn which students need to be leaned on 

to get more out of them, which students are 

hungry and grasping all the time - these are 

skills that take time to develop. As an example, 

you can talk about the motion of vibrato 

for weeks before you say one seemingly small 

thing and your student lights up. They’ll ask 

“Why didn’t you say that in the first place?!” 

but you are excited to have bypassed another 

week of frustration and discovered the key 

to their comprehension. There are incredible 

facets to teaching and a lot of high moments. 

At times it is important to go beyond sharing 

only the information a student needs to solve 

their particular problem. For example, with 

Music Education students I will address their 

technical and musical issues, but I will pause 

to explain other solutions and variables I 

have come across in the hopes that they will 

be able use them when they identify a similar 

problem in teaching others. For performers, 

even when they are executing something at 

a high level, I will give them an additional 

option so they can understand the branching 

possibilities and decision making that comes 

up in a career of playing music. When I see 

someone have a big success, there’s a big buzz 

for me. Those “aha” moments where the 

student gets it, those are very satisfying! 

Closing thoughts? 

For the bow, you want the possibility of 

making all different sounds. We must strive 

to have the ultimate flexibility of our fingers, 

wrist, and thumb. We need awareness of the 

hinges in our elbows and shoulders. We need 

to understand how the body needs to dance 

to create the sound we desire in every moment 

of the piece, our interpretive intention. ■ 

www.RobertsonViolins.com 

Tel 800-284-6546 | 3201 Carlisle Blvd. NE | Albuquerque, NM USA 87110

Next Level Bassist SPRING 2015

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