Intonation....

[Bilbo]

I have been cleaning and, to a limited extent, purging my music room and, whilst I was doing it, made the mistake of listening to some old live recordings I have done with all sorts of bands (they were on cassettes; that's how old they were) and the one thing that kept screaming at me throughout, apart from the shocking timing in the early days, was 'intonation's out, intonation's out)'. I then went to the Great Jaco lines thread and briefly listened to some old Jaco and thought 'his intonation is spot on throughout'.

The $64,000 question is; how do I get my intonation to be that accurate. Mine isn't a million miles off now but it is not as impeccable as JFP III's. I am hoping my new in ear monitoring system will help. What do others do to ensure that their intonation is up to par when they are playing live?

PS I could also start a thread on 'testosterone and tempo'....

[jakenewmanbass]

Are we talking fretless or DB?
But in any case the first and most important thing is you need to be able to hear yourself...!

Edited March 5, 2012 by jakenewmanbass

[Bilbo]

Both, I guess. Where double bass was concerned, I knew that hearing my self properly was an issue (I can hear when I am playing but it is less clear what note it is and whether it is in tune) which prompted the IEM purchase but this revisiting of old stuff has made me realise that intonation of my electric playing is equally suspect. I actually think, on reflection, that one of the issues may be intention. You (Jake) mentioned once about playing what you hear and singing your solos in order to make the link between your ideas and their execution. The wrong thing to do is to let you fingers 'play' themselves i.e. singing what you are playing rather than playing what you are singing. Projecting this concept into the intonation debate, I am wondering how much of my intonation problem is a kind of built in latency between my ideas and their execution. I 'hear' a phrase or note (say a sixth) and my fingers dither over whether it is a natural or flattened sixth. This split second of indecision results in a subconscious 'miss'; a note that is marginally too sharp or flat, depending on the line. Not enough to be caught on the fly, particularly in a live situation, but, during playback, when my 'miss' rate is one in three or four or five, it all starts to fall apart.....

Its certainly less of an issue when I am playing lines, walking or ostinatos. It is when I am improvising.

[jakenewmanbass]

At the point at which your parameters of analysis are sufficiently honed you may (I did) experience a coming together of your technical facility (practice is at the heart of that), and better intonation, in my experience, is something that emanated from that. In the first place I have pretty good ears, that helps enormously, then physical strength for the job in hand (not brute, but efficiency and finesse) plays a helpful part.
Understanding the qualities of individual semi tones is something I find very useful on DB for tuning, both in isolation, eg 2 octave chromatic scales on each string, and in context, eg playing through a sequence such as II V I and paying particular attention to the 3rd and 7th resolutions for semitone accuracy.
Then the same with modulating sequences to use semitone movement in 'making' the changes with guide tones. For me literally handling the guide tones is really good ear training for intonation as the sound and quality, nay the very existence of the chord relies on your accuracy. I would liken it to tenor and alto singers handling the guide tones, because in close harmony if the 3rd and 7th are out of tune the listener struggles to pin the movement, so not only does it being out of tune become painful, but also the music becomes nebulous and ill defined.

Edited March 5, 2012 by jakenewmanbass

[LastBass]

I know the issue is about hearing yourself in a live situation, but can I borrow this thread to run some thoughts past you much more experienced players?

I'm fairly new to fretless (unlined, but the usual side dots) electric bass, but have some cello experience and know that intonation problems will get better with work. So I've been working very hard on the interval exercises in Steve Bailey's fretless bass book, all over the neck, not worrying about speed or even rhythm, but making sure I say the name of each note. Scales in the same way, naming each note out loud. Really concentrating and not letting myself get away with sour notes or intervals. Basically how my cello teacher taught me. Just starting too on the early pages of Ray Brown's DB method (adapting l.h. fingering to one fret per finger), and also trying consciously to read the notes on the page as I play them and say them out loud.
I'm making quite pleasing progress, and also finding that when I sight read eg Bach cello pieces that I'm familiar with, in the sense that I know what the next note will sound like but not quite sure yet where it'll be on the bass, my intonation is a lot better than when I'm playing pieces from memory or "improvising" (aka noodling or wasting time!) Also that playing with more treble in the tone than I'd really like shows up sour intonation better, esp on the lower strings.

How does this approach strike you? Any comments, hints, tips much appreciated. Sort of simple level though - Jake, I understand what you're saying, but I'm not at that level yet. Though I am finding the truth of the notion that eg an F# in a G major scale is different going up to what it is coming down.

Many thanks

Geoff