Thumb position.....

[Bilbo]

I just need some reassurance on thumb position playing. I was watching John Patitucci play on a dvd (w. Horacio Hernandez) and his thumb postion playing looked effortless. I assume the searing pain in the side of my thumb which I experience when I use this technique will pass as the famous callouses develop?

Has anyone noticed that Paul Chambers never played above thumb position?

[thisnameistaken]

Yeah it makes my thumb hurt too. I think this is normal.

Or we're pressing too hard.

[Faithless]

I've got came to this 'Thumb Position' issue a few nights ago..

Guess I'll need to check some Youtube tutors' stuff..

[Hector]

I don't profess to be the font of all knowledge, especially compared to such distinguished gents and ladies as Jake, the Major and Jennifer, but I've been paying my dues in the practice room really intensively during the last month so I thought I'd share some advice/encouragement. I'm sure one of them will tip up to correct me/give much better advice than I can in due course.

1. As far as callouses are concerned, take it easy! A little bit of practice each day will be, in my opinion and experience, much better for developing a bullet-proof thumb than a big session that decimates your thumb and leaves you unable to practice for a few days.

2. Keep your elbow up - dropping it will cause an awkward angle in your wrist and make stopping notes much harder than it ought to be. Also, this will help you use the weight of your arm more, rather than pushing with your fingers/hand (which will impede agility and cause pain). Better to take some of the strain in a powerful muscle group like the shoulder than in the delicate muscles of your hand.

3. Don't straighten your fingers, rather keep them curled and relaxed, playing on the tips. This will cause you to approach the string like this: -->/ rather than like this: -->|. A perpendicular approach is much better at transferring the force of your fingers onto the string, making notes easier to stop.

4. Supportive fingering is quite important. When you cross strings, your thumb (and any other fingers closer to the nut than your fretting finger) should be there to press the string down. Another useful tip is to tilt the bass slightly into your body, so as to use some of the instrument's weight to help you stop notes.

5. Don't be afraid! A lot of people get all wound up about the thumb position, but it's no harder than playing in 1st or half position, just different. So long as you stick to the cardinal rules of not settling for being out of tune and using the right technique. Thumb position isn't a big deal.

6. Watch the pros. There's a lot to be learnt by keeping a beady eye on their left hand. For some really inspiring stuff, I recommend [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXt6htVi3C4&feature=fvst"]Renaud Garcia- Fons[/url] (intimidating, but he does have a super low action, which helps!), [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ono-jJPGCs"]Marco Panascia[/url] (and [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxnurDFZCgQ&feature=related"]here[/url] for a better view) and of course my main man, [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGfGF3o5rAI"]Christian McBride[/url].

As for exercises, playing a Bb major scale with the left hand in chromatic position and going across the strings is good, as you can use the harmonics to check tuning. Also try vomits for ability to shift into and out of thumb position. If you want some Etudes, try Petracchi's "Simplified Higher Technique". You can also transpose anything up an octave and work on that.

Take home point: don't fight the instrument, with the right technique you should be able to work with it. A bit of patience and some elbow grease in the woodshed, and you'll be playing soaring melodic lines in no time, especially with that formidable harmonic knowledge of yours Bilbo!

I hope you don't think this post is presumptuous/ rude, just trying to share my (fairly limited) knowledge with a fellow DBer. Feel free to tell me to p**s off!

p.s. One more thing - about PC not playing above thumb position: although traditionally you play thumb position from the octave upwards, it's the technique that is the thumb position rather than the place on the neck. It's quite normal/possible to play thumb position below the octave (although not too far below) and in some cases this makes particular passages easier to execute. There's an example of McBride doing this on a nice bluesy lick in the Superbass video I linked to.

Edited April 6, 2010 by Hector

[Damo200]

Yep, buy the Petracchi. Its medieval, but will sort out your core finger strength in thumb. Take it slowly though (particularly exercise 4!)

A good german bow also helps :brow:

[OutToPlayJazz]

Hector made some very good points on this in the post above.

In addition, you very rarely use the thumb for an actual stopped note, so you don't need to press it down most of the time. Thumb position is usually used for maintaining the hand shape (usually the thumb will sit about an inch behind the index finger and that distance will be maintained as you move the hand around).

One good practise item is the bass solo from the start of the slow movement of Mahler I. You'll find it in "Double Bass Solo 2." You can touch the thumb on the harmonics where the octave is and use it to play the harmonic D & A octaves.

The best advice I've heard on this thread so far is that of keeping the elbow up. Nothing maintains hand shape and intonation like keeping the elbow up when you're playing either cello or double bass.

Rich.

[Major-Minor]

[quote name='Damo200' post='804770' date='Apr 13 2010, 12:28 PM']A good german bow also helps[/quote]
I could say "There's no such thing as a good german bow!" but that would be rude and uncalled for. Each to his own i say (but French is better ! - sorry I didn't mean that to slip out).

My first ever bass lesson was on the thumb position.
My Dad had just bought me my first bass - I was 15. We were in Skelhorn's string instrument repair workshop (near Manchester) one day and met a guy called Charlie Hamer who was Principal bass in one of the big US orchs (New York Phil?) but was actually from Manchester originally and was over visiting his relatives.

He offered to give me a lesson. It turned out that his technique was very individual and unique. He tuned GDGD and used the thumb all the time even in the lowest positions. Well, in an hour or so i tried to take all this in - I think he hoped I might champion his methods over here - but of course it was impossible for me to continue in this way without his ongoing supervision.
But it was an interesting insight into what can be done with the thumb. Mind you , he had particularly big hands.

Hector pretty much sums up everything I would have said about learning thumb position. But, Hector, what does this mean ?:
"Also try vomits for ability to shift into and out of thumb position."

The Major

[fatback]

[quote]Also try vomits for ability to shift into and out of thumb position.[/quote]

Was wondering about this myself.

I was pretty apprehensive about taking up db before. Now I'm really nervous...

[Hector]

Sorry to have to inflict the pain on you - it's a bit like seeing that tape in the ring.....

Ok, so vomits are a specific exercise that my first teacher showed me. Gary Karr is well known for advocating them, and I'll try my best to explain. What you do is set your metronome at 60bpm and play an Ab major scale starting in half position on the G string. With your first finger, sliding between each note with the finger pressed firmly down, play Ab then slide up to Bb in one bow. Then on the next bow, play Bb and slide back down to Ab. Now slide from Ab up to C on one bow, then from C back down to Ab on the next bow. Do this for the entire scale, making sure to slide on just the first finger, and one bow per shift (If you're a total badass, keep going and do a 2 octave scale). Once you've done this, repeat the whole thing but playing each Ab with the first finger and each other note with the second finger. Then again with the ring finger for other notes (you heard right!) and again with the pinky for the other notes. Then repeat all that, but with the Ab as the second finger and going through using the other fingers as the other notes. Repeat again using ring finger on the Abs, then with pinky on the Abs. If you're feeling hardcore and your fingers haven't been ground down to the bone, you can repeat this, but starting at the top and working down. Take care to always make your tone lovely! (Btw, you can do this in Bb or any other key or scale type on the G string if you want). I'll say now [i]don't overdo it![/i]. If it's hurting your fingertips or anywhere else, just stop. You're practicing to make music through solid technique, not to take on Vinnie Jones in a nutkicking competition, so no need to prove how tough you are.

Anyway, sounds gruelling huh? The reason I like this exercise so much is that it drills so many things at once:

You build mega callouses.
You work your intonation awareness (helps to sing along, so that the note you are heading to is internalised).
You get more comfortable with shifting (hence why I originally mentioned it, as you'll be shifting past the heel of the neck as you would be going into thumb position) and let's be honest, with the size of the bass you're gonna have to get used to being comfortable shifting! If you watch most of the top players, they shift very accurately. It's not a coincidence.
It's great for bowing: you'll need to get comfortable finding the right bow speed for each pitch and position (higher up the fingerboard = faster bow speed and bowing closer to the bridge, make sure to keep the bow perpendicular to the strings). In order to get a nice sounding portamento you'll need to adjust this on the fly as you shift.
If you try as hard as you can not to squeeze with your left hand thumb on the back of the neck, it becomes about using your arm weight to stop notes rather than squeezing with your left hand (makes playing easier, as well as making sure you get a nice vibrato that isn't strangled). For me, bowing is the most important aspect of this exercise.
You'll get your left and right hands indpendent.

...phew! I've got a headache, all that explaining!

Have fun doing these, I really recommend them. Bear in mind that I'm just some guy on the internet, so [i]I take no liability for any distress they cause you[/i], not to mention the distress cause to those who listen to your practice (who will want to vomit themselves, in the other sense of the word!). Take it easy and look after yourself. Build up to the full exercise, it can be quite tough to start with. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions about any of this.

Aaaaaaanyway, back on the topic of le thumb, one more thing I'd say is about where on the thumb you stop the string: make sure not to use your thumb joint, as this will eventually cause pain and a loss of mobility (arthritis maybe?). Better to use the soft bit (not soft for long!) between the joint and the base of your thumbnail. It'll be tender at first, but this will soon give way to a callous and you'll find your hand position is bit more relaxed (at least I did when I made this change I'll stop harping on about TP playing and let you get down to it - enough of my blabbering!

[quote name=' "The Major"']I could say "There's no such thing as a good german bow!" but that would be rude and uncalled for. Each to his own i say (but French is better ! - sorry I didn't mean that to slip out).[/quote]

Explain [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WMO0nJRWAM"]THIS[/url] then! Just kidding, I prefer French but that was the way I was taught to start due to my teacher's preference. I think it's probably a preference thing. Seriously though, that video is the mutt's nuts!

Hector

Edited April 13, 2010 by Hector

[Major-Minor]

[quote name='Hector' post='805046' date='Apr 13 2010, 04:46 PM']Explain [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1WMO0nJRWAM"]THIS[/url] then! Just kidding, I prefer French but that was the way I was taught to start due to my teacher's preference. I think it's probably a preference thing. Seriously though, that video is the mutt's nuts!

Hector[/quote]
I really was just kidding about German bows. I work with many great players who use them.
When I started playing in the 60's just about everybody in the UK used the French bow so naturally I followed suit. I did recently consider changing to German as I've been getting a few arm pains and wondered whether the change would do me good. But its a very different technique and I'm not sure if I could find the extra time (or patience) needed to learn it.
In any case I'm gonna be skint for a while as I've decided to have a major renovation job done on one of my basses. If I did buy a german bow it would have to be a good one, and good bows can cost a fair bit.


The Major

[TheRev]

Hector - what a great exercise, painful, annoying and yet eventually extremely productive.

I like your style mate, looking forward to more nuggets of DB wisdom from you.

[Faithless]

Anyone could offer any good 'starter' exercises to become familiar with Thumb position?

All I do now, is C major scale, starting on low E, and, ending on C..