NVdG Day

[NickA]

Brought my late dad's bass viol home to clean up and try to sell.  But I'm getting quite attached to it.  Should I learn to play it?

 

Up side, they're amazing things played well.

 

Downside, bass guitar, double bass and fellivto CELLO to practice and the damned thing takes ages to tune, goes out of tune all the time and you sometines have to adjust and replace the gut frets.  It has weird D, G, C, E, A, D tuning and the best music for it is in the alto clef.

 

sigh.

 

Edited January 5 by NickA

[Ian Davies]

That looks brilliant!

 

Definitely a keeper and worth persevering with (I feel your pain with the alto clef!! ) 

 

I can just imagine creating tracks with double bass on the low end, bass viol playing more chordal / arpeggio stuff and the melody on fretless Wal!

 

Good luck 😀

[tauzero]

22 hours ago, NickA said:

It has weird D, G, C, E, A, D tuning and the best music for it is in the alto clef.

 

That tuning is reminiscent of guitar tuning but with the 3rd interval between the adjacent pair of strings. Tune the E to F and you've got guitar a tone down.

[BassTractor]

Having "played" a vdg for some time, I too got attached to it.
Love these things.

The D, G, C, E, A, D tuning system and the alto clef are easy enough, IME.
Just give it 15 minutes each day - not hours every once in a while.

Can't advise anyone else, but personally I'd be all over it.
Though, if  "fellivto practice"  means  "fellatio practice", then maybe prioritising the vdg is a bit stupid. 🙂

 

 

 

Edited January 5 by BassTractor

[Magister Ludi]

excuse my ignorance,but would this instrument be a 'Lyra Viol' ?

 

[NickA]

Errmm  .... 'cello,  'cello,  violincello.  Medium size violin thing between a viola and a bass 🙂  What was I thinking about when I pressed post?

It's a Viola da Gamba or Basse de Viol or Bass Viol.  I think the Lyra Viols are a bit smaller and meant for playing really fancy stuff? (https://earlymusicshop.com/blogs/early-music-shop/introducing-the-lyra-viol). I knew almost nothing about Viols till this arrived and I had an ensuing long email conversation with Alison Crum who quite literally knows as much about viols as anyone in the universe (and has played with Jordi Savall no less).

 

Evidently I'm, getting a bit keen as I just ordered 1.2m of "fret gut" to replace the missing fret and now have to learn to tie "fret knots" and adjust the fret position.  Just read a long tract on tuning, in which the different types and flavours of 4ths was discussed at length.  Ha, you thought a fourth is a fourth is a fourth ... not with Viols it seems.  I recal my dad getting into a huff with a harpsichordist, because dad was playing open strings (as you should) but had tuned said open strings in even temperament instead of "just" temperament which meant he was micro-tones out of tune with the harpsichord; the harpsichord man refused to use even temper as "the cadences would not resolve properly". 

 

Whole nother world; I have trouble getting my jazz band colleagues to tune up at all 🙂

Edited January 5 by NickA

[Owen]

Is it possible to tune it so that you can transfer to it using already-established muscle memory? I know that instruments are built for specific tunings, but a little tweak now and then can just be called scordatura I remember actually LOLing when I tuned my DB up a tone for the first time. Bowing it was like bowing a 'cello all of a sudden. I have often considered buying a 'cello again and buying "4ths" strings for it.

[NickA]

I could tune the whole thing in fourths and play it like a 6 string bass ... I guess;  might need super heavy gauge for the bottom 3 strings which would be going down two tones.  But then, I think,the chords in genuine viol music wouldn't work out.  That earlymusicshop video says that much of the repertoire is written in tab so that you can play all kinds of scordatura without having to learn which note is on which fret with different tunings ... on the other hand you have to learn to read tab!

 

I was intrigued to see that you can actually get fourth tuning 'cello string sets for bassists wanting to play the 'cello.  Retuning a normal CGDA set to EADG might beabitmuch for a normal C string.  I've played a couple of 'cello pieces that invovle tuning down,but not up (EG Bach 5, which has a tone de-tuned A string, and the Kodaly solo sonata (the easier bits!) which needs the C and G de-tuned a semi-tone) these are written as if you are playing with normal tuning, so you read it, plonk your fingers in the normal place ... and unexpected notes come out!  Suprisingly easy to get used to and some strange and wonderful chords!

 

My "fret gut" arrived today.  I'd bought the wrong gauge (0.55mm and it should probably be 0.75mm) but tied it on and it works.  Oh my ... different tunings, different temperaments through variable fret location, different gauges of string and different gauges of fret!  A new clef and a possible need to learn TAB.  Music used to be a whole lot more complicated than a 4/4 12-bar in E.