In the last few lessons, we've talked about general guidelines and even common patterns
that you might come across in music.
But, in this lesson, I wanted to go over a specific piece of music and discuss my fingering
choices in context.
In this lesson, we're gonna go over the prelude to the first Bach Cello Suite.
And we're only gonna go over the first eight bars because there's a ton to talk about just
in these first eight bars.
And I've included a PDF of the sheet music and my fingerings along with this video, so
make sure you're following along with that in this lesson.
I'll start right from the beginning.
In this first bar, I get a lot of questions about how to play that G. You play it open
or do you close it?
And for me, and I think for most people that play this piece on upright bass, the answer
is open G, and there's a few reasons for that.
First of all, it just rings really nicely.
When you're playing a piece that's completely solo like this, you want that ringing as much
as possible because it kinda fills in the gaps and makes it sound a little bit more
full.
So use as many open strings and harmonics as possible.
Now, if you can take a look at the first four bars in total, you'll see that every single
bar has a pattern that is played throughout the entire full bar twice, right?
And so, because of this, I've planned out my fingering so that I hold the same hand
shape all the way through every single bar, and I'm not shifting in the middle of the
arpeggiated pattern.
I'm holding a hand shape all the way through.
And the reason I do this is, is for clarity, for accuracy, and it just makes my life a
whole lot easier.
So in the beginning, I've got open G, thumb on D, B, and A, and that's one hand shape.
And then, in the next bar, I move my thumb up to E and play that hand shape like that.
If you can just kinda look at those fingering patterns, you can see that every single one
is a very natural hand shape.
[00:02:02] [music]
[00:02:19]
Now, in bar four, the reason I chose to do this G closed on the D string as opposed to
with, say, thumb on the G string was because I wanted that string crossing between the
B and the G. When you play this on cello, you've got all of these string crossings,
especially between two closely related notes like B and G. And, I wanna emulate that as
much as possible because I think that's what Bach was going for.
If you look at the whole piece, you find that a lot.
So, I'm gonna try to emulate that as much as possible.
So, that's why I'm gonna play it close like this
to get that timbre change rather than on one string.
It's just not the sound that I think Bach was looking for.
And then, the same thing happens on bar six where you've got C sharp on A, G on the D
string, and then the thumb on the G string.
I chose that second to third to thumb finger pattern for that exact reason.
You wanna hear that distinct timbre change between the thumb on A and the G on the D
string.
That's exactly what Bach was looking for.
Now, bars five and seven are perfect examples of when you have to choose between going across
the string or shifting up and down on one string.
And, for both of these, I'm gonna go across the G to D to A string.
And, the reason for that is, I'm focused all on clarity and accuracy, and I can still get
a nice tone quality when I go across strings as opposed to shifting up and down.
So this is what that would look like.
And that's bar five, and the same thing goes for bar seven.
The only minor shift that I've got is the shift after that D harmonic.
And then everything else is just gonna be in position.
And again, the reason I do that is because I'm focused mostly on clarity at this point.
If I were to go up and down, then it would get really slurpy, and instead, I wanna focus
on playing everything as accurately as possible in the same position.
Now, finally, I wanna talk about that fourth finger that I've marked on the G harmonic
on bar eight.
Now, I know, I just got done telling you a couple lessons ago that I stopped using fourth
finger past the F sharp on the G string, or I don't use fourth finger on the F sharp on
the G string.
I use third finger instead.
But in this case, when I'm going back to that B a second time, instead of shifting or pivoting
to reach that G harmonic with third finger, my fourth finger is just right there, and
I'm kind of holding it, it's not really very awkward.
So, I'm gonna play fourth finger on that harmonic.
Rather than, again, pivoting may be for that third finger.
It eliminates a break, and it just kinda...
it's easy, it's just right there.
So, this is a prime example of when one of those no-nos that we talked about earlier
actually is okay.
Planning fingerings is a huge task and it will take a while at first.
But, the more you do it, the better you'll get at it, and eventually you'll come up with
your own fingering system that will help you play your best.