Hey, guys, it's Lauren with Discover Double Bass.
Today, I want us to talk about shifting.
Shifting is a tricky technique, and there's a whole lot that can go wrong when you're
doing it.
But because of such an integral part of playing bass, we have to be able to do it efficiently
and cleanly.
So in this lesson, I'm gonna show you the key to nailing that shift every time.
One of the most important aspects of playing bass is keeping in contact with the bass or
particularly with the fingerboard.
But so often, we lose that when we're making a shift.
It's really common to see when you're making a shift, that finger or hand lifting off of
the board.
So it might look something like this.
If you can see my finger kind of lifted slightly off of the board rather than keeping it planted.
If I were to keep it planted, this is what it would look like.
Really, really down on the board, and I'm gliding on my finger.
Now, the reason that lifting your finger isn't so great for a shift is, first of all, you
lose that muscle memory, and we'll talk about this a little bit later.
But when you're lifting your finger off of the board and it sort of up in the air, it's
really difficult to measure that distance and maintain the muscle memory that we've
been trying so hard to develop.
But also, it creates a space in between the two notes.
And when you lift your finger off, more than just creating a space, you really risk just
a big fat squeak.
So, when you're playing, something like this might happen.
Some kind of icky sounds like that.
And when you keep your finger planted on the board, there's no space in between the two
notes because your finger never loses contact with the board, it's always playing a note.
Whereas when you lift a finger off, there's a moment where you're not actually playing
anything but your bow is still playing and that combination is what causes that squeak.
Now, in terms of the space when you have the finger down, like I said, the same thing with
the squeak.
When the finger is always in contact with the board, your finger's always playing something.
So, there's less risk of a space, and the only time you're gonna get that is if you've
got a stop or a space in the bow.
Now also, keeping in contact with the fingerboard just helps build that muscle memory.
You do so much better building muscle memory when you have something concrete to kind of
hold on to, like a fingerboard.
But when your finger is up in the air, it's sort of difficult for your hand to measure
distance.
So when you're up in the air or even just halfway there, it's difficult to kind of measure
exactly where your hand wants to go.
Your fingers and your hands are actually really smart at figuring out and measuring distance.
But if you lift your finger off, it's a lot more difficult to measure that and build that
muscle memory.
So, keeping your finger planted helps in so many different ways, and this is what that
looks like.
If you were to lift the finger off, it will look a little bit like this.
Now, over time you'll develop an understanding of what it feels like to shift with your finger
planted versus with your finger lifting off of the board.
But to practice this, what I would do is take maybe a shifting drill or a tricky shift in
your music, and just isolate those two notes.
And I'm gonna show you exactly how I would practice this, using the first finger D on
the G string, and shift up to first finger G on the G string.
The first thing I'm gonna do is really slow down that shift, so I hear that slide all
the way through.
And the important thing is, that you actually hear it and you feel your finger planted on
the string.
And you can do this in separate bows, you can do it slurred, it doesn't really matter,
just along as you hear that slide.
You wanna go really slow here.
And be careful not to squeeze your hand, do wanna use the weight of your arm to pull the
hand back, and press the string down that way rather than squeezing.
If you squeeze, then that makes it a lot more difficult to move freely.
So, keep your hand relaxed but firm in a form and pull back.
So, now as you get more comfortable with that exact shift, what you wanna do is try to do
that shift between the two notes quicker.
And as you're doing this, you're gonna move your left hand quicker but you're not gonna
lift your finger up, you're gonna keep that feeling of the finger being planted as you
move just a little bit quicker.
[00:05:04] [music]
[00:05:18]
So as you get more comfortable with this, try to make it as quick as you can and try
to eliminate that slide in between the two notes without lifting your hand.
That's the real important part here, is that you're keeping your finger planted and you're
moving quickly but you're not lifting anything up or squeezing unnecessarily.
So I hope this helped, and I gave you a lot to work on with your shifting technique.
If you have any questions, please leave a comment in the section below and I'll answer
you as soon as I can.
If you enjoyed this lesson and you would like to learn more from me, please check out my
full link course all on some position available exclusively on discoverdoublebass.com.
Thanks for watching, see you next time.