Figured bass

“ During the concerted music, the organist had to accompany from figured bass, and the voice part was rarely given him, as the cantor would not trouble to write it out, though Bach, with his characteristic thoroughness did so in many cases.
Bach’s method of playing from figured bass
There exists a specimen of Bach’s method of playing from figured bass in a MS. accompaniment to a violin sonata of Albinoni, by H. N. Gerber, a pupil of Bach. [83] It contains a few autograph corrections by Bach himself, [166] and it may be taken, therefore, as an example of the manner which Bach approved of. ”

“ The following examples, with the chords filled up at length in notes, will be found simple and useful Persons, who have not the advantage of a master. will find themselves much assisted in their progress, by first writing out the figured basses and the top note., of each chord as here given, and then. ”

“ The basso continuo of certain organists, who have fallen asleep over their pedals, soon becomes an intolerable nuisance for the audience. We should go wild at a performance of a symphony in which the double-basses played uninterruptedly from the first note to the last. Plain-song itself, thus interpreted, loses its eloquence; although the apparent monotony of its design, closely confined within the limits of an octave, would, above all, seem to be better adapted than any other form of music to a continuous bass. ”

“ One is, the wise God will have it so; some must pipe, and some must weep. Now Mr. Fearing was one that played upon this bass. He and his fellows sound the sackbut, whose notes are more doleful than the notes of other music are; though, indeed, some say the bass is the ground of music. And, for my part, I care not at all for that profession which begins, not in heaviness of mind. The first string that the musician usually touches is the bass, when he intends to put all in tune. God also plays upon this string first, when He sets the soul in tune for Himself. ”

“ The high, squeaking tones of the violins and flutes, and the growling ground bass of the bassoon are all that I can hear; they follow each other up and down in octaves, which tear the ear, until, at last, like one who is seized with a burning pain, I cry out involuntarily,
“What mad music! Those detestable octaves!”—Near me some one mutters.
“Cursed Fate! Here is another octave-hunter!” I look up and perceive now for the first time that imperceptibly to me a man has taken a place at the same table, who is looking intently at me, and from whom I cannot take my eyes away again. ”

“ If the violin is the leader of the orchestra, the double bass is its foundation. To it is given the lowest part, on which both harmony and melody rest. The English term 'double bass' has probably been applied to the instrument because it often doubles in the lower octave the bass of the harmony, given to the bass voice, the violoncello, the bassoon, or some other instrument. ”

“ The notes of the lowest register, when played piano, sound weird and sometimes grotesque, and are sometimes used instead of the kettledrum; when played forte the tone is grand and full. The lowest octave is mainly used as a fundamental octave bass to ’cello, bassoon or trombone. ”

“ The mechanism and fingering are very intricate. Theoretically the whole construction of the bassoon is imperfect and arbitrary, important acoustic principles being disregarded, but these mechanical defects only enhance its value as an artistic musical instrument. The player is obliged to rely very much on his ear in order to obtain a correct intonation, and next to the strings no instrument gives greater scope to the artist.
The bassoon has an eight foot tone, the compass extending from B♭ bass [1] to A♭ treble , or in modern instruments by means of additional mechanism to C or even F . ”

“ Its four strings are tuned as follows the entire range of the instrument being from EE to a. In music written for double-bass the notes are always printed an octave higher than the tones are to sound: that is, when the bass-player sees the note he plays this being done to avoid leger lines. The tone of the bass is much heavier and [Pg 119] the instrument itself is much more clumsy to handle than the other members of the group, hence it is almost never used as a solo instrument but it is invaluable for reinforcing the bass part in orchestral music. ”

“ If a very low bass found a note rather high, he may have howled it as he best could, or it would perhaps itself have cracked up into falsetto, or he will have gone down instinctively to the octave below, or remained where he was until the melody came again within his reach—ears being not yet critically cultivated. Even now, towards the end of the 19th century, it is not at all unusual to hear amongst a congregation basses singing the air of a hymn below the actual bass part, or soprani singing in the tenor-compass for convenience sake. ”

“ Never leave a bass string the slightest amount too sharp. As flatness is so obnoxious in the treble, just so is sharpness in the bass, so if there must be any variation in any bass tone let it be flat ”

“ The boom of the breakers finds a marvellously close echo in the splendid volume of the men’s voices, which are bass for the most part, and very much more powerful and sonorous than anything one hears in the country of the “superior” race. The women’s voices are somewhat shrill, but they sound well enough as one usually hears them, wandering wildly in and out of the massive harmonies of the basses. ”

“ The technical capabilities of the double bass are necessarily somewhat more limited than those of the violoncello. Quick passages, though possible, are seldom written for it; they cannot sound clear owing to the time required for the strings to vibrate. An excellent effect is produced by what is known as the intermittent tremolo: owing to the elasticity of the bow, it rebounds several times on the strings when a single blow is sharply struck, forming a series of short tremolos. The double bass is the foundation of the whole orchestra and therefore of great importance ”

“ I have heard, and you doubtless, in a fine concert of viols, extemporary descant upon a thorough bass in the Italian manner, when each performer in turn plays such variety of descant, in concordance to the bass, as his skill and present invention may suggest to him. In this manner of play the consonances invariably fall true upon a given note, and every succeeding note of the ground is met, now in the unison or octave, now in the concords, preserving the melody throughout by the laws of motion and sound. I have thought that this is life. ”

“ To many people a bass is a bass, and that’s all there is to it. To be sure, they recognize the fact that some bass are larger than others, but the process of differentiation begins and ends with the table of weights and measures. Skegemog bass belong to the small-mouth family, and there is as much difference between these and the big-mouth variety as between a split-bamboo rod and a saw-log. The small-mouth is the aristocrat of the bass family. He is more dainty in his tastes, more plucky, and has more brains than his brother of the more generous facial opening. ”

“ A bass-drum would thunder down, breaking the back at a stroke of a long roll proceeding from a tenor one near by, whilst another of the latter species would rub-a-dub right into a pair of cymbals, and scatter their silver clashings into an entire route. New tunes would be constantly arriving as the distant companies came marching up to give fresh life to the wrangling discord, whilst to add to the uproar, the whole pack of pedlers, amounting to nearly a dozen, had given tongue at the first hurly-burly of the music, bursting out, as it were, in full cry. ”

“ The bass-bar has to be cut and adjusted to meet the requirements of every violin; and only long experience can determine how long, how thick and exactly where the bass-bar should be made and placed. The fraction of a line makes all the difference in the world.
The bass-bar is the only member, or organ, of the violin’s body that has undergone any change since the days of Antonio Stradivari. Owing to the increased pitch (higher tuning) of the present time, the tension, or pull, of the strings equals eighty pounds! ”

“ Double Basses by the great makers are rare and not effective in the orchestra: professional players usually choose old English ones, or modern ones by such makers as Fendt and Lott, who made the Double Bass a speciality.
Fiddle-making is so little practised as a trade in this country, that a short explanation of the process may be useful. ”

“ To this instrument are assigned normally the deepest bass parts of the score. Basses are mounted with three, four, or five strings. The four-string variety is most widely used, having almost completely supplanted the three-string instruments. In modern symphony orchestras the five-string bass is making rapid headway, its special advantage being the downward extension of its compass to low (16 foot) C—one octave below the C string of the cello. ”

“ With the growing favour for simple chords, which were developed into the Continuo or Thorough Bass accompaniment, the bass strings—diapasons, as they were called—were added beneath the finger-board accordance to be tuned for basses as the player required. At last they were attached by the contrivance of a double neck to a higher peg-box, by which the Lute became a Theorbo. ”

“ Five pounds, four ounces, he weighed, and his relatives under the canal bridge knew him no more for ever.
The bass has countless vagaries, and one never knows what he will do under given circumstances. As a father and son were fishing for small-mouth on the St. Lawrence, the senior hooked a fish which broke the snood and went free. Now there is a persistent tradition that, when a bass has been pricked by the hook, he does not bite again until the passing of twenty-four hours or such a matter has served to wipe the experience from his memory. ”

“ Owing to its register—basso profondo + a still lower compass,—and its muffled resonance, the double bass is little capable of broad cantabile phrases and only in unison or in octaves with the 'cellos. In my own compositions there is no phrase of any importance given to the double bass without the support of 'cellos or bassoons.
Examples:
* No. 10. Legend of Kitesh 306. Double bass solo, doubled first by the double bassoon, later by the bassoon. This example affords an instance of the rare use of the alto clef (in the last few notes) . ”

“ As I heard the deep bass of the old Drummer, rolling in a low, solemn undertone, a sudden shifting of the scene came to me. I was in a great auditorium filled with light, and packed with humanity rising tier on tier and stretching far back till lost in the maze of distances. A grand orchestra, banked before me, with swaying arms and earnest faces, played a wonderful harmony which rolled about me like the sea and whelmed me with its volume till I was almost swept away by the tide, then suddenly down under its sweep I found the low deep roll of the bass drum. ”

“ The back organ has solo and combination stops, the principal of 4 ft. (octave higher than diapason) , and bassoon (bass) and oboe (treble) , 8 ft. These may be mechanically combined by a stop called full organ. The French maker, Mustel, added other registers for much-admired effects of tone, viz. “harpe éolienne,” two bass rows of 2 ft. pitch, the one tuned a beat too sharp, the other a beat too flat, to produce a waving tremulous tone that has a certain charm; “musette” and “voix celeste,” 16 ft.; and “baryton,” a treble stop 32 ft., or two octaves lower than the normal note of the key. ”

“ Suddenly the heavy vibration of a single pedal note burst from the organ upon the breathing silence, long drawn out, rich, voluminous, and imposing. Presently, upon the massive bass, great chords grew up, succeeding each other in a simple modulation, rising then with the blare of trumpets and the simultaneous crash of mixtures, fifteenths and coupled pedals to a deafening peal, then subsiding quickly again and terminating in one long sustained common chord. ”

“ Tuning the Bass. In tuning the bass, listen for the beats only, in bringing up the octaves. It is sometimes well to try the string tuned, with its fifth, but the octave in the bass should suffice, as the vibrations are so much slower here that if you listen acutely the octave beats will guide you.
It is not necessary to pull the strings higher than the pitch at which they are to stand. Learn to pull them up gradually and in a way that will "render" the string over the bridges, which is an easy thing to do, the strings being so much heavier here than elsewhere. ”

“ Basso, bas′so, n. the same as Bass (1) : also a bass singer.
Bassoon, bas-ōōn′, n. (It. fagotto) a musical wind-instrument filling an important place in the modern orchestra, of the reed species, made of maple-wood or plane-tree, its compass from B flat below the bass stave to C in the treble.—The Double bassoon (It. contrafagotto) sounds an octave lower.—n. Bassoon′ist. [It. bassone, augmentative of basso, low, from root of Base.]
Bass-viol, bās′-vī′ol, n. a musical instrument with four strings, used for playing the bass in concerted music; the violoncello. [See Bass, low, and Viol.] ”

“ The wood wind, for example, consists of flutes and oboes, which are purely soprano instruments, clarinets, which extended from upper bass to moderately high soprano, English horn, which has a tenor range, bass clarinet, which runs from deep bass up into treble, and bassoons, which comprise bass, baritone, and tenor registers. That organization of instruments is capable of independent performance, possessing, as it does, all the components of full and extended harmony and a wide variety of color. ”