The title of this book is revealing of its content: romantic, humorous, practical, three attributes to be highly valued (and all too rarely found!) in the literature of modern instrumental techniques.
Kyle Motl's assertion in the text's introduction that the double bass is ‘particularly suited’ to performing harmonics is certainly true; the string properties relative to pitch and body length, non-linear between members of the violin and viol family (from the latter of which the double bass descends), favour the scope and clarity of harmonics on the double bass compared to the cello, and the latter compared to the viola and violin. As a cellist researching and performing harmonics and multiphonics, I have long been envious of the expanded harmonic possibilities on the double bass, and of the existence of so many performer -champions of such techniques: Stefano Scodanibbio's ingeniously inventive improvisations and compositions, Bertram Turetsky's early guidebook for performers and composers,Footnote 1 Mark Dresser's pedagogical texts,Footnote 2 Håkon Thelin and Knut Guettler's parallel physical and musical analysis of multiphonics,Footnote 3 and informal documentation by a myriad of performers – see, for example, Florentin Ginot on the Ensemble MusikFabrik You Tube channel.Footnote 4 And yet, I consider this literature far from saturated, and welcome Motl's contribution; moreover, I hope that it will elicit not only musical activity, but also other guidebooks, études and academic research. The book's core value is in its open-minded approach and clever musical examples that allow performers to enjoy discovering harmonics on their instrument, and to develop their technique according to their personal musical taste and framework. The book comprises simple physical explanations and diagrams, technical descriptions, short musical exercises, contrasting examples from the literature, two transcriptions (Ortiz and Scarlatti) and two études by the author.
Motl has a gift for constructing clear explanations and inventing musical examples– for example, in presenting two alternate fingerings (one intuitive, the other less so) to play the same mixolydian scale, or a self-proclaimed ‘ridiculous’ example of using harmonics to play a four-octave scale without departing from first position – as perfect demonstrations of the accompanying technical text, or in showing how the 21st harmonic can be found by touching the dual nodes of the 3rd and 7th harmonics. He is also careful, intuitive and clear on the physics of harmonics. He is able to describe phenomena in musical terms while staying true to physical fact (a pitfall of other texts in the literature) – for example, the phenomenon of lower harmonics having more ‘nodal space’ (‘wiggle room’ in the left hand) than their higher counterparts, or higher harmonics ‘jumping out’ and destabilising lower ones. He demonstrates the departure of harmonic nodal positions from semitonal equally tempered stopped string positions without going into the mathematics but nonetheless giving musicians a clear overview of the theory. Open questions are also hinted at: the influence of string type and string age, the change in sound quality for different choices of touched node (in a theoretical string equal, in a real string more complex) and the influence of bowing/plucking position. Here, enough information is presented to intrigue musicians and to make physics-oriented minds curious (after all, there are still many avenues for fruitful physical research into stringed instruments), and yet the text is never overloaded. Nonetheless, Motl does not pander to musicians: he convincingly explains why learning harmonics by number and associating these with positions on the fingerboard is more effective than learning harmonic positions relative to equally tempered stopped pitches.
Discussing his transcriptions, Motl describes Bert Turetzky giving him the task of making pizzicato arrangements of early musical works. I am reminded of Turetsky's lament that ‘little or no heed’Footnote 5 was paid to Berlioz's proclamation: ‘The study of the violin is incomplete. Pupils are not taught pizzicato.’Footnote 6 In a clear demonstration of pedagogy in action, this is no longer the case. Motl invents exercises to work on the balance between plucked open strings, stopped strings and harmonics, which presents string players with subtle physical-intuitive challenges; indeed, the disparity between relative and actual dynamics in the case of pizzicato is large, and composers’ use of prescribed or described notation is still often unclear. Motl also uses harmonics as a means of working on diverse aspects of technique – for example, polyrhythms using two-handed ‘harp’ harmonics, or just intonation in sequences of the 4th, 5th and 6th artificial harmonics over chromatically ascending stopped fundamentals (‘more fun’). In this sense, the aim he sets out in the introduction of improving ‘expressivity, musicianship, listening… and technique’ is met. I have discussed inhibitory terminology and overly personalised technique books hampering technical progress.Footnote 7 Motl seems to share these concerns, arguing convincingly that ‘extended technique’ is an ‘othering’ term, and taking seriously his intention to appeal to double bassists from diverse backgrounds: providing material for improvisation, describing just intonation in cents, including many exercises in modal scales or triadic patterns and assimilating jazz, free improvisation and early music into his études.
In one of Motl's études, he differentiates between ‘subtle’ and ‘clear’ multiphonics. I recognise this distinction and was excited to see it notated, but in this case I missed the clear explanations that I had become used to. The tips for right-hand playing in multiphonics are useful, but descriptions of the pitch content, or a reference to where one might find such informationFootnote 8 were lacking. While most of the language is both precise and informal, some aspects could have been cleaned up with a final edit – for example, the confusion generated when discussing bow weight and weighting (relative loudness) of a partial within a sound could easily have been resolved by referring to bow pressure, as is more conventional. Finally, short videos to demonstrate each of the examples could be a real asset to this textbook.
In summary, Motl has created a book that is technically challenging, physically accurate, pedagogically sound and musically non-partisan, an achievement indeed, and a model for future work.
