The German Bow in Tango Music

Maria Alejandra Bejarano Salazar

This artistic research compares French and German bow techniques in Tango music. I have been playing for a couple of years with a German bow when I play classical repertoire, and a French bow when I play tango. Considering that Tango has changed and added many things throughout its history, I wanted to investigate why the tradition of playing with a French bow is still extremely strong. So that is why the main question of this work is how to approach Tango music for double bass using a German bow technique? To answer this question I have been studying the method "The bass in tango" published by Tango sin fin, that approaches all of the elements from the perspective of the French bow. However, I have studied this using the German bow technique. I have found that you can play Tango with both techniques, but you cannot follow the same instructions to find the same results. This is mainly because of the anatomy of the bow. Additionally, because there is not a strong tradition outside of Argentina of typical orchestras or soloists that play beyond Piazzolla the tradition of playing with a French bow is still strong. After finishing this research, I would like to continue working on this subject through a new repertoire in a personal search to improve my performance as a tango player and then share this knowledge playing concerts or teaching with other double bass players.

Repertoire

These are the pieces I will play in my final exam and where I will apply all the elements I worked in this research. The first piece is “De tal palo” by Leopoldo Feredico. This piece was dedicated to Horacio Cabarcos, one of the most important bass players in Tango.

Here is the sheet music and a video where I play the first seven bars with French and German bow. In this video we can find the arrastre and the marcato in 4.

In this pdf we can find some annotations that specify which articulation, effect or phrasing I would like to play

Note: The blue circle means that the note I will play it with arrastre. But when the notes have accents as in the bar 16 it is a small arrastre and when it does not have accent as in the up beat of the beginning it is a big and strong arrastre.

Back

Regarding "Kicho" by Astor Piazzolla, it is one of the most popular works for solo double bass not only in the world of tango, but also in academic music. This thanks to the great diffusion that the music of Astor Piazolla has had.

The piece was wroten for the bass player of his quintet, Enrique “Kicho” Díaz, who in 2000 was named as double bass player of the century.

The piece was initially presented to the public and recorded in 1970, in a quintet format that was made up of violin, piano, electric guitar, bandoneon and double bass. In this first version, effects such as the buzzer or the 3-3-2 hits are essential. Later, as was characteristic of Piazzolla, this version is modified, since he changes the double bassist after

1972, and he made the versions of his compositions considering the skills and characteristics of his musicians. There are also versions for guitar - double bass, piano - double bass and occasionally violin - double bass or bandoneon double bass, the version with piano being the most popular, especially in the field of academic music.

Notes:

The blue circle means that in this notes i will play with an arrastre. When the note has accent it is a small arrastre, but for example in the solo of the piano these quarter notes have a bigger arrastre.
The 3.3.2 before the solo of the piano I play it the first time with bow and the second time with pizzicato.

Here a pdf of Kicho with some indications.

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