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.

Vocabulary

To understand the annotations here are some definitions that we can find on the book the bass in tango by Ignacio Varchausky.

Fraseo cuadrado: Performing an expressive passage (that means a melodic passage) using the written rhythm without modifying the fraseo or the tempo.¹⁰

Fraseo pelotita: A form of phrasing that involves speeding up the phrase toward the target note in imitation of a increasingly rapid bouncing of a dropped ball.¹¹

Here a picture to understand better.

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Fraseo básico: A kind of phrasing that modifies the written rhythm but respects the 1st and 3rd beats of the bar as points of arrival. ¹²

Arrastre/Arrastrado/Arrastrando: The effect produced by anticipating a note or chord with notes of indeterminate pitch and length that finish abruptly upon arriving at the pitch and length of the written note. This effect provokes a particular sensation in the movement of the rhythm, melodically and hermonically, since adds an amorphous anticipation to the precise "shape" of an articulation. Depending on the instruments, it is generally executed as a combination of glissandi, chords, clusters or ascending chromatics with a slight crescendo. ¹³

Pesante: Is a tango accompaniment that bgives the music a calm and less intense feeling. Most of the time it is used to accompany a soloist. ¹⁴

Strapatta: Percussive effect made by hitting the strings of the double bass with the bow and the palm of the left hand at the same time. ¹⁵

3.3.2: Its name describes how the eighth notes are grouped, according to the accents in the measure. ¹⁶

Yumba: Its name is taken from the onomatopoeic sound it makes when played: “YUM-BA, YUM-BA” the “YUM” syllable on the strong beats and the “BA” syllable on the weak beats. This effect comes from Osvaldo Pugliese's orchestra where it was used as marking time model. ¹⁷

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