Hearing Double: how to use the double bass in the VI Concerti Armonici by Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer.

Eva Euwe

Name: Eva Euwe Main Subject: Violone Research Supervisor: Johannes Boer Title of Research: Hearing Double Research Question: Was the double bass used in the VI Concerti Armonici by Unico Wilhelm Van Wassenaer, and if so, how was it used? Summary of Results: As far as we know, the VI Concerti Armonici by Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer were written for a chamber music setting with one instrument per part. We do not know which basso continuo instrumentation was intended or preferred by the composer, but it could have been possible that a double bass was to be used. At that time in the Netherlands, double basses and bassists were around and it is not unlikely that they also played in relatively small settings such as chamber music. If the double bass played the basso continuo line in this piece, there are many reasons that it was used in a different way than the more usual 'concerto grosso' style of playing the continuo line. It is also likely that instead of a double bass, a smaller bass instrument in the 8 foot register was used to double the continuo line with. This would be an instrument that is perhaps bigger than most baroque cellos and close to a basse de violon or a G-violone. To illustrate these possibilities, I have recorded several versions of the same Concerto with different basso continuo instrumentations. Biography: Eva Euwe (Amsterdam, 1988) studies historical double bass and violone with Margaret Urquhart at the Royal Conservatoire of The Hague. She received her Bachelor’s diploma from the Utrecht Conservatory where she studied modern double bass with Quirijn van Regteren Altena. She received masterclasses from world-class bassists such as Joel Quarrington and Edicson Ruiz.  Alongside her studies, Eva works as a freelance bassist with several ensembles such as De Nieuwe Philharmonie Utrecht, BarokOpera Amsterdam and Música Temprana. She also performs with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment as a participant of the OAE Experience 2018.

The excerpts

I selected two excerpts from Concerto III in which the two problematic exceptions of the violoncello obligato line are incorporated.

Excerpt 1.

The first excerpt is bar 1 - 14 of the third movement, Largo Andante. The violoncello has a long, melodic solo line that is different from the basso continuo, and mostly in a higher octave too.

IV. Experiments

Five different basso continuo instrumentations

Based on the information in part III. of this research, there are at least five instrumentations for the basso continuo group that could very well have been used in the Netherlands between 1725 - 1766:
1. Only harpsichord

2. Harpsichord and a large 8 foot instrument
3. Harpsichord, a large 8 foot instrument and a theorbo

4. Harpsichord and double bass

5. Harpsichord, double bass and a theorbo.

In order to investigate the musical impact of these options, I decided to record excerpts of the VI Concerti Armonici with all of the five instrumentation options instead of using existent recordings. In this way, the comparison between different options would be more thrustworthy. Moreover, none of the existing recordings has a version with just harpsichord or seems to have investigated the use of an 8 foot instrument larger than the violoncello obligato.1

I picked a six string violone tuned in G as a large 8 foot instrument because this instrument was probably one of the various types of bass instruments around in the Netherlands at that time.

The set-up

The location

Despite the modern look of the room, the acoustic is probably not very different from that in the rooms where the collegium musicum gathered and where the first performances of the Concerti Armonici took place. From 1746, Van Wassenaer lived in large house at the Kneuterdijk in The Hague. Before that, he lived in a smaller house that on the northeastern part of Noordeinde that does not exist anymore. It is not unlikely that the large rooms in these houses had a high ceiling, high windows with curtains and a wooden floor with carpets, since the climate in the Netherlands is not particularly warm and houses did not have central heating.

Recording

The sound engineer and I decided to not use individual microphones, but one high quality stereo microphone. In this way, the recording would reflect the acoustics of the room without having the necessity to make changes in the microphone set-up for each time we switched to another basso continuo instrumentation.

Excerpt 2

The second excerpt is bar 1 - 32 of the last movement, Vivace. The violoncello line is the same as the basso continuo line and mostly in the same octave, some bars are an octave higher.

Experiment 2: Harpsichord and violone

As argued in part III. of this research, there are reasons to believe that large 8 foot instruments were used to double the bass with rather than a second violoncello.

Hypothesis: I expect the general bass sound to be too prominent on the moments the violoncello plays along with the basso continuo line. It will probably not be as elegant as the rest, who has just one player per part, and it could overpower the single viola.
In the first excerpt, I expect the balance to be good, since the violoncello has a solo part and the sound of violone has a different colour than the cello.

Outcome: The overall bass sound is lighter than I expected. In the first excerpt, the violoncello obligato and the viola are easy to be overpowered by the 4 violin parts than by the bass. In the second excerpt, the sound of harpsichord, violone and the violoncello blend well together and the bass line is not particularly heavy compared to the rest of the ensemble.
I find that this recording supports the evidence that a larger, 8 foot instrument could have been playing along.

Experiment 3: Harpsichord, theorbo and violone.

The theorbo was probably still used in the Netherlands in the 1730's and was very much appreciated by Van Wassenaer's teacher. In addition to that, I think it's also a useful experiment from an aesthetic point of view, as the Concerti Armonci clearly are influenced by the Italian concertos that often used theorbos.

Hypothesis: I expect that the theorbo would add another colour to the bass group that makes the bass line more audible without being louder than experiment 2. The theorbo player added that the last movement would be too fast to play chords, so she would only double the bass line.Therefore, the theorbo will probably not be very audible in excerpt 2.

Outcome: As expected, the difference with experiment 2 is the most clear in excerpt 1 and not so much in excerpt 2. The bass notes of the theorbo add colour to the basso continuo group and a clear rhythmical pulse. The broken chords blend in very well with the harpsichord, which, to my ear, makes the harpsichord notes sound more mellow than in experiment 2.

Experiment 5. Harpsichord, theorbo and double bass

This is a variation of experiment 4. Instead of adding an 8 foot violone or violoncello the theorbo is added to empasize and colour the bass line.

Hypothesis: As the harpsichord and the theorbo both play in the 8 foot register, I expect that the sound of thee basso continuo group will change the least between the two different excerpts. This instrumentation is also used on the recording by the Brandenburg Consort. I expect this to be the most convincing instrumentation.

Outcome: The addition of the theorbo works very well to fill the octave gap that is present in experiment 4. The overall bass sound is perhaps a bit much for the size of the room. I can imagine this instrumentation would work very well in a concert hall, as the double bass helps to project the sound of the whole ensemble. Compared to the other experiments, the difference between the solo line of the violoncello and having it play the bass line is perhaps a bit less obvious because.

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Experiment 1: Harpsichord

This is a suggestion from R. Rasch, who did a thourough study into this music and the life of Unico Wilhelm van Wassenaer.2

Hypothesis: Easy for the violoncello to come out in the solo lines and maybe still enough bass from the harpsichord. Perhaps the counterpoint and harmonic clashes between the bass line and the violoncello will not come out enough, as A. Dunning states.3

Outcome: The sound is in general very transparent: The violoncello is very well audible, which makes it easy to hear when he changes to its role as a soloist.

The violinists found it more difficult to play and especially missed a bowed bass instrument in the first excerpt, where the violoncello has the solo passage.
In a chamber music setting such as the room we used, I think this instrumentation works very well. I can imagine that the sound of the harpsichord can be too thin for larger space such as a small or medium-size concert hall.

Experiment 4: Harpsichord and double bass.

It is possible that a double bass was used in chamber music settings such as the VI Concerti Armonici. The large instruments we see on paintings could have played in the 16 foot register.

Hypothesis: This could be a good way to have enough bass for the ensemble without covering the violoncello obligato line, but it could also be that there is not enough bass sound in the 8 foot register to support the ensemble.

Outcome: More projection and bass sound than I expected, as I was playing rather light. In excerpt 1, the gap of more than an octave between the violoncello and the double bass is too audible to my taste and therefore not ideal. In excerpt 2, this problem is solved and sounds more coherent.

Further to V. Conclusions