This year saw the dawning of The Double Bass Project in our Junior orchestra. The background being that a) we recently aquired two 1/4-size double basses, and b) our cello section is very large at the moment – in fact we have as many cellists as violinists! Being a cellist myself, of course I think this is just great. But it also provided an unmissable opportunity to let our cellists try out the double bass.
And so I divided the cellists in pairs, and decided that by the end of the spring term, all of them shall have played the double bass in the orchestra at a minimum of one concert. So far this has been very popular, and the cellists all look forward eagerly to having their turn on the double bass (I even think some of the violinists are a bit jealous...). Not to mention that the orchestra sounds so much better with a double bass section!
The cellist-turned-bassist pairs all get three lessons to learn the very basics of double bass playing. Then they get to play the bass in two or three pieces in the next orchestra concert.
This also means that I have had to make some new pieces to suit these aspiring bassist. The upcoming pieces on this blog (tagged with Double Bass Project) will therefore have a double bass part that is very easy – only open strings – but that requires some orchestra experience (such as being able to count rests). I hope other string teachers will find this useful, too!
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