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Thread: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

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    Default Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Coming from long term fiddle, I suspect that if I don't think about it, I pick in the directions I'd bow a tune. Do other fiddle players do that, and does it work for you?

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    I’m not a fiddler, Max, but that sounds off to me. There is little to no similarity between bow technique and flat pick technique other than that both are used to excite the strings.

    There is another thread on this page about “Reading Rhythm” and I wrote a post down in that thread that includes two videos - check out those two videos, because they show proper elementary pick direction technique - applicable to both guitar and mandolin - maybe the videos can help you get on track. All fiddlers that I know of use the same sort of picking technique, bow direction is a different animal.
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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    No relationship between my bowing and picking at all. In fact, after lots of fiddling picking is difficult to transition to without a good warmup to get my brain switched. Of course, I've been at the fiddle for over 20 years so bowing has the stronger muscle memory.

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    The right hand techniques for the two instruments are completely different.

    For instruments that are played with a pick, we prefer down strokes on the beat, and an up stroke on notes between the beat. This principle is generally not subject to alteration due to string crossings. There are occasional exceptions-- the technique called "cross-picking" is one example.

    On the bowed instruments, accenting and string crossings are governing factors in choosing bow direction.

    If you pick a tune on the mandolin the way you would bow it on a fiddle, the results may be a sound that is stilted and uneven.

    On the mandolin and guitar, I have been known to emulate the rhythms that can be achieved with a bow by using more slurs in the left hand. I still stick to the right hand principle of "down on the beat, up off the beat." On the plucked instruments, we are limited by the number of notes that can practically be slurred together before the sound decays, and we don't have any very effective way to slur notes across two strings.

    It can take a while for people transitioning between bowed instruments and plucked instruments to learn to develop and control the different techniques required for each instrument.

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    Mando-Accumulator Jim Garber's Avatar
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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    You can't slur two or more notes on the same string in the same direction with a pick whereas you could bow a few notes on the same string with the same bow direction. I play both mandolin and fiddle for over 45 years and rarely think of any similarities with bow and picking hand.
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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    A friend of mine who is also a mandolin player went along to the local fiddle workshop ayear or two back as he fancied taking up the fiddle. One of the long-time fiddle players said that my friend would take to the fiddle really easily as he already played the mandolin. I had the same experience in another fiddle workshop where I was told that I was well along the road to fiddle playing as I already played mandolin and guitar. Anyway, my friend was getting annoyed at the fiddler who kept telling him at each meeting how similar the instruments were, so one Saturday morning he brought his mandolin along and handed it to the fiddler. saying to him that since the fiddler was already a good player, he would be able to play the mandolin as easily as my friend should be able to play the fiddle.
    The outcome was predictable: fiddler got nowhere and conceded that apart from the tuning in 5ths and fairly similar scale lengths, there were no other similarities. We both found the fretting finger placement was helped by our mandolin playing and we could get reasonable intonation quite quickly, but otherwise everything was very new and very different.
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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Yeah .... I started playing guitar in 1965, I started playing mandolin in 1980 ... I started playing fiddle in 2000 ... a pick is not a bow .. the noting hand while in similar territory the touch , angle and amount of grip involved are worlds apart. I still at times "fight" with the bow in part because I spent decades with down up down up and down down up. Bowing patterns still leave me uttering expletives. Manual dexterity developed on one instrument will give you a hand up , haha, in playing another ... but they are all cousins, not twins. R/
    I love hanging out with mandolin nerds . . . . . Thanks peeps ...

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    I don't agree completely with the others, Max. Cape Breton and Atlantic Canadian fiddlers generally are fairly percussive, and many fiddlers try as much as possible to emphasise the beat using the down bow. In Cape Breton fiddling, we also play a fairly strong up bow at times. When I started jamming on mandolin, a professional musician, who plays mandolin and guitar, noted (favourably) my occasional use of a strong upstroke between beats, a variation on my fiddle technique. There are definitely differences between fiddle and mandolin techniques, especially if you want to do something other than simply pick fiddle tunes. It's good to listen to the advice of others, such as those who replied above. However, different regional and genre styles of fiddling and mandolin playing use different techniques. Many of the musicians I admire are self-taught, putting their own twists on existing styles. I'm not a strong believer in absolute rules about music, although one has to learn a style that's acceptable to the audience you want, be it your small children, who won't be too worried about rules, or symphony goers, who will. During the first mandolin lesson I had, the teacher told me that a great thing about mandolin is that there is no established set of rules that you're expected to follow.
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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranald View Post
    In Cape Breton fiddling, we also play a fairly strong up bow at times... When I started jamming on mandolin, Many of the musicians I admire are self-taught, putting their own twists on existing styles.
    I had the honour, quite a long time ago, to go to a fiddle camp where one of the tutors was the late Buddy McMaster. Buddy was a great fiddler, once he got 'switched on' - about the second, maybe third, tune set he'd suddenly change gear and go for it. It seemed like he'd never analysed what he himself played by way of ornaments, but he had infinite patience for repeating a small section of 'toon' slower and slower till you figured out what was happening. The story goes he'd been a railway guard on Canadian tracks, and had a fiddle stowed in the caboose.

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    I don't play fiddle, but have been in a couple of French Canadian fiddle workshops where the teacher has tasked me with trying to put in multiple up or downstrokes to mimic the fiddle bow. It's something to keep working on, although it will be a long time before any of my playing sounds anything other than me trying to play another style.

    FWIW, was just in a workshop with Pascal Gemme and he showed that most of his bowing is "backwards". He upbows most downbeats in order to get the lift he hears in Quebec music.
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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    I don't even know how literally following the same bowing directions would work, unless you only ever play saw stroke or 2 note slurs on the fiddle. But there are at least some occasions where bowing and picking patterns line up, like starting measures or phrases on a downbow/downstroke. And accent patterns might be the same (regardless of bow/pick direction).

    I used to have a somewhat related problem: I'm primarily a mandolinist and If I didn't think about it, my foot tapping would start to follow my bowing hand when I played fiddle (down on downbows and up on upbows but still in time). I didn't even realize I was doing it until someone pointed it out to me. Playing McReynolds style crosspicking messed with my foot tapping for a while as well for the same reason (the foot taps and downstrokes don't line up the same way as alternate picking).

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Quote Originally Posted by Peewee View Post
    I don't even know how literally following the same bowing directions would work, unless you only ever play saw stroke or 2 note slurs on the fiddle. But there are at least some occasions where bowing and picking patterns line up, like starting measures or phrases on a downbow/downstroke. And accent patterns might be the same (regardless of bow/pick direction).

    I used to have a somewhat related problem: I'm primarily a mandolinist and If I didn't think about it, my foot tapping would start to follow my bowing hand when I played fiddle (down on downbows and up on upbows but still in time). I didn't even realize I was doing it until someone pointed it out to me. Playing McReynolds style crosspicking messed with my foot tapping for a while as well for the same reason (the foot taps and downstrokes don't line up the same way as alternate picking).
    I'm not fanatical about this idea of picking like you bow. Cape Breton fiddling, for instance, is quite complex, and putting the beat on the down bow (as I mentioned above) isn't always efficient, especially in jigs and slow airs which are common, and waltzes which are less so. I'm just suggesting that if a person can play fiddle and has a good sense of rhythmic playing, there's no harm in experimenting with fiddle techniques. You might come up with something good, but different from the tried and true. As Buffy Sainte-Marie said, It's just music, you're not going to break anything.

    In the Down East fiddle traditions that I grew up in, loud foot movement to the beat is considered part of fiddling. A fiddler pounds the heel more than tapping the toe. However, following Cape Breton style, I pound and tap my foot differently, with more or less emphasis on particular beats, depending on the time of tunes. My foot action is relatively simple but differs for jigs, reels, and strathspeys -- the last two are both in 4/4 but while playing strathspeys, I emphasize every beat, whereas while playing reels I place less emphasis on the 2nd and 4th beats. In this style, my heel pounds the strong beats while my toe taps the weaker ones. Many fiddlers, including most French-Canadians -- use more complex foot rhythms, based on dance steps, so that they're synchronized with the complexity of the dances, they often play for. This makes them especially good dance fiddlers. Richard Woods, a professional fiddler from Prince Edward Island, recommends that anyone who wants to play fiddle (as least in his style) take up step-dancing to absorb the "dancey" rhythms of the music. When I started mandolin, I had to discipline myself not to be a floor pounder. On mandolin, I try to keep my toe taps to the beat, but sometimes notice (moreso while fiddling) that I'm tapping more rapidly during a run of short notes.
    Robert Johnson's mother, describing blues musicians:
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    Lomax, Alan, The Land where The Blues Began, NY: Pantheon, 1993, p.14.

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Yeah, I often bow 'wrong way round' on fiddle, sometimes it makes the bowing easier and work better to put upbows and accents on e.g. the beginning note of a bar. Lots of classical fiddlers have trouble with that till they get used to it.

    I have a foot stomp board from Quebec that I should attend to some. That 'podorhythmie' footwork is amazing, and it drives a tune along when there's no other percussion. I've only seen fiddlers doing that - Do Quebecois style mandoliists do it too?

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Quote Originally Posted by maxr View Post
    Yeah, I often bow 'wrong way round' on fiddle, sometimes it makes the bowing easier and work better to put upbows and accents on e.g. the beginning note of a bar. Lots of classical fiddlers have trouble with that till they get used to it.

    I have a foot stomp board from Quebec that I should attend to some. That 'podorhythmie' footwork is amazing, and it drives a tune along when there's no other percussion. I've only seen fiddlers doing that - Do Quebecois style mandoliists do it too?
    I don't know about mandolin players (mandolin isn't popular in Quebec traditional music), but here is Gadelle, a group of Prince Edward Island Acadian (east coast French-Canadian) musicians, with no mandolin. You'll see plenty of foot action by all the musicians except the bass player, but not to the degree of the fiddler, Louise Arsenault. Notice how her foot stomping is actually part of the music, and not just a method of keeping time. Her musical partner, Helene Bernard, says of Louise, "We pay her by the mile." Louise is no kid either; that's her son on bass.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=844Q...l=Gadellemusic

    Last edited by Ranald; Jan-31-2021 at 5:04pm.
    Robert Johnson's mother, describing blues musicians:
    "I never did have no trouble with him until he got big enough to be round with bigger boys and off from home. Then he used to follow all these harp blowers, mandoleen (sic) and guitar players."
    Lomax, Alan, The Land where The Blues Began, NY: Pantheon, 1993, p.14.

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Quote Originally Posted by Ranald View Post
    I'm just suggesting that if a person can play fiddle and has a good sense of rhythmic playing, there's no harm in experimenting with fiddle techniques. You might come up with something good, but different from the tried and true.
    I wasn't disagreeing. Some people are way too dogmatic. Try playing all downstrokes, all upstrokes, reverse your normal pick direction (UDUD instead of DUDU), use rest strokes, sweep picking, fingerpicking, turn reels into jigs and jigs into reels, change major tunes into minor tunes, change keys, play in different positions, try playing a melody all on one string, etc. Even if you don't come up with something "good" it's good practice for your brain and your fingers. I was only questioning the technical aspect. Three or more note slurs are basically impossible (or at least impractical) to play on the mandolin, so I'm not sure you could literally use the same pick direction as bow direction most of the time.

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Doesn’t work. Sorry.
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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    One is a string/bowed instrument, the other essentially a percussion instrument. We could sometimes emulate one with the other - but the fundamental differences of note/sound production are too disparate to reasonably expect much analogous comparison. A bit like comparing an organ with a hammered dulcimer...

    ......


    Ranald, I play a lot of solo fiddle - mostly trad scandinavian these days. Something that highly compels me are the complex meters, contrapuntalism, foot accompaniment, etc. I love to get lost in the contrasting rhythms - I often find myself/body swaying in counter-rhythm to what my feet and hands are doing, winding, unwinding, weaving... immersed in several articulations at once.. (kind of like drumming, dancing...the Norwegians liken it to the rivers..) *that is, the mountain rivers



    *(not me)
    Last edited by catmandu2; Feb-01-2021 at 1:49pm.

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    ...otoh I do experience analog all the time - I mentioned something about this on another thread. What i wrote above is too stuffy

    Of course techne is different .. but there are other levels.

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Quote Originally Posted by maxr View Post
    Coming from long term fiddle, I suspect that if I don't think about it, I pick in the directions I'd bow a tune. Do other fiddle players do that, and does it work for you?
    If you are slurring notes (hammer-ons, pull-offs, slides on mandolin) in the same places you would on fiddle, I see nothing wrong with fiddle/bow direction with a plectrum.

    Quote Originally Posted by Jim Garber
    You can't slur two or more notes on the same string in the same direction with a pick whereas you could bow a few notes on the same string with the same bow direction.
    I disagree on that. Double-hammer-on, double/triple pulloffs, hammer-pulloff are easily doable and within reach. If develop your LH finger strength you can get more notes on the slur. You can also slide up to a note and then slide down to the note. But you need to practice to acquire those skills. Frankly, I was always more attracted to the sonic phrasing of fiddle players and guitarists (Swarbrick, Richard Thompson, Clarence White, Hendrix etc.) and sought to emulate that. The every-note-with-a-pickstroke approach seemed sonically limiting. There have been instances where I counted how many pickstrokes were used in a bar of 8 notes, and sometimes it's been only 3, or even 2. The remainder were slurs, finger-plucks etc.

    The sad fact is that most mandolin "primaries" do not think/hear sonically in slurred phrasing. And they are indoctrinated by the fact of fretted intonation to hear 12-tone-equal-temperament as the "correct" in-tuneness. (as opposed to guitarists who bend notes, and fretless instruments such as fiddle, steel guitar...)

    The equivalent to being able to play anywhere on the neck at will with the LH is playing with any RH pick direction, pick+fingers or other RH technique. Converntional mandolin playing dogma has had a limiting effect on the soulfulness of what comes out of the instrument, imo.

    Quote Originally Posted by Pete Martin
    Doesn’t work. Sorry.
    In the Mandocrucian's Digest, I ran a number of columns by Horseflies' fiddler Judy Hyman for "Old-Time Fiddle Tunes on Mando" and the only way to get close to that internal fiddle rhythm and sound was to rethink the mando pick direction and use the fiddle bowing as a guide. I would bet that you, Pete, could pull it off if you spent some time on it, but you probably figure "Why bother? I can already play the tune on fiddle." (and it will, of course, be more effective, and easier, on fiddle.)

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    Default Re: Fiddlers picking with bow direction?

    Quote Originally Posted by maxr View Post
    Coming from long term fiddle, I suspect that if I don't think about it, I pick in the directions I'd bow a tune. Do other fiddle players do that, and does it work for you?
    I revive this thread as I've encountered this exact thing while driving my self crazy trying to figure out the crazy timing of the opening phrases to this tune. Mr. Smith throws everything at this song, amazing is an understatement. I've noticed that bow and pick "direction" do matter regardless. Arthur seems to use a LOT of pulling the bow and requires a lot of up-stroking to "try" and mimick his sound. Of course I'll never be able to play it "sweet and sour" like him on mando but I'm gonna try.

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