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Thread: Double stops

  1. #1
    Registered User Ace's Avatar
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    What is a good technique for learning good double stops?

    Thanks
    Ace

  2. #2
    Registered User jim_n_virginia's Avatar
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    there are so many doublestops on a mandolin. In the beginning when I was first learning I couldn't find a book or anyone to fully explain this to me until one day I found a pretty good mandolin teacher who told me to just take apart chords to find most of the doublestops.

    In time the secret of understanding doublestops revealed itself to me just by listening to other people play and trying to copy them and as I said earlier most doublestops are just a fragment of a chord.

    hope that helps a little

  3. #3
    Ursus Mandolinus Fretbear's Avatar
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    This is is not about technique but more about the amazing revelations that come from using double stops. The exact same double stop can have an entirely different function, although they always retain some element of relatedness. Take for instance D string 9th fret and A string 5th fret. This can be used as the centre of a G major DS as it is B and D, the 3rd and 5th of G major.
    It can equally well be thought of and used as the centre of a B minor DS, as that same B and D are now being used as the 1st and flat 3rd of B minor double stop or chord. It works the same all over the neck, and other DS's all have multiple functions.
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    I play mostly with doublestops as I think they add volume and richness to the mandolin sound. #I once (a few years ago) read a theoretical definition of doublestops and discovered that that my ears are deceiving me. #Try playing by ear and off the common chord patterns for a key and you will discover most of the double stops - a few will need to be searched for but you will find them if you try. #I agree that there is no good instructional material (that I have found) on this subject.
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    M@ñdº|¡ñ - M@ñdºce||º Keith Erickson's Avatar
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    I was lucky enough to have someone so me how double stops work. From that point on, it opened up a whole new world.

    There are times that I use double stops to help me transition from one chord to another.

    ...double stops give me the filler between chords that otherwise would make a song feel empty or bland.
    Keith Erickson
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    coprolite mandroid's Avatar
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    ... another way to consider DS is harmonizing the scale

    with 2 out of the 3(or more) notes of a chord,

    like a 2nd harmony voice singing behind the melody line.
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    Registered User Ivan Kelsall's Avatar
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    Ace - i've sent you a personal e-mail,
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    Bud Orr's Mandolin Antholgy Book published book by Mel Bay

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    Have a look at these articles on double stops over at Mandozine, I think you will find them useful:

    http://www.mandozine.com/techniques/

  10. #10
    Free Spirit Aran's Avatar
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    Saska, Can you send me the email too please???
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    Registered User Ivan Kelsall's Avatar
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    Hi Aran - DONE !!,
    Saska
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    Innocent Bystander JeffD's Avatar
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    I just attended "Mandolin II" classes at Swannanoa Gathering Old Time week. The instructor opened the world of double stops, and provided a systematic way stringing them together and combining them with the melody.

    Better than any book I have worked through on the subject.
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  13. #13
    Innocent Bystander JeffD's Avatar
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    A talent for trivializin' the momentous and complicatin' the obvious.

    The entire staff
    funny....

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    I learned about double stops after mastering the "long chord" positions and then just playing two of the sets of strings in whatever chord I was playing. This works for me; absolutely no theory behind my technique but like I say it seems to work. Play around by choosing different sets within the chord and see what sounds good to you. Have fun.

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    I haven't listened to it for a very long time, but Mike Seeger's Old Time Country Mandolin instructional audio recording from Homespun includes some simple advice on double-stops.

    I tend to think of them in three ways: 1) Playing inversions of the same interval up or down the neck (e.g., 1st and (higher) 3rd in one position, then the same 3rd note and a higher 1st (such as the octave of the one you started on); 2) playing a pair of notes with an interval and then one of the notes with a different interval (e.g., 3rd and (higher) 1st, such as (in the key of G) B on second string and G on first string, followed by B on second string and F, the flatted 7th of the G chord, on the first string), which gives a melody line moving against the constant note; or 3) movement of both tones from a 2-note piece of one chord to a 2-note piece of another in a progression.

    Given that you can most often play a particular note on at least 2 and often 3 different strings (7 frets higher up on the next lower string, or 7 lower on the next higher string), you can replicate the same sequence of double stops (with a somewhat different tone) on different string pairs, as well as putting the same sequence through 2 octaves or more by moving across strings. Another example of the benefits of the symmetry of mando tuning.

    It is somewhat difficult to organize this in your mind in the abstract. It's one of those things that's much easier to do by ear than to understand theoretically or formally (at least for me). Sort of like Chuck Berry style double stops on guitar.
    Jim


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    Greg Horne has some good explanations in his Intermediate Mandolin book. You can also find some very good stuff for free at Music Moose, where Anthony Hannigan does a whole lesson on double stops, double stop tremolo, and moving double stops all over the neck.

  17. #17
    jbmando RIP HK Jim Broyles's Avatar
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    If you learn your chords, and the notes which are in those chords, and where those notes are on the fretboard, you can easily find double stops which fit those chords all over the mandolin. If you do not know each of these elements, asking about learning double stops is like asking how to parallel park before you know how to put the car in gear.
    "I thought I knew a lot about music. Then you start digging and the deeper you go, the more there is."~John Mellencamp

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    Still Picking and Sawing Jack Roberts's Avatar
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    You know, this is something that is a lot easier to show than to describe in writing. There isn't a lot of mystery to making very nice sounding double stops once some one shows you how to do it. you can do a lot with just three basic finger positions. If you you don't have a teacher, buy a few lessons at the local music store, or better yet, go to a jam, grab the best mandolin player you can find, buy him or her a beer, and ask how it's done. It will take 10 minutes to show you, and a few weeks practice, and you'll have it down.
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  19. #19
    Registered User pickloser's Avatar
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    As JBmando said, you must learn "chords, and the notes which are in those chords, and where those notes are on the fretboard." #But once you know, for example, that G, B, and D are the first, third, and fifth notes of the G scale and make up the G major chord, get a fretboard chart or make one, and label it "G". #Then, on the fretboard chart, write "1" everywhere on the fretboard there is a G note, "3" wherever there is a B, and "5" wherever there is a D. #(If you can't do this, then make a fretboard chart that shows where every note is on the mandolin fretboard, and use that to locate note positions. #You can find these on the web, or in most method books, if you don't want to make one.) #For each fretboard position you have marked, find another marked note on a neighboring string and you will have a double stop appropriate for playing over a G chord. #You will also know whether it is a first and third, or third and fifth, or a first and a fifth. #Do another fretboard chart for G's IV chord, the C chord--C, E, and G. #Any two of those notes on different, but contiguous strings played together will make an appropriate double stop over the C chord. #Do same for the V chord, D. #Then look at your three charts. #Find the sets of I, IV, and V double stops that are easy to switch among. #Then work out runs from the G scale that land you on the IV or the V or I chord double stop. #This may sound complicated, but from the moment you start filling out your fretboard chart, you will see that it is not at all complicated or hard to do. #

    If you move all the dots on your G chart two frets higher, you will have all the A chord double stops; you'll just have to fill in the A's, C#'s, and E's on the first two frets. #Two more frets up and you have B double stops, after filling in the first two frets with all the B's, D#'s and F#'s. #

    This is a great little exercise for boring meetings and seminars. #You can write 1, 3, and 5 or the actual note names on your chart. #If you are a visual learner, it will really help you to process the information, or at least it has for me. #It will also show you all the arpeggios in each key. #Want minor double stops? #Do same with the 1st, flatted third, and fifth of each key. #

    This won't help you play double stops on the fly, but once you have a reference for where they are, you can practice changes between stops and runs between stops. #

    Old hat, I know, for most on the Cafe. #But it helped me out. #It also gives the arpeggios for each chord. #It is also helping me appreciate how "shapes" move around the mandolin's fretboard. #I'm working on knowing where else I can easily go, depending on which doublestop I start with or depending on whether I want the melody line to go higher or lower. #

    Anyway, one picture would explain this more easily, but I can't seem to paste my fretboard chart on here. #Good luck with your doublestops.

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    Ursus Mandolinus Fretbear's Avatar
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    To me they really make all the difference in getting a big full sound. About the only time I use single notes is for really fast melody runs or for transitions. Whenever I am working up something new, it is all about finding the applicable double stops that correspond to the song's changes. Someone trying to learn to take breaks on songs would be well served in the beginning to just learn their double stops, how to play them smoothly at different tempos and then how to move from one to another as the chord changes and try to emulate bluegrass banjo 'faking". A lot of classic mandolin solos are based on this approach.
    Doyle Lawson has said that one reason his tremolo is so smooth is that sometimes for days on end he would practice just going smoothly from double stop to double stop.
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    Again I have say try Bud Orrs's Mandolin Anthology. When I first started taking lessons from John Reishman I play a couple of songs for him. They had double stops and he said that he was happy I knew how to play them. It was all from Mandolin Anthology,Mel Bay.

  23. #22
    Registered User Ivan Kelsall's Avatar
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    Is there any way of attaching an Adobe Acrobat PDF File to a post ?. Can i do it in a similar way to attaching a photo. ?,
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    Registered User Ace's Avatar
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    Thanks everyone for the tips and YES I can put the car in gear!

    Saska, I will email you as soon as I get off here. Sorry I haven't done so yet. You see, My dad passed away last Thursday and his funeral was yesterday. It's been kind of busy around here!
    Sure gonna miss him! He and I were a team so to speak!

    Ace
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  25. #24

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    I have several double stop exercizes that I have tabledited that I use for teaching. I'm thinking they are not sophisticated enough to post on Mandozine, but they seem to work well for my students. I'd be happy to share them if you PM me.
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  26. #25
    Handle Of Science UnityGain's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by (Fretbear @ July 30 2008, 00:11)
    To me they really make all the difference in getting a big full sound. About the only time I use single notes is for really fast melody runs or for transitions. Whenever I am working up something new, it is all about finding the applicable double stops that correspond to the song's changes. Someone trying to learn to take breaks on songs would be well served in the beginning to just learn their double stops, how to play them smoothly at different tempos and then how to move from one to another as the chord changes and try to emulate bluegrass banjo 'faking". A lot of classic mandolin solos are based on this approach.
    Doyle Lawson has said that one reason his tremolo is so smooth is that sometimes for days on end he would practice just going smoothly from double stop to double stop.
    This is me. I love double stops. I almost allways play in a group so finding nice doublestops to move between lets me sound good and fake alomst anything.

    However, I have developed some bad left hand habits from allways playing doublestops that can limit my single note skills. I over rely on position shifts and sometimes play with my thumb behind the neck.
    Gotta start sometime, might as well be now...

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