Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian Gencarelli
You must sing!
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I'll second that. My current teacher tells me to stop playing and punish myself every time I realise that I've stopped singing.
I'll go on for a bit about what my last six lessons (YES, it's that important):
Fix your hand shape. I always used to be able to play chromatic 5ths up and down the bass fairly well in tune, but now with this teacher I've noticed that it's just not that simple, because I didn't apply it to the rest of my playing. The ear is easily corrupted... and if your first position is to small between the 1st and 4th finger - which I was shocked to realise was my case - even if you make a perfect semitone shift up from say B to C, you're out of tune, because you were out of tune in the first place. Myself, I found out that even though I always considered my intonation to be 'good enough', on the G string I was consequently low on B and consequently I was still low after shifting to C. This I had gotten so used to that I considered them to be in tune. As a result, my 3rd pos shape was too big in order to reach D, which was usually rather well in tune thanks to the easy check with an open D. E with 4th finger was too high as my shape was still too big, and E with 1st finger was usually was too low - especially when coming down - for the very same reason. All this was integrated in my playing and in my ears.
A key, as Brian said, is to learn EXACTLY how an interval should sound. Playing with a droning note is nice because you learn where to 'place' your note, but what's probably even more important - as it is what's required of us - is to have a REALLY good idea of what a tempered scale or a perfectly pitched single interval should sound like, and here you may not have any help by that drone, as it might lead you into playing relatively in tune. Which we also have to be able to do. But there is a limit to the practical use of this kind of intonation.
A very good exercise is to play between two open strings, say D E F# G F# E D. Then you can use the open strings as reference points. If you listen properly to that open G, does it sound a bit too high? Then your hand shape is probably too small. Or if the D is sounding low, then the E was already high - and a high first finger in first position is something an awful lot of people do, A on the G string being a frequent problem note, especially when coming down. If you play this exercise, you shouldn't rely on checking the E against the A or E string to see if it's in tune; it can be done, yes, but the point is that you should acquire a perfect sense of where you have a perfect E in relation to the D.
This exercise can and should also be played in thumb pos, and you should also play D E F and D Eb F.
Another common fault is that the hand shape doesn't get small enough when you reach 3rd 4th and 5th pos. It's starting out surprisingly big down in ½ and 1st pos but then decreases surprisingly quickly. But, if you can fix the hand shapes, you'll be sure to improve every element of intonation including shifts.
This is the most important advice I can give you. It has really worked wonders with me during the past month.