Note Manipulation

[Smart Pickins]

What is the term for rotating your fretting finger to add tone to a note? I usually see players do it at the end of a run of notes. Mike Marshall does it most of the time. Any suggestions on how to develop this technique?

[Michael Neverisky]

Maybe you are thinking of vibrato? A technique common among string players of all varieties. Depending upon the amount of energy you put into the move, and the presence of frets, the degree to which the pitch changes will vary.

[billhay4]

I think bending a note is more the correct term. Vibrato refers to striking a note over and over rapidly.
bill

[DavidKOS]

I think bending a note is more the correct term. Vibrato refers to striking a note over and over rapidly.
bill

A single pitch change is a bend...multiple pitch changes become vibrato.

2 types of vibrato - classical vibrato, along the length of the string, and folk/blues/rock vibrato with the direction of movement perpendicular to the string length.

3 types if you include using the heel of one's palm to press the strings behind the bridge like balalaika players do.

[Tom Wright]

With doubled courses another option exists, used by Caterina Lichtenberg. If you very slightly roll away from the fret, you first allow maximal string sustain, but also you will inevitably change the tuning of the pair just a tiny bit, which lets the note bloom a little, a noticeable swell in the tone as the strings go just a bit out of phase.

Mike probably uses vibrato, bending, and Caterina's more subtle trick, as needed. That very slight detuning move is great on emando, too, for those of us with doubled courses.

Yet another pitch-changing move is bending the entire neck, as you sometimes see guitarists do. I do this, also, along with the other options.

[Michael Neverisky]

Vibrato refers to change in pitch. Tremolo is change in volume... or, sustain, in the case of the mandolin I suppose. We execute tremolo with the picking hand (no change in pitch), we execute vibrato with the fretting hand. Mike Marshall executes vibrato with the left, tremolo with the right.

Not to be confused with how those words have been repurposed by people who make guitar amplifiers.

[Tom Wright]

Not to be confused with how those words have been repurposed by people who make guitar amplifiers.

Yes, Fender uses the term tremolo for what is called vibrato on a vibraphone. Neither is what we would call tremolo, or vibrato.

But I would always call tremolo repeated attack, because that is what bowed instruments do, fast strokes, not measured, on a given pitch. Mandolins use it both for sustain and intensifying the expression like violinists.

[Mark Gunter]

"Bending a note" vs. "vibrato" vs. "tremolo"

What you are describing in OP, Smart Pickins, is vibrato as others have suggested, don't get confused by the many mentions of note bending and tremolo - those are distinctly different techniques. As for vibrato, there is more than one technique for it as David Brown and Tom Wright have indicated. You can make vibrato by pulling the string slightly in a vertical motion (that is parallel to the fret) back and forth rapidly. This is not to be confused with string bending, though of course you are in effect very slightly bending the strings back and forth in rapid succession when you do this. A different technique is to sort of rub the strings rapidly back and forth in more of a horizontal motion (that is parallel to the strings themselves), and another way is to vibrate the neck or the entire instrument.

As far as "how to develop this" technique, like everything else, that will come with experimentation and lots of practice. Caterina Lichtenberg spends some time on her own technique in her Homespun Videos lessons. There will be others showing their own techniques as well.

As a blues guitar player, I brought some vibrato to mandolin from guitar, but I have a whole lot yet to learn on mandolin technique. I find the Lichtenberg method difficult to get down (there are many, many guitarists that use a similar technique as well), because I've developed the more vertical movement method way in the past - but it's good to keep trying to learn new technique IMO.

Most players of stringed instruments develop styles for vibrato that are unique to themselves. There is inevitably a blending of various techniques that goes into developing a personal style. For that reason it has been said, and I believe it's true, that you can recognize specific individual players just by the sound of their vibrato!

Here are a few videos I found for you:



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZmo6q8IKMk

And to illustrate how easily people confuse "vibrato" vs. "tremolo" vs. "note bending", when I searched YouTube for "vibrato technique on mandolin" what came up was a bunch of video on tremolo, and this one from Jim Richter was the only one that came up which was actually about vibrato!

I'll post a link to Caterina's technique as soon as I find one.

[Mark Gunter]

Caterina Lichtenberg shows a classical style vibrato for use in sustaining notes in slow pieces. Purchase this entire lesson set here: https://www.homespun.com/shop/produc...ical-mandolin/
NFI



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zuh6RWEhQc

[Mark Gunter]

From the Tim Connell interview here at the cafe:

Unlike most mandolin players, but similar to what violin players do, you use a bit of vibrato in your playing. How are you doing that?

My vibrato comes directly from the modern Brazilian way of playing mandolin, which is traced directly back to Jacob do Bandolim, who was copying the vibrato of the Portuguese guitar in fado music. The actual vibrato technique with nearly all Brazilian players and with me is done by picking a fretted note and then slightly bending the string left and right, parallel to the frets. Most often in choro and in my own playing, the vibratoed note is preceded by a slide up, usually with the third finger - so it's easiest and most effective above the fourth fret.

Full interview: https://www.mandolincafe.com/forum/c...nell-Interview

Listen for Tim's subtle use of vibrato in the two passages of this video beginning about 1:28

[MediumMando5722]

That interview with Tim is a great one. He and Eric Skye's semi-recent album is a crash course in taking acoustic guitar and mandolin to the furthest reaches of their possibilities.

[Em Tee]

Caterina Lichtenberg shows a classical style vibrato for use in sustaining notes in slow pieces. Purchase this entire lesson set here: https://www.homespun.com/shop/produc...ical-mandolin/
NFI



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zuh6RWEhQc

Thank you for posting this video. I was doing vibrato exactly as she says not to, and after using her technique finally got the sound i want.