So I thought I would write down some of my thought processes and major decision points in my path towards first purchasing and then learning to play the Stick. It may be helpful to others who are traveling now the path that I started a little over a year ago. As I get further along, I’ll add my experiences and thoughts to the process.

When I first discovered the Chapman Stick, I found myself fascinated by this instrument. I mean this quite literally. I couldn’t stop thinking about it, Such a strange beast! Two hands playing simultaneously like a piano, but on a stringed instrument like a guitar, but with a percussive nature. I watch video after video by Greg Howard, Rob Culbertson, David Tipton, Kevin Keith and Aiken Unver and many others. I started ghosting this forum… and started hinting to the wife. Her response was typically pragmatic. “It’s not in the budget for this year, but if you’re still interested maybe for your birthday next year.”

But, which instrument? What tuning? What materials? Unlike nearly every other instrument I’ve played, the Stick offers a seemingly endless variety of possibilities. So, being me, I broke it down into component parts.

What attracted me to the instrument in the first place was its versatility and range. So that eliminated the Stick Bass. I only considered the Stick Guitar and Alto Stick briefly for the same reason. The moderately increased upper range didn’t compensate for the loss of Bass range. So the question came down to 10 string or 12? Again, I chose maximal versatility. I was considering the Mirrored 4ths tuning and several people said that for Mirrored 4ths, the 6th string was really needed.

From there, the only question was what materials. I like dark wood, which lead me to choose rosewood. For contrast, I chose turquoise linear inlays… and for purely personal aesthetic reasons I chose smoky gray tuners.

What tuning? That was a tough decision. Matched Reciprocal or classic tuning seemed an obvious choice based on the amount of material out there. But I really liked Rob Martino’s work, and some other artists told me that reading music was easier with mirrored 4ths tunings. So that’s what I chose – Mirrored 4ths.

So how does all my theory fit with reality? Pretty well as it turns out. I have no regrets, and am very happy with my purchase. But there are a few things I noticed that I think are worth mentioning.

Is one down side to 12 vs 10 strings. If I get lazy, the web space of my right hand may mute the 12 string when reaching across to the high melody strings (especially 1st string). It’s not a problem if I keep my thumb where it belongs, closer to the edge, but I suspect with the narrower 10 string Stick, it wouldn’t be an issue at all.

I’m finding the mirrored 4ths tuning works well for me. I can’t say that a different tuning wouldn’t work better (or worse!) since I haven’t really tried them. But having the tuning mirrored between the two sides works well with your hands being mirror images of each other. And I’m not having to learn two fingering patterns. It may not be that big a difference, but frankly learning the stick has been overwhelming enough – I didn’t need even one more variable.

Which brings us to learning the stick. I think I’ll make that the target of my next post in this series. I have some thoughts, but it’s early yet and I want to see how it plays out for a while yet.

Keep on going! I for one, am quite interested to read your thoughts about the instrument, learning and all of that good stuff!

So the next step after choosing the instrument you want, is choosing the tuning you want. I went round and round on this one. Still am I guess. The choice of instrument and tuning is not totally separate - some tunings are better suited to a 12 stringed instrument than a 10 string. But I had already decided on a 12 string for greatest flexibility, so any tuning was an option. A lot of this will be review, but I can’t really explain my thought process without it, and it may help someone who is just starting out, so here goes.

So, where to start? The classic tuning is, well, classic. But I have to say I didn't really give it much consideration. I figured I was learning a new instrument from scratch, having to learn two different patterns of notes didn't sound like a good idea to me. I see now that pattern of notes, actually is repeated on the melody side, just two frets further up. (so looking at the 5th fret, EADGCF starting with bass highest string and moving to center/lowest string, matches the 3rd fret on the melody side, starting with the center/lowest string and moving across to highest). But I didn't see this at the time.

Matched Reciprocal was much more appealing to me because the pattern is the same on both bass and melody. For the melody side, it starts with C on the first string and goes down by fourths, or as I prefer to think of it, starting on the 6th (lowest melody string) at B and ascending in 4ths. Only reason I prefer thinking of it this way is I memorized the 4ths pattern, BEADGCF in that order. For finding notes, the pattern repeats with a slight overlap one fret above with B directly over C. And of course, looking at it a different way, it overlaps one fret below with the last two notes C and F underneath the B E.

In any case, This made sense to me because it is so similar to a guitar, except for Starting at E, and going to a third for the second highest string, so that it ends B E instead of CF. Whatever. I thought I could learn this pretty easily, and it is the pattern for most of the other tunings.

For the the Bass side, it is in ascending 5ths, starting from the 7th string, low C Bass side. Or, again because I learned the pattern in the other direction, starting at B on string 12 and going down a 5th. Because going down 5ths and up 4ths, or vice versa, Up 5ths and down 4ths, lands you on the same note, the pattern of notes is the same from left to right. But for me, there is a problem.

What I couldn’t wrap my head around was that even though the note was the same, the direction wasn’t. I just couldn’t visualize it / hear it in my head – probably because I didn’t have the instrument in my hands.

For this reason, I really gravitated towards the mirrored 4ths tuning. Here, the pattern was the same, ascending 4ths, mirrored around the 5th string. My somewhat obsessive compulsive brain really wanted it to be mirrored down the middle, but several of the people actually using this tuning said having a perfect 5th between the 6th and 7th strings helped them musically. I figured that I “got this” from an intuitive standpoint, and it was the same pattern therefore less to learn, and my hands are mirror images, so this should work right?

Then I heard that Scott was having trouble with it because “it was killing his left hand”. I almost bailed, but then I figured, “Hell, the guy is practicing like 48 hours a day, and twice that at night, no wonder its hurting his hand. It probably won’t bother me.” Ever the optimist, that’s me.

So, I ordered this tuning….and it hurts. Here’s why, from a biomechanical standpoint. There are two things that determine the natural angle your fingers rest on the strings: 1) the length of your fingers. 2) the angle of your arm in relation to the instrument.

So, because your small finger is shortest, ring and index are about the same and middle is longest, there is a natural angle to the line connecting your finger tips of about 60 degrees small to index, or 45 degrees small to middle finger. This is in relation to the access of your forearm without deviating your wrist. If all your fingers were the same length, it would be 90 degrees.

OK, so now look at a chord in first position, melody side. Say a “C” with the root on the 6th string, 13th fret. The third will be on the 5th string 12th fret, and the fifth will be on the 4th string, 10th fret. The angle of this position to the access of the stick is about 30 degrees (ok 150 if you want to measure it that way, whatever.)

When I play at this level (10 to 13th fret, melody side) My right arm approaches the stick at about 90 degrees. As a result the natural angle of my fingers being ~60 degrees to my arm puts it 30 degrees to the stick. In other words, very naturally aligned to the position of the notes.

BUT, this is not the case when playing the Bass side, because you don’t play the bass side down at the 10th fret or lower. You can’t; your hands would interfere with one another. So, you play up around the 5th to 8th fret. So taking up our example, and playing C starting with string 7 fret 8, string 8 fret 7 and string 9 Fret 5, you again get a 1,3,5 chord. But this time the angle is about 15 degrees, because the frets are longer. My arm doesn’t naturally come in at 90 degrees either. It comes in from lower, and this even more apparent if you go higher in the neck. So you end up flexing your wrist, and the notes don’t line up well with the 30 degree angle of your fingers. Raising your elbow to straighten your wrist, makes the natural alignment of your fingers even further off from the notes, so you end up trying to bend your wrist towards your thumb. But your wrist doesn’t deviate very far in this direction due to the radial styloid, and so you end up straining at the limits of your range of motion, which causes pain.

(Another problem is that the close intervals of a 1,3,5 chord sounds muddy in the lower registers, but that is a separate issue…)

So, what to do.

What I would really like to try is parallel 4ths – just flipping the order of the bass strings. That is much more comfortable, based on my trying those chord shapes, (but without actually playing that way obviously). I even considered ordering a set of strings to try this out. But when I talked with Cambria, she pointed out that the instrument is set up for the fat/low strings to be in the middle, with a thing called Bass relief. I don’t actually know how much of a problem this would be. On a grand stick the base relief is more subtle than on a railboard, where you can actually see it with the naked eye. But I decided not to mess with it.

Another option I thought about would be to play uncrossed. But playing melody with my left hand low, reverses the pitch of my finger tip angle, and makes that uncomfortable, unless I change the string order, which again gets into the problem of the heavy strings being on the outside and the bass relief set up for the fat strings in the middle. No joy.

So what else… hmmm. What if I tried switching the strings left to right to put the melody on the right side and bass on the left, and just played melody with my left hand and bass with my right? Sort of setting up the instrument left handed, I guess. Well I can simulate that now by just playing my left hand low bass side and right hand high melody side.... Immediate problems become apparent – I can’t see my left hand because my right arm is in the way. Interestingly though, it is fairly comfortable.

Hmm. That was comfortable. Ok, what if I just play it set up as is, but left handed… in otherwords, put it on my right shoulder instead of left. Wow. That is really comfortable, at least in first position. And instead of getting worse going into the lower register, it actually gets better. Visualization of the melody side is somewhat compromised higher up the neck, but isn’t bad down below 12th fret. Not sure why my view isn't as blocked the other way, probably has to do with the angle of the instrument being more across my chest than up and down.

In anycase, I’m going to play around with this for a while. I don’t think I can play mirrored 4ths in the standard position. Meanwhile, I’ve ordered MR strings so if this doesn’t work out, I’ll be switching to that.

I bet Emmet spent loads of time trying out all these positions. I’d love to hear his thoughts about this. Meanwhile I’m having lots of fun learning what works for me.

Really interesting to read.
All I can give you is my own opinion based on my experience.
Why I jumped back to matched reciprocal was for a couple of reasons...

1) I play that big fat "rock and roll" powerchord (R58va) all the time. It sounded better in 5ths tuning on the bass side than it did in a 4ths tuning. Probably because my left hand was having a tough time articulating the notes.

2) Classic seemed to have too much space between the L and R hand, so although I liked that tuning also, I felt like any step I could take to simplify things was worthwhile. Chords felt too far apart, scale to root was kind of distanced also, and you know me, I want this thing as easy as possible for my music...

3) Everything you play on the melody side is exactly the same notes as on the bass side. So fucking what if it's backwards. All of my 3 note per string stuff translates over, as below... Now, of course when you play good 'ole C Major as a scale on the bass side using this fingering, it might sound a bit weird as a scale because it will drop an octave each time you change strings. BUT... The notes are there, and in order, every one and in a handy dandy tight position.

Melody Side
C--------------------------------------------------------------2--4--5--------
G--------------------------------------------------2--4--5-------------------
D--------------------------------------2--3--5-------------------------------
A-------------------------2---3---5-------------------------------------------
E-------------1--3--5--------------------------------------------------------
B---1--3--5------------------------------------------------------------------

Bass Side
C--------------------------------------------------------------2--4--5--------
G--------------------------------------------------2--4--5-------------------
D--------------------------------------2--3--5-------------------------------
A-------------------------2---3---5-------------------------------------------
E-------------1--3--5--------------------------------------------------------
B---1--3--5------------------------------------------------------------------

Normally, when in 5ths if you want to play a 'scale' it seems that a 4 note per-string approach is in order. Like so with the same scale (Keep in mind that I consider my first tappable fret to be my "open" string...) So yeah, C major scale on the bass side in the "proper" order.

C----0---2---4---5------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
G------------------------0---2---4---5----------------------------------------------------------------------
D-------------------------------------------0---2--3---5----------------------------------------------------
A-------------------------------------------------------------0--2--3--5------------------------------------
E------------------------------------------------------------------------------0--1--3--5-------------------
B-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------0--1--3--5--

I am of the opinion that it's all just a pool of notes, and THAT is what I want access to. So yeah, I practice it "both" ways. But I know my scales really, really well on another instrument as 3 note per string type things,so it only makes sense to leverage that knowledge and ability. The same thing goes with chords and arpeggios. I already come equipped with what is really an extensive knowledge of chords and arpeggios, why not use, em?

Yeah, so the octave is displaced. I really don't care. I have been borrowing from and using that way of thought in my tunes for months now and nobody has said anything. An 'A' is an 'A' if you catch my drift... Plus, I can play standard stick tunes if I want, and cross or uncross if I want. Lots of options for doing my own thing, while still being able to leverage the teachings of the, umm "masters" lol...

Hopefully I am not coming across as lazy, non-diligent, or impatient... Waste not, want not...

Food for thought?

"Food for thought?"

Always man, always. I really appreciate your input. Hopefully my notes will save someone a few steps along their journey.

I'm the type of guy who likes not just knowing what to do but why to do it that way. Unfortunately people here are a) talented and b) flexible, which yields a lot of "sure, that'd work. I do it different but you could do that." and less "You could do this, but this is why it may not want to."

So, I try it out different ways, and likely I will end up in the same place as everyone else, but having taken a different route to get there. But heck, Life is less about the destination than the journey anyhow.

I strongly suspect I'm going to switch to MR...but the strings won't be here for a week, so I figure why not fool around with the mirrored 4ths in weird ways till they get here?

The only reason I first chose matched reciprocal when I ordered my stick was because I read somewhere that both hands would be more separated from each other than if I used classical tuning. The thought behind it was: "I know exactly what I want to play, any tuning will be fine, but this one will leave my hands out of each other's way, so I'll go with this one." The fact that I have the same notes in the same fret doesn't prove to be much of an asset due to the fact that, as I suspected, the brain will always tend to memorize things graphically, so, in time, it has been memorizing notes on the bass side and notes on the melody side. Especially since the hands are not usually in the same fret, it would take too much time to think "the C on the bass side is here so the melody side C should be here also."
One funny thing that happened to me was that I miss read the instructions and made a confusion involving the X fret and ended up tuning the whole stick a half step too high. Only found out about it at stick camp, 3 months later. By then, I already had Bach's prelude memorized along a few other songs and I was really, and I mean, really pissed, with it. The prelude alone took me 1 month to learn, working really hard every single day, and the main reason I chose this one to start with was: it is extremely simple (one note at a time, both hands are working on the same pattern) and it's perfect to memorize chords, notes, and to learn the Physics implied in chords and their inversions. It is perfect as the first thing to get to know your stick.
Anyway, so there I was, everything I learned was wrong by a half step. Spent a lot of time thinking if I should just stick with it (pun intended). The guys there were even making up a new name for it "half-raised matched reciprocal"
Finally decided on relearn everything for one reason: decrease the tension on the strings.
All of this I'm describing is just because, in my opinion, you should choose the tuning according to the kind of music you wan't to play, not because it seems easier. Music always comes first.

Now for the technical part. Once the tuning was decided and I started spending endless hours with it two things became apparent:
1st - it's a lot easier for the right hand than it is for the left one.
2nd - I use too much force on the left hand and it never really seems to be as relaxed as the other one. Plus the wrist bending.... man, what a struggle!
Couple of things that really helped along the way:
- taking my eyes off the fingerboard. That enables me to have the stick facing front thus increasing the left hand access to the strings.
- closing my eyes: I can have a much better perception of the amount of strength used by my left hand, and the overall music, for that matter.
- Greg's 3 finger pattern for left hand scales - what can I say? It's genius!
- the more vertical, the more comfortable and less tiring.
- stick your elbow a little bit out: I know it seems a bit uncomfortable at first, but once your body learns the position, everything is easier and sounds better.
And none of these have anything to do with the tuning you chose! they're just good principles for look for: good technique means you have a way to translate to the instrument your musical ideas.
Finally, pursuing this idea that the better access the left hand has, the better I'll play with it, I recently ordered from SE a non angled belt hook. You see, my hands are small, and I need all the help I can get - have you seen the size of Bob's fingers? Or Kevin Keith's?
So I got it but I forgot to mention it was for a railboard and not a wood stick so it doesn't fit right. Tried it anyway, even if it's loose and not quite right and I got to tell you: In 5, really, JUST 5 Minutes, I was able to do things that were a dream before. All the tension is out and I finally feel my left hand free as my right one always was. For the first time since I got the instrument, a little over a year ago, I feel that both my hands have the same access to the instrument. Now I understand the true meaning of Emmet's sentence: free hands! as in plural!

Finally, the 5ths on the bass side. I had a couple of concerns before I got the stick: Will I end up confusing were to go when I change from the bass to the stick? Will it ever make sense the inverted position? From my experience, the brain truly is a magnificent thing: it doesn't make any mistakes or mess changing from one to the other. No more than it does if I go from the piano to the guitar. Different instruments, that's all.
Just To wrap things up, if I was to give any advice, based solely on my own personal experience, it would be:
Choose the tuning based on what do you intend to do with the instrument.
Look for any and all possible ways to free your left hand, granting the best possible access of those fingers to the fingerboard.
Don't worry about the inverted 5ths: Just learn a few songs, one step at a time and your brain will figure it out in the background.

Sorry if this is too long. It's just that I've been worrying for so long with my left hand that it became a really important subject for me
I'll let you guys know how it went, once I get the right non angled belt hook. I suspect I will want to rearrange and enrich every single song in my repertoire
Cheers
Rodrigo










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Thanks for your input! I think this is a really important topic for the beginner - it seems we all spend a great deal of time thinking about it. So the more points of view the better.

Can you expound a bit on your comment "Choose the tuning based on what do you intend to do with the instrument."

Especially since this seems to be a change the opinion you stated at the beginning, "I know exactly what I want to play, any tuning will be fine."

How does the tuning you choose affect what you play or vise versa. Or put a different way, what tuning, in your experience, goes best with what style?

Oh, sorry if I didn't explain myself right. What I mean is, in my case, I wanted to do traditional music. For this kind of thing I would need, apart from the melody, a good consistent way of accompanying it with beautiful open chords and still put in some occasional bass lines. So any tuning that had the left hand in 5ths would do for me: raised, MR, classical, baritone... the thing with the bass side in 5ths is the abilty to play open chords and still have enough versatility to play good bass lines. I considered baritone melody for a long time and still think about it sometimes, I just love the overlapping... maybe if someday I get a 12 string. Anyway, as I said, I knew I wanted to do this but I also know that one of the things I'm always looking for in my arrangements is a way to have some contrapunctual voicings with the melody, so I wanted to have some room between both my hands to play a chord and still have enough room to stretch my fingers to the upper register of the bass side and embellish the melody that the right hand is doing without running out of space. That's why I ended up choosing MR - decision based on the knowledge of what I wanted to do musically.
Now let's say I wanted to do mostly Bach peaces, or to play some Brazilian Chorinho, things that don't need that much use of open chords but rely heavily on scalar bass lines: then I would have gone for a bass side tuned in fourths. This way the notes would all be much closer resulting in saving movement of the left hand and increasing speed and accuracy.
Of course none of this is limiting anything: I've seen people tuned in 4ths do amazing things I never thought possible, as well as seen some amazing Bach with left hand in 5ths. There is no limit, just small advantages and disadvantages in any tuning. But, If you know what you'll end up doing, it's a good starting point.
Now, for a completely different example, let's say you're already a bass player and want to use the stick for that specific role. Do you want to just have the stick sound and use what you already know? Go for the mirror 4ths. You want to explore a whole new world of possibilities in bass lines? Go for the inverted 5ths.
Anyway, it's just my opinion
Cheers Rodrigo




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I love Rod's comments, an excellent insightful post. I would pay money to see him pissed off hahaha lol Even in the "wrong tuning" the guy blew me away. ONE MONTH and he has a Bach piece together and performance ready. Awesome. I sure as hell didn't notice that he was "tuned wrong". And I still don't care hahaha It sounded awesome.

I can't speak for Rodrigo, but I'd love to chime in on some of his comments and maybe throw another perspective on his insights...

"Choose the tuning based on what do you intend to do with the instrument."
This is a tough one. For me, I knew the Stick was the right instrument for what I wanted to do, I just didn't know what that was exactly. lol I still don't. The only certainty was I wanted to self accompany. Thusly, I went through a whole bunch of tunings trying to find what was right for me.

"I know exactly what I want to play, any tuning will be fine."

Well, all of the notes are there, right? I mean... really there's only 12 of 'em so technically, if you are willing to think about it a bit and mess around any piece of music is possible in any tuning. Some will be easier to execute than others though... On this instrument, tuning is less of an issue than the simultaneous nature of playing. (Independence)

I agree that the music comes first. Always. But I will confess that I also believe that music (like language) is liquid, and therefore malleable. We can say the same thing many, many different ways... And as we learn to speak, read and write, like the children we are we may make the odd spelling error, and our letters may be backwards, messy, but the 'point' still gets across.

Awesome thread.

N. Awn Musishan

Couldn't agree with you more!
As for seeing me pissed... Ricardo is another stickist from Portugal, and he was there and he saw that. I'll tell you what I said to him next year, at Interlochen. You see, each time you write that we have little time and that we should learn faster, that totally resonates with me: time is precious.


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