Real recorded double bass notes on a piano keyboard: click, touch or type, and the double bass answers. The double bass is the foundation of both the orchestra and the jazz band. Free, nothing to install, with note names, your computer keyboard and a metronome.
Recorded notes, the double bass's own range, and the keyboard you already know.
Every key plays a recording of a real double bass: 13 notes from F#1 to B3, each key pitched from the nearest one. The double bass is bowed and plucked string instrument: four strings tuned in fourths - E, A, D and G - like the four low strings of a bass guitar, bowed in the orchestra and plucked in jazz.
The keyboard covers E1 to C4, where the recordings sound natural; a real double bass plays E1 to about G4. Use the octave arrows to move, and More keys on a wide screen.
Play short, separate notes and walk up and down the scale - one note per beat - for a jazz walking bass. The note sounds as long as you hold the key, like a bow or a breath.
Famous double bass music: Saint-Saëns, The Carnival of the Animals: The Elephant; Beethoven, Symphony No. 5: the scherzo's trio; Jazz walking bass lines. Pick out a melody by ear on the keyboard above.
Click or touch a key. The first note starts the sound; the double bass recordings for the visible keys load in the background.
A S D F G H J K L play the white keys, W E T Y U O P the black ones (Q and Z on AZERTY). Z and X move an octave (W and X on AZERTY).
Set Labels to C D E or Do Ré Mi to see every note name, or to Keys to see your own keyboard letters.
Turn on the metronome and play along. Then try the same melody on the cello or the piano.
| Type | Sampled double bass, playable on this page, free |
|---|---|
| Family | Strings - bowed and plucked string instrument |
| Samples | 13 recorded notes, F#1 to B3 |
| Range here | E1 to C4 |
| Real range | E1 to about G4 |
| Notation | Bass clef, written an octave higher than it sounds |
| Controls | Labels, octave arrows, More keys and a metronome |
| Computer keyboard | Ableton layout by key position - QWERTY, AZERTY, QWERTZ |
| Credits | Double Bass samples from tonejs-instruments by Nicholas Brosowsky, CC BY 3.0 - see credits |
| Requirements | Any modern browser with Web Audio - Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari |
Most online instruments are a synthesiser with a picture on top. This one plays recordings of a real double bass, so the attack, the tone and the decay are the instrument's own. The double bass is the foundation of both the orchestra and the jazz band.
The largest and lowest bowed string instrument descends from the viol family as much as from the violins, which is why it is tuned in fourths and has sloping shoulders. In the 20th century it became the heartbeat of jazz.
A real double bass is written in bass clef, written an octave higher than it sounds. The keyboard here plays the sounding notes, so a melody you find by ear is the melody you hear. To go further, the free sheet music and chord pages work with any instrument you can read music on.
Yes. Every key plays a recording of a real double bass - 13 notes from F#1 to B3 - pitched to the nearest key. The recordings come from the tonejs-instruments library, under a Creative Commons licence.
Yes. The middle row of letters plays the white keys and the row above it the black keys, by key position, so it works the same on QWERTY, AZERTY and QWERTZ keyboards. Set Labels to Keys to see the letters on the keys.
A double bass plays E1 to about G4. On this page the keyboard goes from E1 to C4, where the recordings sound natural.
Saint-Saëns, The Carnival of the Animals: The Elephant; Beethoven, Symphony No. 5: the scherzo's trio; Jazz walking bass lines.
Yes, free with no account and nothing to install. It runs in any modern browser, on a computer, a tablet or a phone.
The double bass on this page is free, with no account. GOONS Studio adds a sampled piano, drum machines, synths and a sequencer in the browser - free for 7 days, no card required.
Free on this page, no account. Play the cello →