Scordatura

A scordatura (Italian) is an alternate tuning used for the open strings of a string instrument. It is an extended technique used to allow the playing of otherwise impossible melodies, harmonies, figures, or other note combinations.

Scordatura in classical music

An example of programmatic composition using scordatura, by Heinrich Ignaz Biber (1644-1704):

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In the second sonata (2), for example, the higher two strings are unmodified while the lower two are both tuned up a wholestep. Though Biber was the most extensive Baroque composer for scordatura tuning, there are examples by Schumann and Bartok as well.

Related Topics:
Schumann - Bartok

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Other examples include:

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• Mozart, viola in Sinfonia Concertante for Violin, Viola and Orchestra. Changing the pitch of the open strings to a semitone higher was in this case probably primarily intended to make the viola sound louder, and so better discernable in the symphonic orchestra: indeed, increasing the tension in a string, not only sharpens the pitch, but also makes it sound louder, the loudest sound being obtained just before breaking.
• Mahler, scordatura violin soloist in the 2nd movement of his 4th Symphony. In this case the composer probably intended primarily the specific (tone)"color" of the sound produced by a scordatura violin, which is less suave than the sound of a standard tuning.
• Saint-Saëns, violin in Danse macabre
• Igor Stravinsky's The Firebird is a rare, perhaps unique, piece which calls for the entire violin section to retune a string, in order to play some natural harmonics.
• Bach's fifth cello suite requires the soloist to tune down their highest string from an A to a G.