the how to play bass monthly ezine - july 2014 · port for the walking basslines 101 course. ......

2 | Free How To Play Bass Monthly Ezine | July 2014 | how-to-play-bass.com

THE HOW TO PLAY BASS MONTHLY EZINE - July 2014

Welcome to the free how to play bass monthly ezine for July, 2014. In this month’s issue I’m going to feature another excerpt from a course I’m teaching on Walking Bass Line playing.

In this month’s ezine we’re going to include an excerpt from a bonus re-port for the Walking Basslines 101 Course. In June’s free monthly ezine we published an excerpt from Lesson 29 of my Walking Basslines 101 course. That excerpt was taking some ‘2-5-1 vocabulary- from a tran-scription of Autumn Leaves played by jazz great George Duvivier.

In this month’s free monthly ezine we’re going to take just one piece of vocabulary from last month’s excerpt and I’m going to show you some of the ways you can practice this...and talk about why this is important.

(The Bonus Report that this month’s excerpt is taking from is called Walking Bass Lines: The Futsal Way. For those who don’t know, Futsal is a version of soccer that involves a smaller pitch, less players and a small-er, heavier ball. To find out how this applies to walking bass lines you’ll have to enroll on the Walking Basslines Course!)

Updates To The How To Play Bass Website

Before we go onto the song tutorial I just want to take a moment to tell you about upcoming changes to the how to play bass website:

1. Firstly the website is being redeveloped/redesigned at the moment. I’m not sure when the new layout will roll out...but it will be in the next couple of months hopefully.

2. Those of you who’ve subscribed for longer than a few months will no-tice that the monthly ezines were erratic in 2013. That’s something I’m rectifying and from now on they will be regular. Every month there will be a new song tutorial and the previous months song tutorial will disap-pear into the archive of First Bass And Beyond.


3. Those of you who’ve visited the website recently may notice that it hasn’t been updated with new songs recently. That’s partly because of the redesign that’s ongoing. And partly because of a change of policy.

For most of 2013 I’ve been filming two video tutorials a week to tie in with my weekly magazine First Bass And Beyond. And I’ve been posting versions of those tutorials on youtube and on the How To Play Bass web-site.

I have nearly 300 videos on YouTube and have decided that although thetwo video tutorials a week schedule will continue, I won’t post many of these tutorials to Youtube anymore. Perhaps it will be one a month plus the free song tutorial like the one that usually features in the free month-ly ezine.

4. This policy is already under way - here are videos that subscribers of First Bass And Beyond have had access to that weren’t uploaded to Youtube:

Lets Spend The Night Together (Rolling Stones)Our Song (Taylor Swift)Sympathy For The Devil (Rolling Stones)Telegram Sam (T Rex)Ring Of Fire (Johnny Cash)We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (Taylor Swift)Schools Out (Alice Cooper)More Than A Feeling (Boston)Folsom Prison Blues (Johnny Cash(I Walk The Line (Johnny Cash)Tumbling Dice (Rolling Stones)Shake (Otis Redding)Boys Are Back In Town (Thin Lizzy)20th Century Boy (T Rex)Fa Fa Fa Fa (The Sad Song) - (Otis Redding)

5. Upcoming tutorials will be focused on songs that are commonly played by gigging bands. That will range from soul and R&B classics to rock and rock blues tunes.


6. I’ve added a new section to First Bass And Beyond called ‘Working Basslines.’ That section features complete tutorials for songs that bands commonly play - these tutorials feature streaming and downloadable videos, notation in PDF and tab, instruction on creating individual sec-tions in Band In A Box to isolate and practice (which includes necessary chords and keys and tempo information) and also bass less backing tracks to play along with.

7. There are two new sections to the First Bass And Beyond members area. The first of these is a section on Theory. Each of these lessons is serialized in the weekly issues of FB&B and then it is transferred to the

website and any musical examples are filmed and embedded at the ap-propriate place in the lesson. That way this becomes a permanent theo-ry resource for members of FB&B. So far we’ve covered 22 lessons - and we’ve looked at intervals of the major and minor scale as basic building blocks of music, along with an introduction to time signatures.

In September I’ll start adding to this with a detailed look at modes and chords and scale relationships.

The second new section of the First Bass And Beyond website - so new it’s not even officially published until Friday! - is a mini course on how to create and play bass lines from chord charts. Again, this is serialized in First Bass And Beyond and then transferred to the website. There are tons of exercises to practice this skill, plus MP3 backing tracks with no bass to practice with! Again, this will be another great resource for members of FB&B.

8. Over the next few months I’m going to finish serialising in the free monthly ezine a book I wrote - called LEARN SONGS NOT SCALES - that details the background to why I don’t think bass players should learn scales by rote. (Note bass players DO need to understand scales and how they are formed....but we don’t need to practice them by rote. It will all be spelled out over the next few months!) This month’s issue is so big that I’ve left this out this month.

5 | Free How To Play Bass Monthly Ezine | July 2014 | www.how-to-play-bass.com

Excerpt From Walking Basslines 101 Report - WALKING BASSLINES - THE FUTSAL WAY

Introduction

In last month’s free ezine we looked at extracting some 2-5-1 vocabulary from a transcription of George Duvivier’s performance on a tune called Autumn Leaves.

In July’s issue we’re going to look at some of the ways you can practice this.

Why Is Practicing 2-5-1 Vocabulary So Important?

The 2-5-1 progression is found throughout jazz. If you look at just about any improvisation tutorial book for other instruments - e.g. saxophone, piano, guitar etc - it’s common to find a number of solo phrases that fit over 2-5-1 progressions followed swiftly by the recommendation that you should practice them in every key.

If this is important for solo instruments, why should the bass be any dif-ferent?

The answer is of course that it’s not. When you find a phrase that fits the 2-5-1 progression and that you like - as we did last month by lifting phrases from George Duvivier’s bass line on Autumn Leaves - then in order to be able to use that in different jazz tunes you need to practice this vocabulary thoroughly in order to assimilate it so that when you are playing you can use this vocabulary without really thinking about it.

Before we can learn how to practice a piece of vocabulary thoroughly we need to identify a piece of vocabulary that we can use as a model.

Here’s a nice piece of vocabulary that we’re going to use for the rest of today’s process:


Without practicing this in all 12 key areas, and with different ideas and permutations, you won’t truly master this vocabulary. So let’s start look-ing at some of the ways you can practice this so that you can thoroughly assimilate this vocabulary.

(Paul’s Note - this vocabulary has a very deliberate rhythmic focus - as you can see the line is strictly comprised of quarter notes. Once the vocabulary is assimilated it’s a relatively easy step to vary it with differ-ent rhythmic articulations.)

Let’s start assimilating....

1. Practicing Through Individual Key Areas Individually

The featured piece of vocabulary is in the key of Bb. The first step is to practice this piece of vocabulary individually in all 12 keys.

Now that sounds fairly basic...and it is. But even with this simple first step there are multiple ways of practicing this.

1.1 Practicing In Different Locations Of The Fretboard

If you remember from the June issue the original vocabulary was actu-ally pitched an octave higher. We know it works at that octave...so we should practice the vocabulary in that octave too:


If you look closely at the tab you’ll see that this has all been tabbed out on a single string. And you can walk up the neck in this manner. But you should also practice playing in different locations. For example starting at the 10th fret of the D string:

1.2 The Perpetual Motion Practice Exercise

When you get comfortable playing this line in different places on the fretboard then you can turn this into a perpetual motion exercises. Here’s how this works. You pick a place to start the line...and you can ONLY play the assigned pitches in the order shown in the line.

And you have to keep playing forward - set yourself a number of repeti-tions of the basic four bar sequence. For example, let’s say you are going to play 16 bars.

So the challenge becomes having to shift locations by using octave dis-placement. Here’s one way you could use octave displacement to get through 16 bars:


Notes:

1. Octave displacement works best (IMO) on beats 2 and 42. Anytime you use a note that corresponds to an open string is a


great chance to use octave displacement using the open string.3. Any time you get a repeated note in a bass line - e.g. the repeated Bb’s in Bar 3 - you’ve got another great opportunity to use octave displace-ment.4. Octave displacement works displacing up as well as down. In this example I’ve used down exclusively - that’s because the shape of the line is upwards.

1.3 Disguising The Line With Rhythmic Variations

You can also practice disguising the line with rhythmic variations.

(Excerpt not shown)

1.4 Practicing In This Manner In All 12 Keys

Once you’ve worked through Bb, then work through the remaining 11 key areas using these ideas!

When you are comfortable in all 12 keys then you can move onto Prac-tice Exercise 2.

2. Practicing 2-5-1 Lines With Progressions That Modulate Through All 12 Keys

Once you have thoroughly mastered the line in the individual keys you can start practicing with longer chord progressions that modulate through the 2-5-1 progression in all 12 keys!

Now the obvious ways to string these 12 key centres together are either via the cycle of fifths. Or chromatically (either up and down). But you should practice moving the 2-5-1 progressions in major seconds (two cycles), minor thirds (four cycles) and major thirds (three cycles).

Here for example is our basic line played around the first three key cen-tres if we were moving in descending major seconds:


When you’re practicing like this you can use octave displacement to ex-plore the line over the full range of your fretboard.

Practicing through the different possibilities that cycle through all 12 keys help thoroughly prepare for how 2-5-1 progressions modulate in real world jazz songs.

Some things to remember when practicing in this manner:

1. Always start exercises in different keys. That ensures you are equally comfortable in Gb major as you are in C major. There’s no such thing as a ‘weak’ key - there’s only key areas that haven’t been practiced as thor-oughly as other keys.

2. Always practice with tracks that have rhythmic as well as chordal backing. That way you’ll get a ton of subliminal ear training practice.

3. Always start out slowly. Better to be able to play through successfully


at 80 BPM than scuff through at 120 BPM. Greater facility WILL come with practice - always aim to practice at a speed where you can practice as perfectly as possible.

Let’s move onto Practice Exercise 3.

3. Convert Major 2-5-1 Lines to Minor 2-5-1 (and Vice Versa)

Here’s a reminder of our Major 2-5-1 line:

Let’s convert it to a minor 2-5-1. In Bb, the minor 2-5-1 chords would be Cm7b5 to F7b9 to Bbmin7. This particular line needs two note to change to make it fit:

When changing from Cm7 to Cm7b5 - the basic change to make is that any fifths change to b5. We didn’t need to make any alterations there - though we could have changed the ‘2’ to ‘b2’ if we’d wanted a more sca-lar sound.

When changing from F7 to F7b9, the second (or ninth) is the scale de-gree we need to amend. In this example I duplicated the root note and then played the b2 (b9) before jumping to the major third.


When changing from Bbmaj7 to Bbm7 the main notes to look out for are the major 7 and the major third - both of which should be flattened.

When you convert major 2-5-1 lines to minor - and vice versa - some-times you’ll come upon moderately interesting variations (like this example). And sometimes you’ll come up with really interesting varia-tions. My recommendation is that if you come up with something that you really like the sound of, then take that back to Step 1 and practice it thoroughly. If a conversion sounds only OK....that’s a guideline that it’s something to take note of, but perhaps not invest lots of hours of prac-tice time.

Time for Practice Step 4.

4. Trimming Line to 2-5 - Practicing In Cycles of 2-5

The next step is to trim the 2-5-1 line down to just a 2-5 line and then practice that in cycles. Here is our original line trimmed down to a 2 bar pattern:

And here’s the first few bars using this line and moving through the Cycle of fourths:


Notice the use of the open D string to facilitate octave displacement and a position shift in Bar 5.

As with the 2-5-1 progression , there are multiple ways of practicing modulating the basic 2-5 chord unit. Make sure you practice them all!

5. Using the 2-5 Line On The Bridge Of I Got Rhythm

Back in Lesson 22 we looked at playing through the bridge section of I Got Rhythm. That bridge section looks like this:


But as we saw in Lesson 22 you can ‘suggest’ the 2-5 as an implied chord progression. That looks like this:

And here’s this implied Rhythm Changes bridge with our 2-5 line:

And of course you could use this line as part of your I Got Rhythm prac-tice in all 12 keys - or you could just isolate the bridge and practice that in all 12 keys. Or you could extend this progression through the Cycle of 5ths to practice this in all 12 key centres.


This idea is something that we can also add to our modal bass line cre-ation.

6. Using 2-5 Lines On Modal Tunes

As we saw in Lesson 27, one way to create more interest in our bass lines on modal tunes is to use this idea of implied chord changes that we used in the I Got Rhythm bridge.

So instead of looking at a section of a tune like So What? as 8 bars of Dm7, we can look at it as four two chord units going from Dm7 to G7. And that gives us a further opportunity to practice and use our 2-5 line.

Here’s 8 bars played with this implied two chord progression - and using octave displacement to play over the fretboard:

Of course you can use this idea over the Ebm7 section of the tune as well.


Summary

This excerpt is from a bonus report called Walking Basslines - The Fut-sal Way. And hopefully as you can see you can get a lot of mileage from just ONE walking 2-5-1 line.

The benefits of practicing in this thorough manner are:

1. Assimilation of authentic repertoire to the point that it can be used in multiple tunes and chordal situations2. Increased fluency across the fingerboard3. Subliminal ear training (if practicing with realistic backing tracks with chordal material as well as rhythmic material)

Additional practice should include:

1. Incorporating practice repertoire into deliberate compositions of lines for songs2. Disguising cyclical exercises by connecting up sections with different approach methods3. Cataloguing songs where 2-5 or 2-5-1 progressions are used. And catalogue those were these progressions modulate in a specific way (e.g. in Stella By Starlight there is a section with 2-5 chords modulating in descending major seconds) then make sure you take that modulation to your practice space.

Each time you practice a piece of repertoire in this manner you’ll find that the amount of time it takes to assimilate new repertoire decreases as you get more comfortable with the process.

Walking Bass Lines 101 For more information on my comprehensive walking bass lines course, please see this page:

http://www.how-to-play-bass.com/walking-basslines-101-join.html

http://www.how-to-play-bass.com/walking-basslines-101-join.html

17 | Free How To Play Bass Monthly Ezine | June 2014 | how-to-play-bass.com

FIRST BASS AND BEYOND - THE ULTIMATE SONG RESOURCE FOR BEGINNER AND INTERMEDIATE BASS PLAYERS

If you’ve read this far it shows that you’re interested in detailed song tu-torials for bass. How would you like to get access to over 200 song tutori-als over the next year for less than a dollar a tutorial? Well First Bass And Beyond gives you that....

Here’s how it works.

First Bass And Beyond is based on a magazine model and I publish a PDF like this one every Friday at 5pm GMT. Each magazine includes two song tutorials in the PDF that are complemented with video tutori-als and MP3s as well.

I publish 50 issues a year - so that’s 100 song tutorials over the next year.

Additionally there is a section of the website called Working Bass Lines - and new members will get a new song every week in that section of the website. That takes you up to 150 song tutorials in the next year. (See list at the end of this PDF)

When you join you get access to the archive of the free How To Play Bass monthly ezine - there are currently 35 videos in that archive. That’s 185 song tutorials. (These 35 tutorials are all immediately available - and to see what songs are available, see the list at the end of the PDF)

When you join you also get access to the Bass For Beginners course which currently includes another 35 song tutorials - that makes 220 song tutorials. (And these 35 tutorials are available immediately).

Plus if you subscribe as an annual member you get 10 back issues of the magazine as a bonus - that could potentially add another 20 song tutori-als to your song tutorial library!

There’s more in the magazine too - a main transcription every week that is usually more advanced and doesn’t have video to go with. Plus there’s


a theory column for bass players taught from the perspective of the bass player’s role in a band playing songs. And there’s currently a columndeconstructing the playing of Rocco Prestia of Tower Of Power. When this column has finished I’ll move on and deconstruct Tommy Shannon’s bass playing. And so on.

All this costs either $57 for a quarter or $187 for a year. The full details are here:

http://www.how-to-play-bass.com/first-bass-and-beyond.html

Contact

If you’ve got any other questions don’t hesitate to email me via the con-tact form on the website.

Have a great month, and enjoy.

Paul

PS - there are lists of what songs are featured in the Archive and what songs are featured in the Working Bass Line Section to follow.

http://www.how-to-play-bass.com/first-bass-and-beyond.html


LIST OF SONGS INCLUDED IN THE WORKING BASS LINES SECTION OF THE FIRST BASS AND BEYOND WEBSITE

When I decided on creating this section of the First Bass And Beyond website I polled the current subscribers who are currently in gigging bands and asked for them to post their set lists. The following list of songs is pooled from these set lists - and bear in mind that although the bulk of those who responded live and gig in the US, I also had responses from the UK, Australia and other countries.

This section WILL be expanded to 100 songs in the future - and un-doubtedly there will be more classic rock, more classic R&B, more Mo-town, a heap of blues songs and more!

PLEASE NOTE: when you join FB&B these songs appear on a weekly basis....starting with Midnight Hour.

1. Midnight Hour by Wilson Pickett2. Brown Sugar by The Rolling Stones3. Proud Mary by Creedence Clearwater Revival4. Jumping Jack Flash by The Rolling Stones5. Superstition by Stevie Wonder6. Play That Funky Music b7 Wild Cherry7. I Feel Good by James Brown8. Cocaine by Eric Clapton9. Respect by Aretha Franklin10. Sweet Home Alabama by Lynyrd Skynyrd11.Sultans Of Swing by Dire Straits12.La Grange by ZZ Top13. We Are Young by Fun14. Brown Eyed Birl by Van Morrison15. Johnny B Goode by Chuck Berry16 Who’ll Stop The Rain by Creedence Clearwater Revival17. September by Earth Wind And Fire18. Good Times by Chic19.. Gimme Some Loving by The Blues Brothers20. Twist and Shout by The Beatles21. Pride And Joy by Stevie Ray Vaughan


22. Mustang Sally by The Commitments23. Get It On by T Rex24. I Wish by Stevie Wonder25. Long Train Running by The Doobie Brothers26.Little Wing by Jimi Hendrix27. Satisfaction by The Rolling Stones28. I Saw Her Standing There by The Beatles29. Summer of 69 by Bryan Adams30. Lost In Music by Sister Sledge31.Soul Man by Sam And Dave32. Suspicious Minds by Elvis33.Back In The USSR by The Beatles34.Carwash by Rose Royce35. Le Freak by Chic36. Stand By Me by Ben E King37. Pinball Wizard by The Who38. Billie Jean by Michael Jackson39. Honky Tonk Woman by The Rolling Stones40. Hey Joe by Jimi Hendrix41. Forget You by Ceelo Green42. Locked Out Of Heaven by Bruno Mars43. Let’s Stick Together by Roxy Music44. Stuck In The Middle With You by Stealer’s Wheel45. Brick House by The Commodores46. Great Balls Of Fire by Jerry Lee Lewis47. Moves Like Jagger by Maroon 548. Smooth by Santana49.Roadhouse Blues by The Doors50. Black Magic Woman by Santana

Note: Tutorials for some of these songs can be found on my YouTube channel. The ‘working basslines’ section has a fuller tutorial with tab and notation, has bass less backing tracks to practice with, and also has a tutorial section on programming the different sections of the tune with Band In A Box so that you can isolate sections giving you problems.


LIST OF SONGS INCLUDED IN THE ARCHIVE SECTION OF THE FIRST BASS AND BEYOND WEBSITE

A Love Of Their Own by The Average White BandAfter Midnight by Eric ClaptonAll The Small Things by Blink 182Alright Now by FreeBand Of Gold by Freda Payne7 Nation Army by The White StripesSunshine Of Your Love by CreamGreen Onions by Booker TBehind A Painted Smile by The Isley BrothersBlack Dog by Led ZeppelinCrossroads by CreamDock Of The Bay by Otis ReddingDon’t Stand So Close to me by The PoliceFactory Of Faith by The Red Hot Chili PeppersGet Lucky by Daft PunkGo Your Own Way by Fleetwood MacGrapevine by Marvin GayeHey Soul Sister by TrainI Fought The Law by The ClashI Wish by Stevie WonderLayla by Derek and The DominosLondon Calling by The ClashMan On The Moon by REMRespect by Aretha Franklin Rock The Casbah by The ClashSex On Fire by The Kings of LeonSigned Sealed Delivered by Stevie WonderStir It Up by Bob MarleySummer of 69 by Bryan AdamsSuperstition by Stevie WonderSweet Home Alabama by Lynyrd SkynyrdThe One I Love by REMValerie by Amy WinehouseWhen You Were Young by The Killers

the how to play bass monthly ezine - july 2014 · port for the walking basslines 101 course. ......

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