transcription to black dog by led...

2 | Free How To Play Bass Monthly Ezine | March 2012 | how-to-play-bass.com

TRANSCRIPTION to BLACK DOG by LED ZEPPELIN

This month transcription is the bass line by John Paul Jones to the Led Zep-pelin classic “Black Dog.”

This is one of those tunes that every bass player should know - it’s a great line and it’s fun to play.

This was originally featured in one of the very first issues of First Bass And Beyond and I filmed a 40 minute tuto-rial that has been buried away on my hard drive - so I thought it was time to

blow away the virtual dust!

Effectively there are 4 sections in this tune. When I entered them into Sibelius I called them: Main Riff, Main Riff Variations, Easy Bit, and 2nd Easy Bit!

And that’s how I’m going to present them for this lesson, rather than give you a complete transcription which actually might bog you down. And once you’ve learned the parts it will be a good exercise for you to put them together ‘by ear’ and playalong to the Led Zepp original.

APPROACH TO THIS TUNE

I’m going to spell out this approach in more detail in the Video Tutorial that accompanies this lesson.

Here’s how I would recommend that you learn it.

First learn the main riff. ONLY when you’re comfortable with this riff, then move onto the Main Riff variation - which incorporates the main riff and then master that. Spend some time thoroughly mastering these two sections before you look at the two ‘easy’ parts - the second easy part is effectively used as a repetitive device under the solo. And the first


easy part is a ‘connector’ - it provides some musical relief before the riff comes in again.

So let’s look at the parts. Here’s the main riff:

Now if you’re a beginner - or you’ve not been playing too long - the sight of 6:4 and 5:4 bars might put you off. Don’t let it. I’ll cover this in greater detail in the video but rather than formally ‘count’ through this if you don’t have the experience, a good tip is to listen to the riff over and over and then start humming how it goes.

That will give you the ‘sound’ of the rhythm - and then you just need to add the notes to it. Another approach you can take - especially if you’ve got a Tascam Bass Trainer, or software that allows you so slow something down without changing the pitch AND loop it - is to just play it as a loop and play it over and over again.

When you can play it at slower tempos then gradually increase the tem-po. And make sure you can play it perfectly before you move the tempo upwards again.

Again, refer to the video lesson for more details on this.


When you’ve mastered the first riff, then you need to deal with the sec-ond riff - where you’ve got the added complication of a modulation to playing the riff in a different key PLUS the line you played in 5:4 you still play, but now you play it in 4:4 so it displaces a note by a beat.

And if that wasn’t enough the bass and the guitar kind of float over the rhythm that’s provided by the drums. So it sounds complex.

Here’s what it looks like:

Again this looks and sounds complex. But again the strategy of slowing it down and looping just this part and listening to this part in isolation will let you absorb the ‘sound’ of it. Once you’ve got that firmly in your head start ‘adding the notes’ to it and playing through it slowly again.


Only move the tempo up a notch once you’re comfortable that you can play it. And then repeat it more times and again only move the tempo up a notch when you’re comfortable. And then you can work it up to performance tempo.

Once you’ve mastered these two parts then you’ve got the two ‘easy parts.’ Here’s the first one:

Please note that the first bar of this part is the same as the last bar of the part above - but in my version of Sibelius I don’t know how to get a hold right at the start of the four bars shown here.

Here’s the second 4 bar ‘easy part’ - this is the predominant pattern used under the guitar solo.

So once you’ve mastered the two ‘hard’ parts - and can play them with-out thinking - then look at these two parts and try playing along with John Bonham and Co and seeing if you can get everything in order by using your ears!


As with all the transcriptions I do, the Tab I’ve used are the positions I would probably use whilst playing through the tune. Feel free to change the tab to suit your own positioning system, bass scale and size of your hands.

Enjoy.

As always if you have any questions or queries feel free to drop me an email.


FIRST BASS AND BEYOND

As well as the free monthly ezine, I also publish a weekly magazine called FIRST BASS AND BEYOND.

First Bass And Beyond is published every Friday, usually weighs in at around 50 to 55 pages and follows this format:

1. Main Transcription: The main transcription each week is featured in notation, and then in notation and tab. Recent transcriptions have included basslines like Chicken Grease (D’Angelo), Graceland (Paul Si-mon), Walk Between The Raindrops (Donald Fagin), Africa (Toto) and others. Future transcriptions will include bass lines from James Jamer-son, Audioslave, Robert Plant and more.

2. Beginners Corner: The beginners corner is a bass line/lesson that is suitable for beginners/intermediate players to play. The beginners cor-ner lesson is also turned into a video - a basic version goes on YouTube, and a High Def version is available for the members to download. (This version features extra content including playalongs to the original re-cording at normal speed and also slowed down). Currently the Begin-ners Corner is featuring a mini series of John Deacon lines. The next series will be Doors bass lines.

3. The Deliberate Practice Cello Challenge: This column is taking the Deliberate Practice approach to learning a complex piece of music in 4 bar chunks. The piece of music we’re learning is the Bach Suite 1 Pre-lude in G Major. This has nearly finished and will be replaced with a detailed column on Time and Groove for Bass Players.

4. Blues Bass For Beginners

This is a new column for beginners in the weekly magazine that will build on the 30 Module bass for beginners course that’s available to all annual subscribers. There will be a song tutorial in every column.

5. Bass Book/DVD Review There is a detailed bass book or bass DVD


review in each ezine too - recently I’ve been reviewing books from other musical instruments and disciplines that we can use to create interest-ing new exercises for the bass.

6. Monthly Ezine Archive Annual Subscribers will also get access to the archive of all previous monthly ezines. (So far that’s 12 Video/PDF les-sons)

7. Bass For Beginners Course Annual Subscribers also get access to the 30 Module Bass For Beginners Course that’s been running over the last 7 onths in First Bass And Beyond. There’s a detailed overview below.

Here’s the First Bass And Beyond page - for more information if you’re interested in joining. (If you’re interested but not sure, drop me an email and I’ll send you a random copy so you can see for yourself what I pro-duce every week).

The Bass For Beginners Course

I used to teach an interactive series of lessons for beginners - but I got full up pretty quickly. So I started a waiting list. That got full up too. And I hated emailing people and telling them that I was full. So I de-cided to revamp my course and turn it into a series of lessons that a be-ginner could follow and go from just picking up the bass to being able to play though a bunch of songs, to have a simple yet robust left and right hand technique, and be aiming to ramp up to a low intermediate stan-dard by the end of the course.

That course is going to be about 30 lessons long - and currently stands at 15 lessons. Here’s what we’ve covered so far:

Lesson 1 Lesson 1 is about plucking hand technique. The technique I teach is called the 2 Finger Rest Stroke and I go into how it works, anchor points for your thumb, and some simple exercises to get you to start working on this technique.

http://www.how-to-play-bass.com/songs-adventures-raindance-maggie.html


Lesson 2 Lesson 2 is a further development of Lesson 1 - we’re still work-ing on plucking hand technique. In Lesson 2 we’re looking at how the plucking hand deals with string crossing.

Lesson 3 So far we’ve been working on our right hand technique in an ascending fashion - now we’re adding the ‘rest’ to the rest stroke and working on descending as well.

Lesson 4 In Lesson 4 we introduce the fretting hand and look at basic fretting hand exercises. We talk about finger independence and digital exercises. And then we get to the heart of my method - applying this information to songs. In Lesson 4 we’re learning one of the easiest bass lines in history - With Or Without You by U2.

Lesson 5 In Lesson 5 we’re going to start systematically learning the notes on our bass guitar fretboard. We’re going to use an exercise called The Notefinder to learn every location where you can play the notes ‘E’ or ‘F’ on your fretboard. In the song tutorial part of the lesson we’re looking at the first part of a simplified version of Every Breath You Take by The Police.

Lesson 6 In Lesson 6 we’re continuing our explorations of the finger-board - we’re learning all the locations of the notes ‘F#’ and ‘G’. And in the song tutorial section of the lesson we’re learning the rest of Every Breath You Take.

Lesson 7 In Lesson 7 we’re adding two more notes to our ‘palette’ of learned notes - this week it’s ‘Ab’ and ‘A.’ And in the song tutorial we’re learning So Lonely by The Police.

Lesson 8 In Lesson 8 we’re moving further up the fretboard and learn-ing the location of ‘Bb’ and B. And we’re having an introductory look at rhythm.

Lesson 9 In Lesson 9 we’re learning the locations of ‘C’ and ‘Db.’ And we’re looking at a bassline that uses whole notes and eighth notes - that’s Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol.


Lesson 10 In this lesson we’re going to learn the last two notes we need to learn to complete our 12 note palette - ‘Eb’ and ‘E.’ And we’re spend-ing some time looking at quarter note bass lines - we’re looking at some bass line snippets like Moondance and My Baby Just Cares For Me and then we have a detailed song tutorial and we’re using Rock Around The Clock by Bill Haley as our ‘quarter note rhythm’ tune.

Lesson 11 In this lesson we’re doing two things with the note finder exercises we’ve been working on. Firstly we’re creating a composite ex-ercise with all 12 notes. And we’re using a pack of playing cards to ‘ran-domize’ what we play so that we can be sure we truly know it. We’re also looking at how you can use a Tascam Bass Trainer to slow a piece of mu-sic down to learn it, and why this is important. We’re doing this with an 8 bar section of Superstition.

Lesson 12 In this lesson we’re developing on our left hand technique with some digital permutation exercises, we’re learning a specific rhyth-mic pattern and how to count it, and then we’re learning a song based on that rhythmic pattern. That song is My Girl by The Temptations.

Lesson 13 In this lesson we’re got another set of left hand technique/digital permutation exercises, we’re learning a specific rhythmic pattern and how to count it, and then we’re learning a song based on that rhyth-mic pattern. That song is Tramp by Otis Redding.

Lesson 14 In this lesson we’re got another set of left hand technique/digital permutation exercises, we’re learning a specific rhythmic pattern and how to count it, and then we’re learning a song based on that rhyth-mic pattern. That song is Tramp by Otis Redding.

Lesson 15 In this lesson we’ve got a composite set of rhythmic exer-cises and we’re looking in more detail at straight 8th note rhythms - and the song we’re using to illustrate this is Dancing In The Dark by Bruce Springsteen.

Lesson 16 In this lesson we’ve got some more rhythmic exercises and the song we’re using to illustrate this is New Years Day by U2.


Lesson 17 In this lesson we start a mini-series on practice thoughts. Plus there’s a new set of rhythms and song that illustrates them. That song is Glory Days by Bruce Springsteen.

Lesson 18 In this lesson we’re continuing with our thoughts on practic-ing. Then we’re moving on with our rhythmic studies - and looking at the simple bass line to Stand By Me as our song tutorial.

Lesson 19 In Lesson 19 we’ve got more thoughts on practicing, and we’re continuing our rhythmic studies and our song tutorial is a song that blends two different rhythmic styles together - that song is Roxanne by The Police.

Lesson 20 In Lesson 20 we’ve got more thoughts on practicing and we’re looking at a rhythm that has a rest on the downbeat. The song tutorial that illustrates this unique rhythm is Addicted To Love by Robert Palmer.

Lesson 21 In Lesson 21we’re starting to move towards the ‘goal’ of the course - being able to play driving and dynamic 8th note based lines. The tutorial this week is Living On A Prayer by Bon Jovi.

Lesson 22 Lesson 22 focuses on practicing and a song tutorial called Keep On Running by Spencer Davis. This is a great bass line and willen-hance your left and right hand techniques.

Lesson 23 Lesson 23 has some more thoughts on practicing - and the song tutorial we’re looking at is that hoary old rock classic Smoke On The Water.

Lesson 24 Lesson 24 includes information on the Deliberate Practice concept of Comfort Zone/Learnign Zone and Panic Zone. And the song tutorial introduces the ‘slow learning’ method of mastering a song or bass line - and we’re using the Riff from Daytripper by the Beatles as our practical example.

Lesson 25 Lesson 25 looks at how to use the principles of Deliberate Practice to audit your practice sessions and make sure you are practicing efficiently. The song tutorial part of the lesson is a complete note by


note tutorial for Daytripper by The Beatles.

Lesson 26 Lesson 26 looks at a really powerful exercise that I learned from Jerry Jemmott - this exercise is called Say It Sing It Play it. The song tutorial is Jamerson’s driving 8th note line on This Old Heart Of Mine by The Isley Brothers.

Lesson 27 In Lesson 27 we’re looking at simple exercises that will in-crease your facility in playing in every key. The song tutorial for this lesson is another Jamerson 8th note line - it’s Get Ready by The Tempta-tions.

Lesson 28 In Lesson 28 we’re continuing to look at increasing your facil-ity in every key. And the song tutorial for this lesson is Nowhere To Run by Martha And The Vandellas

Lesson 29 In Lesson 29 we’re finishing up at our look at increasing your facility in every key. And the song tutorial for this lesson is I Saw Her Standing There by The Beatles/Paul McCartney. Great finger burner!

Lesson 30 In the final lesson of the course we’re looking at where to go from here, and the final song tutorial is Shake A Tailfeather by Duck Dunn/The Blues Brothers.

NOTE: all of these lessons are available to annual subscribers irre-spective of when they join. All the lessons feature notation and tab. All of the lessons feature the teaching in PDF and Video Format. There are downloadable backing tracks for most of the lessons at different tempos to help you practice and learn.

There are around 3 more lessons to go - when I’ve finished this course, then I will go back to ‘Rock Around The Clock/Lesson 10’ and create a ‘Blues Bass For Beginners’ course that spins off from there. That will also be available permanently to Annual Subscribers. If you figure what the cost of 30 lessons with a private instructor would be then this resource on its own justifies the $127 Annual Subscription fee.

And don’t forget that you’d get another 50 Video Lessons on top of this course. And a whole lot more too.


Here’s the First Bass and Beyond page again.

Contact

If you’ve got any other questions don’t hesitate to email me via the con-tact form on the website - or leave a comment on my Facebook Wall.

Have a great month, and enjoy.

Paul

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

http://www.how-to-play-bass.com/songs-adventures-raindance-maggie.html

transcription to black dog by led...

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