The IIB's New Online Bass CourseSoloing Techniques For Bass Guitar & Acoustic Bass
March 1, 2010
Ever since the introduction of the bass guitar and acoustic upright bass, a bassist's primary role has been to provide a supportive function as an accompanist within the setting of a rhythm section. Today, as a well-rounded bass player, you are also expected to produce lyrical solos with proficiency. Soloing Techniques is an intermediate to advanced level course that explores all of the fundamental elements required to improvise effective solos. Featuring classic bebop to modern era techniques, you will be presented with a wide array of improvisation concepts and learn how to create your own horn-like solos in the jazz idiom. Following a step-by-step analysis, this course begins by examining basic theoretical principles including the construction of intervals, triads, seventh chords, tensions, and scales. Over the span of 12 weeks, you will be introduced to various techniques and concepts such as passing notes, approach notes, neighbor notes, cells, sequences, voice leading, superimposition, phrasing, melodic interpretation, thematic development, and the assimilation of those components through practical application. Soloing Techniques will expose you to a collection of proven strategies which will help you implement these techniques in a musical fashion. Utilizing a compilation of popular standards from the jazz repertoire and an archive of signature solos recorded by some of the most innovative instrumentalists in the history of jazz music including John Patitucci, Jaco Pastorius, Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, Oscar Peterson, Sonny Stitt, and Wynton Marsalis, you will learn to connect your ears to the fingerboard, develop ideas, and expand the traditional role of the bassist through the vocabulary of the jazz language. Transcriptions of legendary solos, dozens of play-alongs, and a series of essential listening tracks will be employed to establish a database of documented statements and demonstrate the proper integration of phrasing considerations. Upon the completion of this course, you will have acquired the necessary tools to improvise solos in the styles of the premier bass soloists such as John Patitucci, Jaco Pastorius, Jeff Berlin, Michael Manring, Brian Bromberg, Alain Caron, Gary Willis, Ray Brown, Ron Carter, and Paul Chambers. Soloing Techniques is recommended for both aspiring and professional bassists alike who are seeking an indispensable resource for the contemporary study and analysis of soloing concepts on bass guitar and acoustic upright bass. ... Enroll Today!
The IIB Monthly Newsletter - Sign Up Today!March 1, 2010
The International Institute of Bassists is a bass-centric web site aimed specifically toward the art of contemporary bass playing and the study of the bass tradition. Since its founding in 1997 by bassist Cliff Engel, the IIB has established a long-time presence on the internet and grown into one of the largest and most popular interactive bass-related web sites found online.
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Bass Lessons - Soloing TechniquesMiles Davis' Solo On "Billie's Bounce"
January 25, 2010 - *Subscriber's Area*
One of the most effective ways to learn how to solo involves the transcription, analysis, emulation, and manipulation of the phrases recorded by your favorite soloists. Similar to learning a new language, soloing involves studying and using a vocabulary to express and develop ideas. Because note choice, rhythm, and phrasing are too many variables to consider at the beginning, transcribed solos that have been recorded by your favorite musicians will initially limit your focus and help establish a solid foundation so you don't feel overwhelmed with all of the possibilities that are available to you as a soloist.
Keep a collection of transcribed solos by your favorite bassists, saxophonists, trumpet players, pianists, and guitarists. This archive may consist of solos you've personally transcribed as well as solos you've acquired through other resources. Even though there are a number of outstanding bass soloists including John Patitucci and Jeff Berlin, be sure to check out the solos of other great instrumentalists like Miles Davis, Charlie Parker, John Coltrane, and Oscar Peterson.
As bassists, we devote most of our time to practicing grooves since our primary function in an ensemble is to provide support within the rhythm section, and as a result, bassists are generally not the best soloists. While bassists such as John Patitucci and Jeff Berlin spent time analyzing bass solos early in their development, today they are considered elite bass guitar soloists because they have spent a significant amount of time studying solos that were recorded by their favorite horn players, pianists, and guitarists which they then assimilated into their own approach. By examining the solos played by horn players, for example, you are presented with a different approach to playing bass since horn players don't have to deal with the same physical limitations that are imposed by a fretted bass guitar.
After you transcribe the lines of your favorite soloists, practice playing them along with the recordings by memorization without referring to the notation. Listen very deeply to how the master soloists communicate through the language of improvisation. Strive to not only play all of the notes and rhythms perfectly but also emulate the sound and feel that has been captured on the recordings as close as possible. Pay particular attention to all the little nuances and inflections that soloists often incorporate into their phrases, and try to make an emotional connection to the solos. Once you understand how they arrange their phrases, you will be able to utilize that knowledge and create more sophisticated solos by altering the basic structure of your favorite phrases through melodic interpretation and rhythmic displacement and then assimilate those ideas into your own solos.
As a soloist, one technique of melodic interpretation involves the varying of phrase lengths. This can be accomplished through either phrase extension (prolongation) or phrase compression (reduction). Phrase extension can be applied by simply making the durations of notes longer or including notes not found in the original melody. Phrase compression is a technique where a portion of the phrase is omitted or note durations are shortened.
Besides altering the melodic vocabulary within a phrase using the techniques of extension and reduction, phrases can be modified through rhythmic displacement. Rhythmic displacement is a basic musical concept that involves taking a figure and manipulating it by simply shifting notes from their original position to other beats within the music. Effective rhythmic phrasing is an essential aspect of sustaining rhythmic interest. When presenting a speech, the best speakers will pause in order to allow the listeners to absorb the information. Great soloists take the same approach and will incorporate pauses so that the listeners can process the musical ideas being expressed. A completely different solo phrase can be created by just changing the place within the measure where you begin and end phrases as well as manipulating the length of the phrases.
Have you ever sat through a speech where the speaker talked in a monotone voice throughout the entire presentation? Just as a skillful speaker will use different inflections during a speech, sophisticated soloists will integrate various articulation techniques, dynamics, and vibrato into their phrases. Instead of just playing the notes without accents, you can breathe life into your phrases by using articulations such as grace notes, hammer-ons, pull-offs, and slides. You can also assimilate different degrees of dynamics and vibrato according to your personal taste. If, as a soloist, you don't insert a combination of both melodic and rhythmic interest into your solos, listeners will simply tune you out as they would someone speaking in a monotone voice so you should always try to maintain interesting and varied phrasing.
Learn as many melodies as possible because they usually contain repetition and the best target notes, and experiment with improvising phrases using variations on those melodies. This is a great way to understand how ideas relate to each other which will help you expand and personalize your own ideas. Melodies can begin early, start late, speed up, or slow down, and the accompaniment will continue. By learning how to play and interpret melodies, you will acquire the ability to break free of outlining every chord change that is played because you will learn to hear the chord progressions moving underneath your phrases instead of using specific note choice to constantly remind you of the chord changes. As you learn more melodies, you will acquire a sense of the independence the melodic instrument has from the accompaniment.
In this lesson, we will study a blues-based solo recorded by Miles Davis on "Billie's Bounce." Throughout a career that extended five decades, Davis released a collection of landmark projects spanning bebop, cool jazz, modal jazz, and fusion music. He also discovered some of the most important figures in jazz music such as John Coltrane, Bill Evans, Wayne Shorter, Chick Corea, Herbie Hancock, Tony Williams, Ron Carter, Dave Holland, and many others. This solo on "Billie's Bounce" features a series of melodic phrases over the 12-bar blues in F. Since the 12-bar blues is the most common set of chord changes utilized in the jazz repertoire and the foundation of numerous jazz standards, you can take your favorite phrases from this solo and easily incorporate them into other jazz tunes. ... Read More!
