Notes From A Bass Guru (Vol.11, Aug.10)

"Walking Basslines"

Ever hear a piece, usually in jazz, with a bassline that seems to bump along usually in quarter notes or eighth notes? It moves along to the beat of the song just basically keeping things moving forward. Think of old swing jazz especially, you cannot listen to swing without hearing a lot of walking lines! This is what is called a "walking" bassline, and more goes into a walking line than you would ever think. Proper walk lines are a lot of work!

To start, you have to know the chord progression of the song. Whatever the chosen chord is for the bar you are in is the chord from where you should choose your notes. For example, if the chord progression goes: Gmaj,Amaj, Ddom7, Amaj, with the chord changing every 2 bars; then you will play 2 bars of notes from Gmaj, 2 bars of notes from Amaj, 2 bars of notes from Ddom7, and 2 bars of notes from Amaj. Play a note on every beat at least! An example of what this would look like is written on the chord chart below:

There are two ways to choose your notes, an easy way and a harder way. The easier way is to simply run up or down the scale of the root of the chord you are supposed to use. From the example above, Gmaj scale, Amaj scale, Dmaj scale (as dom7 is a major scale), and Amaj scale. A scale based walking line uses any and all scale tones of the root of the chord you are given! Just try not to make it sound like you are playing a practice exercise, keep the feel, or groove if you will!

The tougher way is to use all chordal tones. You will need to know a lot of chords to do this properly and to choose the right tones. So, I suggest you learn as many chords as you can to pull this off right! You should use only the tones that appear in the chord given to you! You will, in essence, be playing arpeggios. Again from the above example, you would arpeggiate the chordal tones of a Gmaj chord, Amaj chord, Ddom7 chord, and Amaj chord. You will need to know all the chords that appear in whatever particular chart you are playing in order to use all chordal based lines. A good rule of thumb is to use a scale based line as a backup for if you come across a chord in the progression you are playing that you do not know. Just determine first if the unknown chord is a major sounding or minor sounding one and choose your scale accordingly, then you can fake your way through the unknown chord
undetected. Use the provided example from this article as an exercise to get you started! Then try writing your own progressions and walking lines!

Now lets go for a stroll!,
Mark McAnaney, Solo Bassist

Notes From A Bass Guru (Vol.10, Jul.10, #2)

"Egyptian Scale Pattern"

Egyptian scales are tricky. This is because they do not make perfect sense according to modern day music theory. Back in ancient Egyptian days, they notated music much dfferently than you are used to seeing. They were the first civilization to write their music down into an organized system, and many of their ideas survived the eons into today. They did use lines, notes, and spaces, but they did not use much else. Modern scales and intervals weren't figured out quite yet either, and then those ideas were experimental. They did, however, have a signature cultural sound all of their own. But how do we get this ancient sound? Think past the modernized and polished interval system we have today. Give up? Well here it is!

The "scale", for lack of a better term (since scales weren't figured out by then), is made up of a root (1), a second (2), a third (3), a sharp fourth (#4), a fifth (5), a sixth (6), a sharp seventh (#7), an octave (8, same as root), and a flat ninth (b9).

The interval pattern is odd due to the fact that you move one and a half steps between the 3rd and 4th, and the 6th and 7th, and to make a full 8 note scale the flat ninth becomes the new 8th step. So the intervals are: root, whole step, half step, one and a half steps, whole step, half step, one and a half steps, half step.

Here is the pattern pictured in G:

This will take some getting used to if you want to master the Egyptian scale, but do not get discouraged! It just predates what is considered normal by today's standards, that is all! In this case, don't be afraid to abandon the rules.

Now go resurrect some ancient mummies!,
Mark McAnaney, Solo Bassist