Calling out all teachers - let's exchange ideas

[mike313]

Hi, I teach bass and I imagine many other users of this site do the same. I think it would be great to have a thread where we can exchange ideas about the best exercises, teaching techniques and general experiences about teaching bass.

I only teach part time to a few students, in general beginner-intermediate level players.
I really like it and I want to improve in my teaching. I would like to ear from everyone about the one or two exercises that they find to be the most useful and/or the most liked by students.

In my case, I see my students really like the classic Wooten exercise with the drum playing a 4 bar loop with the last bar muted, or the last 2 or 3 bars etc... You have to play a phrase (or even just a note) and keep playing and be in sync with the drum when the drum comes back from the silence.

That is an easy exercise you can do even if you never played a musical instrument before. It is also fun and easy to self-evaluate. Also very useful to develop internal clock.

Another one they like is when I play a short phrase on my bass without them looking, and then they have to reproduce the phrase on their bass and also tell me in what key it is.

Edited June 14, 2015 by mike313

[Hector]

[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]"Another one they like is when I play a short phrase on my bass without them looking, and then they have to reproduce the phrase on their bass and also tell me in what key it is."[/font][/color]

[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]Not sure I get this? What if you don't use all 7 notes in a phrase?[/font][/color]

[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]E.g the notes FAC could be in a few keys - F maj, C maj, Bb maj [/font][/color]

[Huw Foster]

This is a great idea. I've started using the Wooten exercise thanks to this thread.

I like the repetition of phrases as presented in the RGT grade books. You tell the student the key and the root note, then it's usually a 2-bar phrase. It gets increasingly difficult as you go up the grades, ie not starting on the root note, use of modes etc.

I'll try to think of some fun exercises I use in lessons. Mostly it is teaching songs or improv, with a bit of sightreading though!

[ras52]

[quote name='Hector' timestamp='1434360605' post='2798826']
[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]"Another one they like is when I play a short phrase on my bass without them looking, and then they have to reproduce the phrase on their bass and also tell me in what key it is."[/font][/color]

[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]Not sure I get this? What if you don't use all 7 notes in a phrase?[/font][/color]

[color=#282828][font=helvetica, arial, sans-serif]E.g the notes FAC could be in a few keys - F maj, C maj, Bb maj [/font][/color]
[/quote]

It's ambiguous even with 7 notes (major/relative minor). But usually there's an implicit key - and if there's no consensus on what that is, then that makes for an interesting and hopefully illuminating discussion!

[enricogaletta]

Nice idea.
Well my approach with my students is usually trying to cover at leat three topics as for example (for beginner and internediate) reading, technique and harmony instead just use some exercises and than I keep working on that topics adding few more, up to when they're completed.
Anybody else use the same approach?
Cheers