Bilbo

There are about four tunes from this CD on my archive page, Palewell Park, Joe Frazier, The Sliding Floor and Gothic 17. I am half way through Land's End and Q. E. D. but they are quite difficult due to internal voicings in choral movements which test me considerably. I have an ambition to write out the bass parts for all three Bruford LPs out because I couldn't do it when I was a learner. That and Cozy Powell's Over the Top. 😁 I am about half way through the exercise.

When I purchased my bass, they hadn't invented 'on-line' 😃😄 We called it 'mail order'.

I like that idea (he says, looking out the window for the imminent arrival of a new theory book). I am doing the same with the 30+novels I haven't yet read. I should do the same with my music books.

There is value in partial transcription. I suspect a lot of details in a full transcription are repetitious and the actual learning is limited. My transcriptions are mostly complete to make them fun for people to practice reading (which is why I publish them). Two written bars of a lick that is otherwise hard to pick up by ear is one thing and is perfectly legitimate. Learning to read a score end to end is another skill that requires a different, but equally legitimate, approach.

I have never met a musician who has less chops than he knows how to use.

It's the eternal dichotomy. Too much practice results in not enough time for creativity whilst too much playing time means not enough time for practice. I guess it it a very personal and contextual thing. I find I don't value practice as much as I used to because I don't seem to have a great deal to practice for (no gigs). I guess you could consider composition as a skill worthy of practice and see your time writing and recording as working on a different kind of 'chops'?

There are other variables that we need to consider when watching people play. What is the setting? Is the player comfortable with the situation? Does he/she feel comfortable with this genre or this tune? Is the loud drummer pissing on his picnic? Is the guitarist being a bit of a git? Is it his or her gear or are they borrowing something? Do they want to be there? Are they a little bit whizzed or a whole lot whizzed off? Are they nursing an injury? (I know of one bass teacher who cannot play more than a couple of songs before it becomes too painful - great player and a great teacher but he cannot gig). I think that judging players by any standard is problematic. I have a lovely story about a name player who nearly lost his greatest gig because, when the band who were checking him out with another band, he was oblivious and was just 'playing the gig' which did not require any grandstanding so they thought he was nothing special. I remember a player I had played with several times hearing me with another band and saying 'I never heard you play like that before' - he had only ever hears me with his band which was a fixed thing that would not have sounded good with me being me. So much of it is context. Oh - and there is one more thing. Not all teachers are great players. In my experience, some of them have no business calling themselves teachers.

I have dozens of these. Bass books, books on Jazz harmony, piano voicings, arranging, orchestration, instrument treatise, guitar chords, Jazz lines, BeBeop theory, solo transcriptions, guitar transcriptions, bass transcriptions, saxophone transcriptions, trombone transcriptions, studio recording techniques, MIDI orchestration and any number of other subjects of a musical nature. I have bought all of them in good faith in an effort to develop some insight, knowledge or skill that, at some point, I felt was in need of attention. As I stand here looking at my comprehensive library of publications, I realise that I have hardly ever got past page 12 in any of them. I start in earnest and then, when it gets complicated, I bail (not consciously; I just move on to something else. My theory is clearly, if I only read 10% of each book, if I buy 10 books, then I will have read one. I have looked through my stack of books and I think there are about three that I can honestly say I have done cover to cover. Is it just me?

He is all over the Prog scene. Hackett, Wilson, Lifesigns etc. I just wish he would call me to dep for him.

7/10 but I got '86 🤣

Another Jeff Berlin performance from the Bruford LP 'Gradually Going Tornado'. Another bass sound that I would look to emulate consciously or subconsciously. Unsurprisingly, Jeff Berlin was a big fan of Jack Bruce also so this is not at all surprising. This is a full transcription of Jeff's bass part to the tune 'The Sliding Floor'. Some tricky sections in this one. Bars of 11/8 (at least, that is how I hear it) and sections of changing time signatures. This is also one of the tunes that Jeff sings on. I always thought his voice was actually pretty good - better than many Prog band warblers!! The Sliding Floor - Jeff Berlin.pdf

An early influence for me , in terms of defining the sound of a bass, was Jack Bruce on the 'Over The Top' album by Cozy Powell. I remember that I bought my first 'expensive' bass (an Aria SB600) because Jack had an Aria SB1000. I couldn't afford the more expensive model even thought, with hindsight, it was probably only £100 more. I was about 17 and we didn't have a lot of money in those days. I can date it roughly to about mid 1981 as it was just after I joined No Quarter (guitarist was mildly whizzed because I hadn't bought a Fender Precision). I loved the sound Jack got on this LP and it started a love of bass players with the letter J in their name, Jack Bruce, Jeff Berlin, Jaco, Jimmy Johnson and Percy Jones. I am working on transcribing things that meant a lot to me as a learner - it's all nostalgia. This is the full transcription of 'Heidi Goes To Town'. I am told that Heidi was Cozy Powell's dog. Heidi Goes To Town Jack Bruce Bass.pdf

Steps Ahead tune from the Magnetic album.

I love the strength your advocacy, Visog. For the record, I had every Yes album to 90125 but they lost me there. I have repurchased a few in different formats. Feraud, on the other hand, has not earned a cent from me. Manring 1 cassette. Wooten and Caron 1 download each. John Entwistle got another duck😁

Absolutely - amateurs copy, professionals steal.

Agreed. But surely studying someone else's 'creativity' is not going to make you creative. I don't actually think we disagree. When I say simple, I generally mean genre specific - like a root five bass line in a country song or a root note shuffle on a Blues tune. If you are genre informed, a walking bass over a blues is easy whereas a walking bass, superficially the same thing, over Giant Steps changes or some other peculiar set of chords will require more study. The trouble with studying complex improvisations in Jazz is that you would never play the thing you have studied if you played that song again whereas, if you learn a complex part like 'Rhythm Stick' you will always play it the same way. Anyone playing a Yes cover is going to find it relatively easy to get under the bass parts. That's what I mean when I say simple. I agree that writing a part is where the artistry is (although, it is known that Yes lifted a lot of stuff from all sorts of places)

I suspect you are right.

That's a tiny bit of a generalisation, don't you think? Things that are easy don't need investigation because they are easy. A ballad with one note per bar on the root doesn't need to be 'studied' in the way, say, 'Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick' would. Most Chris Squire is like that. Study two bars of Roundabout and the rest of it is pretty easy. Same goes for a lot of his stuff. There are exceptions, of course, Relayer being the main one.

I think you get it, Dave. It's about hearing as much as you can, evaluating what it is about a player that you like or dislike and taking things you value forward in your own playing. That's what makes you different from me and everybody else.

I do enjoy our chats.

Actually, in response to the criticism of my tendency towards criticism, in my defence, I would suggest that most musicians are overly impressed by what amounts to journeyman playing and get awfully excited about players who, whilst enjoyable to listen to, are not doing anything too difficult (Pino is a perfect example). I repeatedly hear comments like 'Chris Squire is best bass player ever'. As I said before, I LOVE his playing but 'the best'? Patently nonsense. Berlin can be vapid, I agree. Chops for chops' sake. Squire is probably better to listen to. The great thing is you don't have to choose and can listen to both. I agree re Manring. Most tappers are harmonically limited and annoyingly repetitive. Same with Wooten, Alan Caron etc. Great players but I don't own many of their recordings because they don't move me in any way whatsoever. They are impressive but lack emotional content. The point is only that some things are easy to play and some things aren't. The adoration of Squire as an artist is entirely legitimate but, as a craftsman, he is not leading the field. It all subjective and my opinions are as valid and as invalid as everyone else's. If you don't like my opinion, don't worry. If you wait around long enough, it is likely that I will have others. 🙄 I probably think about this stuff far too much.

Well they are 😁

I guess so. It's not a question of it being more worthy, more a case of recognising the kind of things that are worth investigating if you are looking to explore the potential of the instrument. Nobody 'studies' Steve Dawson of Saxon because everyone can understand it pretty much off the bat. No one can do Michael Manring because it requires a complete adjustment of every shred of technique we have. Everyone else is on a continuum in between. Squire's playing (which I love, by the way, and have done for about 45 years) is nearer Dawson than Manring on that continuum. His lines, whilst interesting and creative, are, in the main, not that difficult to play.

Levin would be a better bet stylistically every time.

I agree regarding Relayer (I wish there was an isolated bass version of that).