Faithless

I'm playing in lots of different bands, and if I couldn't read, I'd be doomed. It's just impossible to memorize ~300 tunes, so I have to write down at least few bars of grooves and certain passages, so that when someone calls a tune on a rehearsal or a gig I haven't played in a while, I don't have to think 'oh, what's the bass groove on that one?', or 'what's that unison passage in the pre-chorus?' Another thing - lots of times, we don't rehearse pretty much at all, just do the gig, so I don't have the opportunity to go through the stuff beforehand, that's where reading is priceless. Doddy might have mentioned this as well,but - 95% of good learning material is in notation, not tab. So, if you read, you have the access to the best material out there, period. To end the story - while I haven't really had to use my ability to read on a 'proper' reading gig yet, last year, while doing a TV show, we were standing behind really famous pop artist, and my trombone player brings me a sheet with a tricky bass part straight to dress-rehearsal, an hour or so before the show itself, and minutes before we had to rehearse it with the artist himself. I had not only had to sight-read the part on the fly, but I also had to do it perfectly, note for note, accent for accent, because I was actually doubling the trombone part. To make it short, after I nailed the part, I was really glad about myself, that I had put the time in to learn something,that I wasn't really expecting to have any major use from at that point. Learn to read, it doesn't hurt easy L

Joe Hubbard had just released his new book on Sight- Reading (which is actually 4 books in 1) - it's absolutely killing, and there are exercises you wouldnt find in any other reading book- it focuses on reading [b]on Electric Bass[/b] - and bass is a tough instrument to do that - I highly recommend you check that out - Joe's been my teacher for nearly two years now, and I know that his stuff can take your playing (and reading, in this case) to another level, if you do what he says properly, trust me! eaasy L

You can go to JazzStandards.com - I've heard from quite a few guys, that the first 100 tunes in there are all played over and over in jams, so you could start by number 1 and, considering you spend 1 week on a tune, after 100 weeks you'll have all them down. Well it's, at least, this sort of process I'm doing right now. Here's another cool thing, a list taken from series of weekly jam sessions in well-known club (you can see that some tunes are being called more often than others): 10/22 Owl & Thistle Confirmation Green Dolphin Street Minority Stardust Jitterbug Waltz Bittersweet What Is This Thing Called Love Blues Tune Concentrate on You 11/01 Owl & Thistle Night and Day Blue Monk Recordame Oleo Confirmation Teach Me Tonight Alone Together Have You Met Miss Jones 11/15 Owl & Thistle Caravan Invitation Bemsha Swing Gone With The Wind How Insensitive (6/8 feel) 11/22 Owl & Thistle Solar Bye Bye Blackbird Corcovado There Will Never Be Another You Lover Man Yes Or No 11/28 Pirattis Craft Bar Footprints St. Thomas Have You Met Miss Jones (7/4) Feeling Good All The Things You Are Girl From Ipanema Softly As A Morning Sunrise Dindi Bye Bye Blackbird Recordame 11/29 Owl & Thistle There is No Greater Love Nothing Personal (G minor Blues) Ishfahan Green Dolphin Street Inner Urge I Remember You 12/06 Owl And Thistle Nardis What Is This Thing Called Love Nothing Personal Invitation Seven Steps To Heaven Well You Needn't Passion Dance Gingerbread Man Other Tunes (Not sure when these were called but I remember them being played) LadyBird Freedie Freeloader Beatrice Blue Bossa Red Clay I Hear A Rhapsody This I Dig Of You One Note Samba Song For My Father

it's necessary to continue after a mistake only if you're on the bandstand, but if you're shedding at home, you want to stop, and break it down - maybe coming up with an exercise that'd focus on the particular issue. I'm not saying you can't just burn through the piece, no matter wheter you made any mistakes or not, but this is the 'performance' part, where you don't really learn anything, and 'science' part is where you play something, find something you can't execute, stop, and correct it.

With sight-reading, you have two different things that you have to isolate and practice separately: it's pitches (notes) and rhythms. As far as pitches go, you have that Note Finder exercise I posted earlier, and, for rhythms, you want to find lines with varies groupings of 16th notes, and practice them (pitches doesnt matter, you can play them on one note all the way through). One more thing - in order to be able to sight-read something, you have to be able to [i]play (excecute) [/i]it. If you want to read Charlie Parker's lines, you have to know how to play Parker first of all, get it? So, to put it short, if you don't have the right chops, you're never gonna sight-read it.

Ok, so, first of all, sight reading is about knowing the notes - you cant really read well, if you don't know the notes on your axe, right? Take this exercise and woodshed that: http://www.joehubbardbass.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/The-Random-Note-Finder-Exercise.pdf https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0sS0hhfezQ Then you can take tunes (melodies) and play them on one string at the time (without metronome!!!). It will help with your familiarity with the bass no end. easy L

For starters, it's not the different keys that's the biggest issue. Do you know your fingerboard well? I mean, REALLY well? check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0sS0hhfezQ It's crucial that you know your axe very well in order to read. Actually, pitches and keys aint the hardest the thing in reading - it's rhythms (groupings of 16th notes, syncopations) - that's what you want to look for.

it's an interesting thing that goes around on on in these kind of topics - how do I become a pro, session work, etc etc..... It's of course very important to network, be punctual, own realiable gear, etc etc, but the thing that goes BEFORE everything else, and I mean EVERYTHING, is being able to [b]play[/b]. You Have to be able to improvise, you have to have your chops high up in there, so that you pull out ANY stuff, that might come in; know (and be able to play) different styles, etc... but first of all, it's all about playing - it doesn't matter how hard you network, and how many cats you might get to know, but if your playing is not happening, then you won't get there.

You have to look after your posture and breath while practicing. Any tension should be sorted out asap - one thing that really helps with reducing any sort of tension, both physical and pshychological, is practicing yoga.

It's interesting you mentioned Charlie Banacos, Bilbo. Very few people have heard of him, but a shitload of top jazz guys had studied with him - John Scofield, Mike Brecker, Berlin (he was on and off the track with Banacos over the years), Stern was religious about studying with him, so he stood with Charlie until his death. By the time I got into improvised music, I couldnt get a chance to study with Banacos anymore, as he died from cancer, but I was lucky enough to get on the track with one of his former students, Joe Hubbard - I've already been studying with him for nearly 1,5 years, and have never been happier about my progress. Good guys charge a lot, and I don't mind spending 30 quid on a lesson, as long as I'm given the right material and right criticism.

So I had a few practice sessions using this MBE thing and while's the thing REALLY loud (I hardly turn on Gain and Master on my Aguilar TH500 at all to dial out quite a bit of volume..), the weird thing is that I have to open up the lower ring on my ACG preamp to dial in the high range - and on most other cabs, at the point where I have my preamp set now, the sound would be really harsh and screechy, but with this cab it's not.... Are these cabs known for cutting off the Treble/High Mids range? Just to keep in mind, I set my Aggie TH500's EQ flat, but I'm doing the same thing with all other cabs I tend to use. L

The problem's with Berlin's stuff is that he doesn't explain how to practice arpeggio's properly position-wise on bass. The way he plays the arpeggio's (all over the instrument) is way too much open to interpretation. Scott's stuff a bit better in that way, but it's not all you can do with arpeggio positionally. As for arpeggio itself - you're doing tensions at the same time with arpeggios. You should first isolate only chord tones (1,3,5,7) and only after you're comfortable with them, you'd move onto tensions. If you wanna know more about this stuff, I'm offering Skype lessons, just drop me a PM and we can sort it out. thanks L

i tried surfing 15 page long MBE bracing threads on Talkbass, and pretty much came out with nothing useful apart from few photos. Although I heard that there are clear instructions (with pics?) on how to do that damn dampening/bracing thing? I don't even know how to remove the front grill safely, not to mention doing something inside the cab....

But, if GK use the same drivers for their 'higher range' NEO series cabinets, why the hell the NEO cab is nearly 8kg heaver than the MBE one? (I'm talking about 2x12 cabs) I'd maybe would have pulled the trigger on NEO, but at 23kg's I don't consider it as a 'lightweight' cab anymore. And what is that you mean by bracing the cab? Do you mean putting some acoustic material as a pad in the cab?

Ok, so the MBE cab has arrived at my town - I still can't get to it till Thursday, but I'll let you know my first experiences first-thing ! easy L

Before you go one or other way, you should ask one question - what am I trying to achieve by doing this? In other words, are you trying to become a 'technician' or a musician? I hope it's the latter one, and if it is, then let me tell you one thing - you don't need to isolate technique as such at ALL to become a good musician. One of the criteria of being a good musician is to be able to play your instrument , no matter what it is, with ease. Now, this implies 'technical' aspect but know this - ALL the tehnical difficulties that you face on your instrument can be solved by practicing MUSICAL content. You don't have to waste your time by practicing 'technical' exercises, because they won't improve your overall musicianship (apart from basic motor-skills) by one iota. Here's a cool new vid from Jeff about this subject: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cK3_QzfVwHA&feature=g-u-u take care, L