Creating Bass Tab

[midgetiser]

I recently left my old band (quite amicably) and the new bassist is struggling to pick up some of the bass lines. My old guitarist has asked me if I could put up a couple of videos and sort out some tab for the guy so he knows how to play the songs which I happily agreed to.

I've made up the videos but the problem is I can't find an easy way of making the tab without having to go crazy typing numbers! I've googled it and there's some random things that sort of work (mostly with an extra 2 strings) but one of the tunes involves hitting the d string open while at the same time playing about on the g string for a section and I can't find one that lets me show playing 2 notes at the same time.

Does anyone else make up tab and know of a nice easy way to do this without all the monotonous typing?

[Chris2202]

i understand what your saying, would it be something like this for example?
G|22337538 _ 234759
D|00000000 or 0~~~~ with the ~ symbol meaning continue the note?

I probably make no sence at all, just an idea lol

Edited October 8, 2010 by Chris2202

[Jean-Luc Pickguard]

I'd tell the guitarist to make him a chord chart so he can play his own bass line. Or failing that. they should get a bass player who can actually play. He sounds like a bit of a numpty

[Bloodaxe]

I suspect you're stuck with, if not monotonous typing, then at least repetitive mouse clicks & swearing.

What have you tried so far? I presume that you're after some kind of WAV >> midi >> tab auto shenanigans.
I tend towards TuxGuitar for most things, it's very good, free, but not without certain "issues". Doesn't do the work for you though

[mep]

Search for and download [i]bucket o tab[/i]

I've never used it but it's what most of the online tabs are created with, and it's free.

Let us know what you make of it.

[Dood]

[quote name='Johnston' post='981953' date='Oct 8 2010, 07:54 PM']google tuxguitar[/quote]


A brilliant and free alternative to guitar pro! Very good too - thank you to the person who recommended it to me!

[Doddy]

How about the good old fashioned way of writing dots on manuscript paper?

[charic]

I use powertab

[midgetiser]

[quote name='Johnston' post='981953' date='Oct 8 2010, 07:54 PM']google tuxguitar[/quote]


Yup, just what i'm looking for. Cheers

[lanark]

[quote name='charic' post='982484' date='Oct 9 2010, 01:05 PM']I use powertab [/quote]


+1

Just google Power Tab Editor.

[DaveB]

[quote name='lanark' post='983440' date='Oct 10 2010, 04:19 PM']+1

Just google Power Tab Editor.[/quote]

+2 to powertab

[lojo]

[quote name='midgetiser' post='981934' date='Oct 8 2010, 07:31 PM']I recently left my old band (quite amicably) and the new bassist is struggling to pick up some of the bass lines. My old guitarist has asked me if I could put up a couple of videos and sort out some tab for the guy so he knows how to play the songs which I happily agreed to.

I've made up the videos but the problem is I can't find an easy way of making the tab without having to go crazy typing numbers! I've googled it and there's some random things that sort of work (mostly with an extra 2 strings) but one of the tunes involves hitting the d string open while at the same time playing about on the g string for a section and I can't find one that lets me show playing 2 notes at the same time.

Does anyone else make up tab and know of a nice easy way to do this without all the monotonous typing?[/quote]

I assume they are not covers?

If they are then cant he listen and google some tabs himself, most are in complete and slightly wrong, but they can point you in the right direction and save a bit of rewinding time

It might be less time consuming to spend a few hours with him, than trying to create tabs?

[toneknob]

Good idea to video it - also I've found that doing an extra clip for the tricky or important bits helps too.

Otherwise +1 to writing out the music. Or getting the new boy to do it for himself.

[Dave Vader]

[quote name='Doddy' post='982441' date='Oct 9 2010, 12:09 PM']How about the good old fashioned way of writing dots on manuscript paper?[/quote]

I was waiting for someone to say that....

[El Bajo]

Write it in standard notation just to be superior

[midgetiser]

[quote name='lojo' post='985304' date='Oct 12 2010, 08:43 AM']I assume they are not covers?[/quote]

Nah, it was an originals band and most of the basslines were easy enough to follow - mostly simple riffs which matched the guitar with a fair few root notes thrown in for good measure - so he only had trouble with one of the tunes (Funnily enough the only written by me and not the guitarist!)


[quote name='Doddy' post='982441' date='Oct 9 2010, 12:09 PM']How about the good old fashioned way of writing dots on manuscript paper?[/quote]

Haha, if I could I would but I haven't looked at notation since i played the recorder in primary school

[Bilbo]

Both of you take a year out to learn to write/read the dots and then write the charts out properly. It may sound like a long way around but when he leaves the band, they won't have this trouble.

[Bloodaxe]

[quote name='Bilbo' post='985683' date='Oct 12 2010, 01:27 PM']Both of you take a year out to learn to write/read the dots and then write the charts out properly. It may sound like a long way around but when he leaves the band, they won't have this trouble. [/quote]
Probably the only long-term solution. However, learning to read music has three sides - Time Sigs, Note Duration & Pitch.

In defence of Tab editors like Tux & GuitarPro, they do go some way towards this as (unlike bits of paper & the common ASCII tab), both Tux and GP force you to learn at least the basics of note duration as applied to a given time signature. If you attempt to construct a tab without regard to these, it goes titzup rather rapidly and very obviously (GP turns an entire bar red if it's incomplete), whilst it's very easy to write complete garbage on paper without necessarily realising it.

If the developers would give an option to allow easy note placement/manipulation on the stave, they'd be even more useful as then they'd have the Pitch surrounded too.

Pete.

[Doddy]

[quote name='Dave Vader' post='985384' date='Oct 12 2010, 09:40 AM']I was waiting for someone to say that....[/quote]

.....And it was always going to be either me or Bilbo