Motown tabs

[Funky Dunky]

I was looking for something like a Motown bass tab anthology, but so far can only find the Hal Leonard Motown Classics book (which contains 21 songs). had a search on Google and Amazon but books of full song transcriptions for bass seem to be thin on the ground! Can this really be, with giants like Jamerson, Dunn and Babbit providing the low end on all those hits? I thought there would loads to choose from, but apparently not!

I can learn a lot of these songs by ear but it would take a whole lot longer. I was hoping to learn three or four a week via tabs, but tab books appear to be surprisingly hard to come by.

Edited July 6, 2015 by Funky Dunky

[ambient]

Standing in the shadows of motown is pretty good. No TAB though, it's all standard notation, but you do get a CD backing track included with the isolated bass track.

[toneknob]

+1 for Shadows, look out for What Duck Done as well.

[Funky Dunky]

Cheers guys, yeah, I saw that and ummed and ahhed a bit over the notation-only factor, but I know it would serve to make me a better musician. I can pick it up cheap on Amazon so I'll get that ordered. I will have a look for What Duck Done also. Can't believe there aren't more bass anthologies for Motown though. Bizarre.

[EssentialTension]

[i]Hal Leonard R&B Bass Bible [/i]has a mix of Motown and Stax/Atlantic material in tab and notation.

[timmo]

Good luck trying to find What Duck Dunn. It is out of print and seems hard to find second hand. I look every so often,but never seen for sale

[Booooooom]

[quote name='EssentialTension' timestamp='1436215033' post='2816140']
[i]Hal Leonard R&B Bass Bible [/i]has a mix of Motown and Stax/Atlantic material in tab and notation.
[/quote]

+1

[Simon.]

Whilst it's not TAB (but most of it isn't too hard to work), there is a huge and very good resource of soul transcriptions here:

[url="http://freebasspart.pv24.pagesperso-orange.fr/Bass_Players.htm"]http://freebasspart.pv24.pagesperso-orange.fr/Bass_Players.htm[/url]

It's Stax/Atlantic based, rather than Motown, but should keep you occupied for a good while. Plenty of Duck Dunn lines to get stuck in to.

[Geek99]

Plenty good stuff there thanks

[Funky Dunky]

[quote name='EssentialTension' timestamp='1436215033' post='2816140']
[i]Hal Leonard R&B Bass Bible [/i]has a mix of Motown and Stax/Atlantic material in tab and notation.
[/quote]

Thanks for this, just checked it on Amazon and it's ideal. I'm having that!

[Funky Dunky]

[quote name='Simon.' timestamp='1436263996' post='2816466']
Whilst it's not TAB (but most of it isn't too hard to work), there is a huge and very good resource of soul transcriptions here:

[url="http://freebasspart.pv24.pagesperso-orange.fr/Bass_Players.htm"]http://freebasspart.pv24.pagesperso-orange.fr/Bass_Players.htm[/url]

It's Stax/Atlantic based, rather than Motown, but should keep you occupied for a good while. Plenty of Duck Dunn lines to get stuck in to.
[/quote]

Fantastic, thanks for this!

[chris_b]

Early Jamerson and all Babbitt bass lines are pretty straightforward.

You should be able to work out a lot of the Motown bass lines. Most people need help with the Jamerson "golden period", but I'd work up to those.

Duck Dunn was on Stax, not Motown, but you should be able to work out his bass lines pretty easily.

[Funky Dunky]

Yeah, some of the Jamerson lines are unpredictable and tricky. Wonderful, but tricky.

[Phil Starr]

[quote name='Simon.' timestamp='1436263996' post='2816466']
Whilst it's not TAB (but most of it isn't too hard to work), there is a huge and very good resource of soul transcriptions here:

[url="http://freebasspart.pv24.pagesperso-orange.fr/Bass_Players.htm"]http://freebasspart....ass_Players.htm[/url]

It's Stax/Atlantic based, rather than Motown, but should keep you occupied for a good while. Plenty of Duck Dunn lines to get stuck in to.
[/quote]Thanks for that, great link

[Geek99]

[quote name='Funky Dunky' timestamp='1436269481' post='2816536']


Thanks for this, just checked it on Amazon and it's ideal. I'm having that!
[/quote]
I have it, it's very worthwhile