The Major' Bass Boot Camp (Session 9)

[Major-Minor]

The Major's Bass Boot Camp (Session 9)

Syncopation - in 1st, 2nd and 3rd Positions

[attachment=39894:MBBC9.pdf]
[attachment=39895:MBBC9.mp3]

As with any bass part, there are many ways you could finger this one. However, I've restricted the fingering here to just the first 3 positions, so if you are new to music reading, you can get to grips with this lower end of the fingerboard. You should, after some practice, be able to play this exercise without looking at your left hand.

As usual, I have not fingered every note. You need to get used to looking at the notes, not the fingering. From bar 25 there is no more fingering. However, I have put the chord symbols in from this point.

Note: The little lines that occur sometimes before the fingering simply show that there is a position change at this point. So for instance, the 1st note in bar 1 is a Bb with the 1st finger in 1st position. The line indicates a change of position. The C# is now played with 2nd finger in 2nd position. I hope this is clear. In this exercise, i have not written in the actual positions, partly due to lack of space, but also to get you thinking for yourself !

Also: Watch out for notes like the Eb in bar 13. The previous bar has an E natural, the natural sign lasting for the whole bar (ie both E's are natural in this bar). Bar 13 reverts to the E FLAT as it is in the key signature. Normally, I would put a guide accidental on that Eb, but as most people don't do this when preparing parts on computer, its as well to be prepared for this sort of thing.

"Syncopation" refers to notes which don't start ON the beat and often carry on into the next beat and sometimes beyond. In bar 2 for instance, the 2nd note G starts half way through beat 1 and stops half way through beat 2.
Look at bar 41:
The last note E starts halfway through beat 4 and carries on until halfway through beat 2 of the next bar.
This isn't the whole story with syncopation. There is more to it, but for now, this description will get you started.

You may notice for instance in bar 5 that the Ab is two tied quavers. Why did I not just write a crotchet across the beat ? Well, sometimes that is how this would have been written. However, I am one of those (some would say old fashioned) musicians who believe that the half bar should be clearly visible. In this instance it is not really a problem, but in more complex music, it really helps to negotiate the notes if you can clearly see where the half bar comes.

A little theoretical point:
This crops up all the way through:
In bar 1 which is a Bb major chord, you will see I have written both the minor 3rd (C#) and major 3rd (D). The off beat C# is really a "passing note", the D coming on the beat. We'll do more on this use of the "blue note" in a future session. But for now, just notice how easily that C# fits into the bass line. If it was a held long note, we might have to treat it more carefully at this register.

The Major

Edited January 12, 2010 by Major-Minor

[stevie]

Just a quickie re. syncopation. I read a while back that you should avoid counting - one and two and, etc. and should try to see the music as a pattern. It seems to have worked for me so far. What's your view on this?

[Major-Minor]

[quote name='stevie' post='708272' date='Jan 10 2010, 10:16 PM']Just a quickie re. syncopation. I read a while back that you should avoid counting - one and two and, etc. and should try to see the music as a pattern. It seems to have worked for me so far. What's your view on this?[/quote]
Hi Stevie. It's a good idea to get used to counting in your head when you first start reading, and to a certain extent i think most accomplished players do effectively count, but it becomes a sort of subliminal counting. After a while, you start to recognize the various patterns that are at the root of our musical language, and the reading of notes becomes second nature. But to get to that point, you do need to dissect what you are reading and fully understand where the beats are, and counting in your head is all part of that.

The one time when you do need to count accurately is when you have bars rest. In orchestral double bass playing this happens all the time, less so in the band world. But for instance, on a recent orchestral concert where I was also playing bass guitar, I had to count lots of bars rest at the start of a particular number, and although you might think this is easy, its also very easy to miss-count and end up coming in wrong ! Thankfully, I got it right !

The Major

[Sean]

Great stuff. Really useful. I want to get my reading up to speed so I can do theatre and cruise ships and the like when I retire, this is a great help, thanks.