[GD_Loser]

Hey everybody! I'm gonna be playin' bass in my school's jazz band this year, and I'm afraid I won't be able to hold my own at the rate I'm goin' right now. School starts at the end of August, and I'm wondering if any of you all with bass experience could give some tips to kind of fake my way through playin' until I get pretty good. Thanks.

BTW I didn't put this in the bass forum 'cause I don't think anyone ever looks in there.

[CaptainTrips]

I can simplify this a little I think.

1. Learn to read chord positions from the guitarists you are playing with. Identify root notes, and the fifth is also important.

2. Rhythmically, learn to anticipate changes and try to add drama and release tension on major changes. Kinda like dropping bombs.

[StringCheeseSector9]

Im also new to bass but as a stringed instrument it is very unique. Make sure you get the technique down of Muting with your thumb and then keepin the beat going with index and middle the best advice i can give you though are the beginner bass lessons at studybass.com

good luck bud

[AugustWest]

Don't sweat too much there are plenty of HUGE top 40 bands who's bass players can't play their instrument. The way they do it is this. Whatever the root note of the chord is play it on rhythm. The old joke what is a bass player thinking GGGG CCCC GGGG DDDD. Now what I find most important in learning bass playing is arrpeggios. Bass players are not typicaly asked to play chords. (three notes or more at the same time) but we accomplish the chord by playing arrpeggios which is just playing the notes of the chords in single notes. You also want to learn how to build from one chord change in the song to the next. This is usually done by a walk up or a walk down. There are many free bass guitar lessons online that can explain these pretty well. But the idea is that if the rhythm guitar player is playing an G chord and you are about to switch to a C chord you want to walk up with single notes right before the change that are G-A-B-C and hit the C at the same time the rhythm guitar player hits the C chord for the change. Hope this helps some.

[GD_Loser]

Thanks for the replies. I think studybass.co is really gonna help me. In fact it already has. Thanks again.

[G'Dad]

I think you have had some sound advice already and seem to have found a good resource with studybass

You are not talking about a lot of time before you start so do not try to do too much just work on some solid basics.

Learn the fret board then you can hit your root notes and if you can as AW says learn some arpeggios then you have a good platform to work from.

In time you can then move onto a greater knowledge of scales to expand your playing

Oh, and if you can get hold of a drum machine to practice with as this will help your timing.

Good Luck