I was really wondering,at how many bpm can you play,say,16th notes?Whoever answers,please mention how many fingers you use to pluck at that speed,too.Thank u!

As far as I can see, playing Tower of Power's "What is Hip?", which is quite long, and is 1/16th notes at 102bpm, is about my limit. It's fine for a coupla verses, then the cramp starts creeping in, especially when it's played toward the end of the gig. I had to learn a lot of relaxation to play that live.

37 notes/second.

http://www.satellitecircle.com

Originally posted by the wizard
37 notes/second.

http://www.satellitecircle.com

wow, cool. which sound sample do you play 37 notes/second on?

Using two fingers I can do 1/8 notes up to about 180 bpm, maybe 200 on a good day. So I guess that says on 1/16 notes I top out at about 90 bpm (forget those TOP covers, ha ha).

That's on electric bass, of course. On upright I'm WAY slower!!!

Ther's more to playing music than just speed though, so I've learned how to work around my limitations.

It really depends on what I'm playing, but just standard Rocco/funk riffs, I can get up to about 150 bpm..But if it's a complicated solo with a lot of wierd shifts, that number drops quickly.

Oh yeah, I use two fingers for normal plucking, but sometimes use my thumb as well for very quick runs/quick triplets, etc...

To Dragonlord, I think if you can play What is Hip or some other Tower of Power tunes, with 2 fingers, which is how Rocco plays, at gigging standard, you're starting to get somewhere! Also the book "Standing In The Shadows of Motown" has tunes such as Heard It Through The Grapevine with plenty of 1/16th's at 113bpm, and James played those with ONE finger!!

[Edited by Marty Forrer on 01-30-2001 at 04:38 AM]

473 notes per second - any song!

using four finger i can play 16th notes at between 200-220 i've spen the last couple weeks practicing speed for a couple hours, so i really brought myself up.

I can go about the same speed as SoundofPhysics, around 200. I always use 2 fingers for plucking. I tried four fingers before, and I didn't have the patience to practice to get it steady, so I went back to two, and it's working pretty well for me. I whole-heartedly agree with brianrost, though.

Is there a way of measuring this? I can get pretty fast, I've never bothered measuring although I'm able to play 200 BPM songs, so I suppose I fit in with the other guys, I use 4 fingers too BTW.

If you practise with a mentronome you know...

I'm SLOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOW...I can barely do continuous (>1 min) fingerstyle 16th notes at about 80-90 bpm. Interestingly enough, I can slap faster than that--King Crimson's "Sleepless" is a ton of sixteenth note slaps, and I can do that at about 108.

Honestly, I can play pretty much as fast as I want. Old skool Metallica, Pantera, whatever. I have a rather unique technique that I've never seen anyone else do. I use one, two, or three fingers sometimes, but to get MAD speed, I use......one finger....figure it out.

well, call me a skeptic but I would really like to
hear any of you that say you play a "clean"
steady stream of 16th notes at 200 or over bpm. With fingers of course. What is Hip at 200?! Personly, I dont think so. Which is basically what you are saying you can do. Not saying it cant be done but I REALLY want to hear it.

Sure you guys arent confusing 8th notes.:)

[Edited by theJello on 02-02-2001 at 10:56 AM]

gimme an example of a song and I'll try it and tell you if I can do it.

Sure, What is hip.
Is goes. 1e&a2e&a3e&a4e&a etc.:) on your E on the A string.
It actually has some octaves and some dominant 7th string
skips in there to. But that is basically it.

What is Hip? Is that the name of the song, band, what?

i guess "what is hip" is some sort of industry standard...lots of players i know talk about executing that one.technique is very important,as is speed .....you might have the best ideas in your head but if you cant transfer it onto the instrument(cleanly)so what!.personally i probable practice right hand against a metronome 2-3 hrs a week,working upto 207-208 (16ths) for about 30 seconds and can play for about 5 mins at 190,my desire to achieve this is to allow playing at more sensible tempos easier.jello,as far as "what is hip" ,string skipping accuratley and in time is harder than pure speed ....in fact playing at 50 bpm is harder..timing shows.i can play the skipping phrases at 170 bpm and the continual passage at 190 for song duration (2 fingers).......vic wooten executes some lovely phrases at 240 using his unique technique ,so why let pure mechanics limit your creativity?...sax players blow at these sort of speeds + ...so if you hear these ideas going on go get the tools....

Well, obviously string skips is going to make a line more difficult. And in time? I thought that was a given. What is the point in playing "anything" if its not in time and cleanly executed?

You said you can play clean stream of 16ths at 190 for 5 minutes! Thats pretty pretty amazing if your idea of clean is the same as mine. I mean that is a blazing tempo. And to be honest I would have to see it to believe it. Im not trying to call you liar though.

If you can play a line like "What is Hip" at 170 I will give you a cookie and hopefully you will be famous one day.
:)





[Edited by theJello on 02-02-2001 at 12:42 PM]

..exactly ed ,no arguments from me !!! the hardest part of playing is telling the story.my point again is that you might have great stories going on in you head but it sure does help to have the means of telling it accurately .technique is nothing without ideas and vice versa .there are no excuses for poor technique though,yet we cant all have the creativity of parker,montgomery and the likes.jello,being able to execute fast lines doesnt make anyone a better player,it only means youve got your chops together,playing other peoples lines also doesnt impress me though it maybe shows a degree of application...in fact making a ballad sing ...no thats where im coming from.technique is personal....you need as much and as little as the ideas you want to express...if you want to slap ,slap...if it doesnt ring ya ding then dont...if you want to play fast lines everyone has to spend time in the "shed".

Uncle.
I totally agree with you. I dont think speed or chops for chops sake means anything. I knew someone would misunderstand me. And the tempos we were talking about are pretty grooveless anyways. Alls I was trying to say that I have never heard "anybody" play a stream of 16th notes at around 200 bpm like so many people in this thread are claiming. Not calling anybody a liar. Not saying its even important. I would just like to hear it and see how its done.
Thats all

jello...i must admit to also be pretty sceptical to the amount of 200+ claims....i just love being a hypocrite...i would also like to hear how clean the playing sounds when recorded ..no place to hide then.i use extreme grooves mainly as tech exercises but check out jaco on "port of entry" and marcus miller soloing on "moons" ..probably both at around 150 bpm for 16ths ..pushing above those speeds allows you to sink into the groove when your technique not a problem otherwise like you rightly say its sounds kinda grooveless.you can also play half tempo against say a 180 bpm and play the occasional 16th note fill which works well.one practice tip is like i said before check out grooves at ultra slow speeds ...thats when you know if your on it.by the way the right practice is the key ..not in terms of duration..one of my students went from 100 to 135 in a month doing 3 45min sessions a week .the result he can now sit back and groove upto about 120 ..anyone can do it if they want it.....

I don't know how many bpm's Master Of Puppets is but there are massive amounts of string skips and it's 16ths. I can also play, like, Seek and Destroy, which is 16ths. There are no string skips in that, though. I do both of those with my fingers. Quite easily, actually.

This is one of the goofiest song I've EVER heard. (What is Hip) I think I could pull it off...honestly.

I used to be a metal head myself.

Those songs you mentioned are 8th notes.
Well depending on how you look at it.
Master of puppets tempo is 220 in 8th notes. 110 16ths

16ths at 110 is what some of the guys above were using as a "pretty good" guideline. The tempo of that Tower of Power song isn't really that fast, even though the bass is goin' quick. If you want to try something tricky (kinda, sorta, not really), try "BBK" by KoRn. You seem to not really have all that much respect for Feildy (the bassist), but, speaking of 16ths...those might be 8ths, actually. It's still kinda tricky to slap all of those notes and keep it clean.

So, ya dont like "What Is Hip?" Good Grief! I think it's one of the funkiest songs ever, and the last band I played it in, it was one of our most popular numbers. For all the speed-kings here: 1/16ths at 200bpm? Bulls**t! "hip" is 102 bpm, and I'll bet there's not many speed merchants here that can play it well, complete with the octaves and 7ths. I agree, you can play 1/16ths at 200 for a short space of time, but for a whole song? Dont make me laugh! And dont forget to GROOVE!

on napster (ghasp!:p) there is only one What is Hip..by tower of power-- is that what youre talking about?

Originally posted by rmp5s
What is Hip? Is that the name of the song, band, what?


"What is Hip" is a song by "Tower of Power". Rocco Prestia plays straight 1/16 notes throughout most of the 5:00 minute song. Mostly all that he plays is octaves, mind you, but still the length that he can play 1/16 notes for is incredible to me.


Edit: The best I can tell the song is around 130 bpm. Anyone else agree?

2nd edit: On second thought, its actually a bit closer to 116 or so.

[Edited by hunter585 on 02-11-2001 at 08:06 PM]

The tempo is actually 102. At least that is what
every transcription I have ever seen of it says.

I think I have heard tower of power perform it even slower.
Like maybe 90 bpm or so.

Yeah, I still wanna see someone play even 16ths at
200 bpm.

[Edited by theJello on 02-12-2001 at 08:48 AM]

I just listened to "What is Hip", I've only been playing 5 months but I think I could pull off that speed, of course, I don't know how clean it would be or how long I could maintain it.

16th's for 5 mins at 200bpm. In the words of Scrooge BAHHHHH Humbug!

16th's at 100bpm for about 4.5 mins with 2 fingers on a good day been timing it, fingers and hand turn to mush after that.

ok,

try TEEN TOWN

http://www.aic.se/basslob/jaco/teentown1.html

at 200 bpm

get back with me...

fred

Metallicarules

Playing 5 months. Its harder than you think bro.
Its not just playing the notes. Its about placing them
perfectly within the pocket consistantly for a duration.
And trust me Rocco just makes it sound easy.

Yeah I realize that now after I tried it, if I concentrate real hard I can get that speed for a little while but it doesn't sound very good at all.

I'd be pretty interesting in hearing some of the 200 bpm 16ths. I've been playing a looong time and will readily admit I can't even approach that speed.

Are we all talking about the same thing?

one 1/4 note per beat
two 1/8 notes ber beat
four 1/16 notes per beat
eight 1/32 notes per beat

yeah, i'm with brad. i think people ought to be backing up some of these claims with some mp3s.


(...crickets...)


(...crickets...)


(...crickets...)


(...crickets...)


that's what i thought. :rolleyes: :D

Nice crickets.

I think they realized we were talking 16th and not 8ths.

Except for uncle marcus. He says he can hold a stream of 16ths at 180 for 5 minutes. A groove that has lot of string skipping at 170 bpm. What is hip at 170 anybody?

I guess there is an exercise he developed and he got a student from 100 bpm to 130 in a month.

I asked him to tell me what this exercise is because I would like to know what Im missing. I have been playing for a long time also and cant even approach those tempos.

Not calling him a liar but I havent heard back from him.

*ponders* I do 98.7630022 km per second. as if! :p

i just play. i figure people in my band don't care what speed i play as long as i keep up. if i put a number to the speed it can dishearten me in a sense that i will be like "but i only do so-and-so" and be too worried about getting faster rather than developing my own technique and sound.

Merls

merlin,

i know what you mean...BUT, i look at the ability to play at faster tempos, CLEANLY and effortlessly like HEADROOM. it allows me to play slower tempos with MUCH more ease and fluidity.

this thread got me inspired...i can now play JACO's line for COME ON COME OVER at 100bpm, not quite up to tempo...10bpm to go.

2 finger right hand approach. and i've found that if i sit down at VERY slow speeds and work out my right hand fingering perfectly, then it becomes automatic and i don't have to think about it when i increase the tempo.

fred