Hi, tell me please what's the best book for
learning slaping, tapping, hammering etc.
technique of bass, and which video can be
helpful. But I don't need book for beginner
'cause I'm intermediate fingerstyle player,
and can read notation. Thanks.

Banks

The 2 best books for slap. Ok this is my opinion but I have looked at alot of slap books over the years and most of them suck ass. There is one called Funk Bass by John Liebman. This book is not that good in my opinion. Alot of people think its good though. I dont. The lines just arent very creative. He has a Fingerstyle Funk book that has some really creative lines in it. I dont know where he went wrong with the slap book.
Anyways. Check out Slap It by Tony Oppenheim and The Slap Bass Bible by Anothony Vitti. Keep in mind that these two books cover traditional Slap technique. Not the Wooten stuff. Its killer stuff and worth checking out. There is a slew of books available but VERY few that are actually any good. Anybody know of any others?
Hope that helps.

The best video is probably The Slap Bass Program by
Alexis Skler@#$@#%$%. :)Dont know how to spell his last name
No tapping on any of this material I mentioned.

Sklarevsky. The Tony Oppenheim book is good too.

Will C.:cool:

Worth the money? How much does it cost.....you make it sound like a lot.

The Vitti book is well worth it. He is bad.

Not sure what you mean by worth the money because its not that expensive. $12-15 with a Cd.

Its gotta alot of cool grooves in it. 100 8 bar patterns. Alot more syncopated than the grooves in slap it. Not just streams of 16th notes.

His fingerstyle funk books are kick ass also. Very advanced stuff. I havent found any other books for advanced players that even come close to Anthony Vitti's material.

I didn't mean to make it seem that I thought the Vitti books were expensive, sorry for the confusion. But I have paid good money (although not a great deal of money) for books that I didn't feel were worth the money spent, that's what I was trying to say. Sorry I was unclear.

I feel ya.
Most books are either crap or are geared towards beginner-
intermediate players. There also seems to be a plethora of slap books. Most have cheesey octave patterns and thats it.
Totally uninspired and uncreative.

Not to much available for advanced players.
Anthony Vitti's books are above and beyond the rest.
All content. Not a bunch of pictures showing you where to put your fingers and stuff like that.

I really like the Jamerson book too. Its the bomb.
Expensive but certainly well worth money considering it has about 50 note for note trancriptions of some of his best work.

personally i think the best way of learning to slap, or do tapping is to develope your own way of doing it. that way no matter what you will feel comfortable playing in that style. just as long as it sounds good style doesn't really matter.

I've got the Jon Liebman book.....kinda dry....and I also have the Slap Bass Program...Alex Sklarevski employs some pretty kewl techniques there at the end...Stu Hamm's videos are pretty good too, even though he looks kinda drunk and unprepared in the first one....lol.....I know....these are videos, but IMO, books really aren't the way to go...anyway....even after watching these videos and various others, I have my own way of playing...slapping is a pretty personal thing...lol...especially for guys like me who don't have double jointed thumbs...yup....my thumb is straight as a board....oh well....happy thumping...

To Gard, I bought the Oppenheimer book ("Slap It!")in the early nineties. (Yes, the one with the funky thumb photos.) I never used the book much, though, because it came with "soundsheets" that had to played on a phonograph. I feel that being able to hear as well as see the examples is a tremendous help, especially in slap where the groove is so important. Do you happen to know if this book has been released with CDs instead?

By the way, I think it is so cool that you studied with Dave LaRue. I think he is a monster bassist and way under rated, as he is hardly ever mentioned in polls of favorite bass players, a fact I've never fully understood. I once dreamed of studying with LaRue, but have since decided that as I will probably never be a fully professional bassist, the expenditure of money would not be justified. Nonetheless, I still envy you and admire you for having had the opportunity.

Jason Oldsted

Originally posted by JasonOldsted
To Gard, I bought the Oppenheimer book ("Slap It!")in the early nineties. (Yes, the one with the funky thumb photos.) I never used the book much, though, because it came with "soundsheets" that had to played on a phonograph. I feel that being able to hear as well as see the examples is a tremendous help, especially in slap where the groove is so important. Do you happen to know if this book has been released with CDs instead?

By the way, I think it is so cool that you studied with Dave LaRue. I think he is a monster bassist and way under rated, as he is hardly ever mentioned in polls of favorite bass players, a fact I've never fully understood. I once dreamed of studying with LaRue, but have since decided that as I will probably never be a fully professional bassist, the expenditure of money would not be justified. Nonetheless, I still envy you and admire you for having had the opportunity.

Jason Oldsted

Jason -

Yes the Oppenheim book is now available with the CD instead of the phonograph record, check the back of BP or anyother bass magazine, there should be an ad for it. By the way, it is Oppenheim, not Oppenheimer (as in J. Robert, the physicist that lead the Manhattan Project during WWII).

I was definitely lucky to have had the opportunity to study with Dave, in addition to being a monster player, he's an incredible teacher and truly decent human being. If you're really interested in getting a lesson or a few lessons from him it's actually pretty easy, just go to http://davelarue.com and you will find a link for correspondence lessons. I've not taken them (was fortunate enough to live near him at one time to get them directly), but have talked to several very satisfied students that did. Dreams can come true, if you work towards them, and they might just be surprisingly affordable too :). Admiration is sorta funny, I didn't do anything admirable, I was just lucky enough to be in Orlando, where Dave and Beaver Felton own a bass store, Bass Central. All I had to do was make a phone call and...BAM....lessons with Dave. And you shouldn't envy me either, because you can get a lesson with him too. :D

I suggest you the Lorenzo Forti's book with mc.
"Slap & Tapping, tecniche avanzate per il basso elettrico" (advanced technique for electric bass)
I find it great! Light to understand (above all, the dead note with left or right hand), and the end livel of exercises is extremely hard ! (like Stuat Hamm, Tony Levin, Mark King...)

where can you get that slap bass bible? i can't seem to find it on the web.

If you are serching it on the web, I don't know where it is.
But the new educational video of Lorenzo Forti is on http://www.chitarre.com/playgame/forti.htm
Try to see them, I find it good!

-BOUNCE-

(for reasons obvious if you've read the edit of my original post to this thread)

It's interesting, not only is it 10 months late, but it also was an accusation that a guy who is white (for the most part, anyway) is racist TOWARDS white people after that *racist* both suggested and plugged Oppenheimer's book.

I think this is one of those "pick your battles" situations, especially since this thread is 10 months old, and not read by absolutely anyone. It's not going to change much for the better, I wouldn't think.

Speak up, Mr. O. Im curious.

I got my start in slapping with, I believe, "Slapping" in the "Progressive Series." There are a whole bunch of books with audio in the Progressive Series. The exercises are all pretty interesting and groovy. I've checked out some other books, but many of their exercises were rather dull, so they didn't really motivate me. But like I mentioned, some of the exercises in the Progressive book on slapping are very groovy. There are a couple of badass exercises in there and when you hear them, you should be like "Whoa, I really want to play that one."

And another vote for Tony's Slap It. It has the grooves I was raised on. I doesn't have the Les, Flea, Feildy stuff which is fine with me.

The video by Alex is pretty good but it puts me to sleep.

[QUOTE]Originally posted by neptoon
[B]...Stu Hamm's videos are pretty good too, even though he looks kinda drunk and unprepared in the first one....


What?! I think Stu's mood in his first video is great. Much better than the second, in which he even seems to be a little pretentious at certain points (specifically, when he explains one of the riffs from "Count Zero"). Anyway, i admire and respect Stu as much as i can. He, as a teacher, was and keep being a great inspiration to me. He commits some minor mistakes in his playing, but (come on!) it isn't good to be that perfectionist. Those little mistakes add life, warmth and sincerity to his performances. If you want to see a drunk-looking player, check the Randy Coven video from Hot Licks, which also has great stuff, anyway. :)

Check out my Funk Bass book. Maybe you'll like it. Thanks!

Jon Liebman