A work in progress

[Alvaro Martín Gómez A.]

Hi everybody.

Late last year, I found the excellent slap solo played by Mark King on the "Live At The Jazz Café" CD. "Mr. Pink" is a tune that I've always enjoyed, but this version is by far the best to me, so I said to myself "I want to play this". Since then I've been studying it and today I've recorded a video just with the intention of sharing my progress on it with all of you, but before you watch it, I want to give some background first:

- There are LOTS of VERY NOTICEABLE mistakes, and it's simply because I'm not ready to play it at that speed yet (which isn't really fast anyway - there's still a long way ahead). I could record it at a very slow tempo and it would be a much neater version, but maybe not so interesting.

- I don't have any transcriptions of this, so I had to figure it out by ear, a task that of course makes the progress slower. My intention isn't to play a 100% accurate copy of this solo, but I think my version is 90% accurate (when I get to play it really well, of course).

- As I've said before, I have a heavy work schedule, so I'm not practicing three hours a day as I used to (another delay factor).

- My biggest technical problem: BOUNCING THAT DAMN THUMB ACCURATELY. You'll notice it, for instance, in those passages with a repeated D note on the A string (0:15 and 0:44). This reminds me of my awful and frustrating vibrato on double bass: I know how to play it but to me is so hard to control it.

About the recording: It sounded really awful with my camera's microphone, so I connected my Kustom KBA30's line output (which comes from the power amp signal) to my PC's sound card and used Sound Forge to record. No effects were applied (not even compression), so that's the true tone of my HHP Bongo with everything at maximum. Only the low mids are at about 70% and volume at half.

Putting all the mistakes aside, I hope you find this effort enjoyable. Any comments, suggestions and/or criticisms are welcome.

P.D.: And yes... a double humbucker Bongo can be slapped.

Link:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=pXhlIMEJd7w

[Twistad]

Good job man, you're on the way!

[bassist 4 life]

Awesome Alvero, that made my day !

[Chip Boaz]

Hey Alvaro! That sounds great! Pretty clean! I haven't heard that for a while, but it sounds pretty close to the way I remember it - good work!

[JHL]

You'll get there in no time... just keep at it. Great job man!

Btw, how do you practise this, or any other for that matter, piece? I would recommend starting at somewhere around 30-50% of the original tempo and trying to play everything perfectly, as soon as u make a mistake, slow down. Then slowly start stepping up the tempo. The aim is to never play any mistakes because those mistakes will be hard to get rid of later if you know what I mean.

[Alvaro Martín Gómez A.]

Hey Chip! I'm really glad to hear from you again, man!

JHL: That's exactly the way I've been practicing it. in fact, I shouldn't play it at that speed yet, but again, just for making it a bit more interesting. For this and any other practice routine, the metronome is my best friend.

Thank you for your comments, guys!

[JHL]

Originally Posted by Alvaro Martín Gómez A.

Hey Chip! I'm really glad to hear from you again, man!

JHL: That's exactly the way I've been practicing it. in fact, I shouldn't play it at that speed yet, but again, just for making it a bit more interesting. For this and any other practice routine, the metronome is my best friend.

Thank you for your comments, guys!

Well... then there's not much more to say
Hope you post it again when you've nailed it.

[Vorago]

Excellent work!

[Phyrexian]

Sounds great! A video clip with some regular fingering would be nice as well!

[Michael Henson]

Awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Papersen]

Awesome as usual Alvaro. I think you´re nailing it pretty well. I´ve got a live version too and a video of that song.
(Escribime si quieres que te lo envie, tal vez te pueda ser de utilidad)

Good luck

[gwx014]

Great Job! That was really cool.