Do you know your solos?

[Wrong Robot]

When I play live my solos are usually 100% improvised...except I performed Take five not long ago and I wasn't used to soloing in 5/4 so I worked on my solo quite a bit before the show...and though I had a totally rehearsed solo to play, once I was up there playing it with all the heat and excitement I practically ditched everything I had sat down with before and played alot of new stuff...however my solo in that song was just having fun, I kept the solid bass part beneath my tapping and popping but then I just broke from it all and started just hitting notes much in the manner Regi Wooten hits his guitar...only less refined, but it sounded great and the audience loved it, My guitarist and Sax player started bowing down when I finished
So though I didn't think the solo was anythign special and any pro that heard it would probably think "what the hell is this kid doing?" I had ALOT of energy and was putting alot out there and I definatly got a good response...

when I record and solo I usually work on making sure I have the scales and changes down 100% and I noodle around in them enough to be able to make a nice sounding clean solo.

I have nothing against memorizing solos, people get the delusion that a solo is all about doing fancy things and improv. when in reality a solo is merely your take on the lead, so if you feel that your personal melody should be a bunch of super notes and crazy playing thats totally fine and if you think that the melody should be diffeerent ,you may write a new melody to be played during your lead and thats fine as well.
but certainly anything can happen during a solo, I played a solo once choosing every note that was NOT related to the scale I should have been in, furthermore I gave extra emphasixe to the especially dissonant notes, and it ended up pretty cool.

[fat-bottom]

I had a teacher who challenged me to come up with a solo without playing the root of any chord. I chose the old standard "Stompin' at the Savoy" which our group plays a lot. It was a good exercise to help me think as a non-bass player and opened me eyes to new soloing possibilities.

[Bassin']

Originally posted by T Jay
I had a teacher who challenged me to come up with a solo without playing the root of any chord. I chose the old standard "Stompin' at the Savoy" which our group plays a lot. It was a good exercise to help me think as a non-bass player and opened me eyes to new soloing possibilities.

That's a great point.

I've found, when listening to local bass players who try to solo, that they seem to be 'anchored' down by the root notes of each chord change. The bassist is so used to recognizing the root notes on chord changes during a song that he/she can't get away from that when soloing.

Soloing is all about rhythm, harmony, and melody. I think the excersize described above would be great for any bass player who is trying to become a proficient soloist.

[Howard K]

To quote from above: "That said, as a listener, nothing is more LAME than hearing a pre-arranged solo."

I disagree in principle. Take Little Wing for example, Jimi plays almost the same solo every time because it's known and because it's beautiful. Sometimes the anticipation of knowing what come next can be great.

I think in rock and pop it's perfectly acceptable to play a predefined solo.

However I think the concept of playing pop/rock etc if differnet to that of jazz. I'd tend to agree that solos should be improvised in jazz, purely because it's the spur of the moment creativity in jazz that makes it what it is.

Personally, I play predefined solos because my improvisational skills might let me down, but then I very rarely solo as such anyway.

[BlacksHole]

As I understand it, Jaco worked out a lot of his solos before hand. I find his solos very listenable even if they are pre-arranged. I suspect most of us go into solos with some basics planned out, but still let our mood govern the solo. I have played totally worked out solos as well as total improv. in public too. Since I spent a lot of time in jazz groups, I tend to solo more than many rock bassists as I got used to having solos in most tunes. The largest percentage of my solos fall into the "basics planned out" variety. I.e., I have certain licks that I know work in certain tunes and I use them most every time I solo in that particular tune.

[James S]

Soloing has a wide variety of meanings for different players.

Having seen hundreds of young bassists try to play a solo by totally improvising I would normally urge them to cop a few licks and "play them till it sounds like your own stuff". This is one way of "learning" to improvise.

As for a memorized solo, this is not improvisation. A preconceived solo is quite common but we usually do not associate this technique with "jazz". However you would be suprised at how much similarity you would here from night to night as a particular jazz soloist played the same tune.

There is far less improvisation, in improvisation that most folks think.

[Bruce Lindfield]

Originally posted by T Jay
I try to never play the same solo twice but sometimes I get into ruts. The most difficult solo I play is with the Brubeck tune Take Five.

That was written by Paul Desmond!!

[JimK]

Originally posted by Howard K
To quote from above: "That said, as a listener, nothing is more LAME than hearing a pre-arranged solo."
I disagree in principle. Take Little Wing for example, Jimi plays almost the same solo every time because it's known and because it's beautiful. Sometimes the anticipation of knowing what come next can be great.

If you're gonna quote me...at least give me the credit!
I'm too tired to go back & re-read what I said-
...I'm pretty sure I added "There are exceptions".
(I think I mentioned "Beat It" as one exception).

[basstastic]

Originally posted by Big Wheel
When you have a solo in a tune you play regularly, do you play a pre-arranged solo or do you improvise it every time?

Hey man, i improvise EVERYTHING

sim

[ishmael_the_god]

I agree T Jay. I played Brubeck's Take Five with a Jazz band several years ago, and it was a little difficult to stray outside the melody while keeping the beat strong. Maybe I should practice more....

Overall, I think that improv is the key to making live music count. Too many bands come out and play the same song the same way every time. If I wanted that, I would have stayed at home and listened to the CD. To me, play the tunes, but throw enough unrehearsed energy into the mix to make it worth coming out onto stage. There is no better motivator to create new sounds than the pressure of performing in front of an audience. Enjoy the fact that everyone is looking at you and give 'em something to remember.

PEACE!
ish

[Aaron Saunders]

I just thought I'd ressurect this topic because it is, frankly, a bloody cool one.

Personally, I've never been in a band, let alone performed live with one. The only time I've ever "performed" musically, persay, was a couple days ago when my group for anthologies (final performance project for grade 11) came into this scene where I'd be playing really mellow, creepy basslines. I had it worked out that I'd do southbound pachyderm for a while and then segué into this thing that followed the same kind of sound that my teacher and I had come up with. It was basically a couple of riffs that I improvised around, which is how I improv with my teacher and at home -- and will probably how I do solos.

Note that I improvise a lot in other ways -- for both of my monologue performances, I ended up doing half of both of them improvised 'cause I couldn't remember the lines! But it was all good, and seamless, so the only person who know was the guy prompting me . I'm also on the school's improv team, and we do both forms of improv -- completely unplanned, two people in a scene with a couple of rules and just go at it, and the whole "30 seconds to plan with suggestions from the audience" a lot. In this, it's given me a fair bit of experience in improv, so I can see it really helping with solos and general improv-bass stuff.

[MiniMoNK_17]

Originally posted by BlackGeezer
then ill hear something in my head in the same key but is not regularly played. so out pops a bass fill. i have made so many that most of my bands songs i never play the guitar part for very long, but it doesnt sound like a completly different songs. so i do both, i improvise and i write. oh and tones, i play in a metal band and everybody hears me play.

I respect that as I as well play in a metal band and although most people who listen to metal take the bass for granted, it's always good when you have people in the audience who recognize you're a bass player who's not just treating the bass as a rhythm instrument. b.t.w. During recording, has anyone ever tried overdubbing an acoustic guitar over-top of a lead?? it sounds mighty cool

[fallon]

I suppose taste and situation play a part in deciding whether to improvise or premeditate a solo.A band I once played in covered that song 'Summertime Blues' and right in the middle of it,on queue,I burst into the melody of 'The Bonnie Banks Of Loch Lomond'.A clear case for learning the part to make it 'sound' improvised?
Stay cool nontheless.Scotland's slap bassist "Fallon"

[Bassin']

Originally posted by fallon
I suppose taste and situation play a part in deciding whether to improvise or premeditate a solo.A band I once played in covered that song 'Summertime Blues' and right in the middle of it,on queue,I burst into the melody of 'The Bonnie Banks Of Loch Lomond'.A clear case for learning the part to make it 'sound' improvised?
Stay cool nontheless.Scotland's slap bassist "Fallon"

Yeah, I've done that as well... I was in a band that finished the night with "Thank You" by Sly and the Family Stone. We would pretty much go through the song verbatim but would then have an extended jam at the end of it where everybody in the band had a chance to stretch out. Initially I would do some improvised slap lines but eventually my solo got more and more involved. At one point I actually incorporated "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen" (it didn't matter if it was during the summer) and "Favorite Things" from "The Sound of Music" into my solo at random points. It was always interesting to see if anyone really noticed. Occasionally I would hear some clapping and laughing and knew it had an impact.