Easiest way to construct a walking bassline from a chord chart?

[missymoolaura]

Hey, my name is laura.

Relativley new to playing bass. Anyway, for music i have been given a chord chart, and have been told to play it as a walking bassline? not too sure on how to do this.

cheers

[pontz]

I don’t post here much, but I read TB every day and learn a lot, often from the simplest answers. So here is my simple answer to this question. I hope it helps. If you don’t understand this answer, you probably need to get some books or take some lessons. Or you could do a search where you’ll find much better answers than this.

Easy walking bass line for a given chord chart:

You’re going to play a note on every down beat, for example if the song is in 4/4 time, tap your foot and count “1 and 2 and 3 and 4”. Say the number when your foot hits the floor, the “and” when your foot is up. To start, play the root note on the 1. For example if the first chord is Am7, play an A on the 1. Now you need to walk to the next chord. Let’s say it is D7. You can use scale tones (try: A, B, C, E) or chromatic tones (try: A, B, C, C#), but either way you want to head towards the next Root, D. These approaches give you a smooth transition from one chord to the next. Maybe you don’t want it to be so smooth. You could arpegiate (sp?) an octave on the Am7 (A, C, E, A) and then drop a fourth to the D root.

Do you get the idea? Now take the chart and have a blast figuring out the best way to walk from one chord to the next.

Good Luck
BP

[DocBop]

Chord tones and approach notes are what its all about. The key is listening and practicing to develop a feel for time and thinking ahead to plan approach notes. What kind of chart is it Jazz, Blues? Jazz is full of II-V-I chord changes so practice Walking II-V-I's to get a feel for where the chord tone lay in relation to each other. Start simple using roots and fifths and chromatic approach note to setup the next chord change.

For Blues you sit on each chord longer, so you maybe want to think arpeggios and approach notes. Same thing Blues chord progressions are main I-IV-V so practice those to get feel where chord tones are in relation to each other.

After you get Walking basics down you will start adding more chord tones and scales for more note resources.

There are a couple good books on Walking Lines Ed Friedland's is a classic and Jim Stinnett has a good book on the topic. Todd Johnson has a good DVD also. Learning to Walk bass is a good education that will teach skills you can use in any style.

[Phil Smith]

Too quickly get started you can play the root, 2nd, 3rd and 5th or the root, 7th, 6th and 5th of whatever the chord is. For a typical progression such as:

| Cmin7 | F7 | Bb Maj7 |

You could play:

| C D Eb G | F G A C | Bb C D F |

Or

| C Bb A G | F Eb D C | Bb A G F |

It's basic but with a good time feel it will get you somewhere i.e. walking. You will still need to incoporate other things to enchance your lines depending on what sounds good and works with the tune.

[Ed Fuqua]

Absolutely shameless self promotion, I hope I'm happy with myself...

[peterpalmieri]

Ed Friedland has a great book called "Building Walking Bass Lines" it is a great book for beginners and more advanced players as well.

I'd suggest you order a copy and spend some time with it...

Good luck...

[Freddels]

A BIG +1 to Ed Friedland's books and also get a copy of Todd Johnson's Walking Bass DVD.

Get hold of some walking blues and learn it. Since the blues will have less going on harmonically (less chord changes) than jazz, it's easier to learn walking bass and develop you ear.