Help me analyze James Jamerson

[AndyMania]

I recently posted a thread in regards to how to incorporate chromatic notes and received lots of great feedback. This also sparked an interest in James Jamerson and I have been listening to a lot of his famous tracks and was wondering if guys can help me understand what he is doing theory wise. I already know about his one finger "hook" method for plucking. But I am more interested in knowing what kinds of concepts are going on ( besides using chromatic notes which I obviously know already.) I also ordered a book on him that someone recommended. Any input, example licks, exercises, etc would be greatly appreciated.

-Andy

[mambo4]

2 things to help, once you have the sheet music:
1.) Look at the chords, and under each note identify which inertval of chord it is-even if it's a non chord tone.
Understand the intervalic relationship between each note to the chord of the moment.
(my copy of SITSOM has lots of little numbers penciled under the staff)

2.) pay close attention to the tones that Jamerson chooses to linger on vs the ones that are used to simply travel.
Usually these will be the roots and other chord tones (-Jamerson/soul bassists also used the major 6th quite often.)

[JTE]

I'm assuming the book is "Standing In The Shadows of Motown" by Dr. Licks, a/k/a Allan Slutsky. Get it and read the whole thing, not just the transcriptions. Especially useful is the chapter written by Anthony Jackson titled "An Appreciation Of The Style".

When you have the book don't just learn the lines. Take some time to look for characteristic things. Lots of the meat and potatoes of those lines still come down to root and fifth. The interesting things are how Jamerson goes chromatic and how he puts things in surprising places within the measure and within the groove.

Also it important to realize that he was coming from a standard jazz background. It's very much different than pop/rock bass playing. To that end, another great book is Ed Freidland's "Building Walking Bass Lines". That will help you understand the basics of where James was coming. That in turn makes it easier to see what he was doing that was unusual.

John

[AndyMania]

JTE,

"Building Walking Bass Lines" by Ed Friedland is the one that is coming in the mail. I also ordered Hopefully this will help understand more. "Standing In The Shadows of Motown" is another one I ordered.

Mambo,

I will try this.TY!

[Stumbo]

Jamerson isolated bass tracks: Rick Suchow - NYC Bassist & Writer / rare Jaco Pastorius & James Jamerson tracks - Bass

[wrench45us]

Jamerson and most of the session players of Motown were making their living playing out in clubs in the Detroit area before they were recruited by Barry Gordy to make records.
My sense is there are different avenues to understand how Jamerson's bass lines. One is to jump in and spend a lot of time with his lines and alternately is to establish a foundation similar to the foundation he may have had in blues and jazz and then see how he evolved it from there. I suppose both have the same goal intended -- direct or indirect. One may take a bit more patience, but may foster a some sort of pedantic sense of history that could be useful.

[BassChuck]

Originally Posted by JTE

....Also it important to realize that he was coming from a standard jazz background. It's very much different than pop/rock bass playing. To that end, another great book is Ed Freidland's "Building Walking Bass Lines". That will help you understand the basics of where James was coming. That in turn makes it easier to see what he was doing that was unusual.

John

This is a great point that is often overlooked when studing the music of the 50's and 60's. Almost all those great players DID NOT grow up listening to the kind of music they were creating. They had varied backgrounds. This is one reason that the music is so rich, it is incorporating many points of view and styles... its had not yet become ingrown.

Another thing to keep in mind. Of all the bass players playing this style of music, Jamerson was the ONLY player who didn't have James Jamerson to copy and show him the way. He was on his own.

[mambo4]

Originally Posted by mambo4

2 things to help, once you have the sheet music:
1.) Look at the chords, and under each note identify which inertval of chord it is-even if it's a non chord tone.
Understand the intervalic relationship between each note to the chord of the moment.
(my copy of SITSOM has lots of little numbers penciled under the staff)

2.) pay close attention to the tones that Jamerson chooses to linger on vs the ones that are used to simply travel.
Usually these will be the roots and other chord tones (-Jamerson/soul bassists also used the major 6th quite often.)

I am compeled to add a 3rd thing to the list: chord progressions.

in addition to noting what each interval is within each chord,
it is very useful to note what function each chord has in the key,
and thus identify common chord movements.
That way you can absorb the ways Jamerson handled a v i- ii - V7- I or a I-IV-V ect.

[jsbarber]

Originally Posted by wrench45us

... One is to jump in and spend a lot of time with his lines and alternately is to establish a foundation similar to the foundation he may have had in blues and jazz and then see how he evolved it from there. ...

Good point. If you look at other BGists with similar backgrounds you will see similarities to Jamerson in approach. For instance, Max Bennett and Wilton Felder. In Max's case, he started on Double Bass and had played jazz for a couple of decades and then switched to bass guitar. His playing has also has a rhythmic sophistication along the lines of Jamerson. Same is true of Wilton Felder (who was the Tenor player for the Crusaders). He is a killer sax player, but also a great bass guitarist. (He did the bass track on "I Want You Back", by the Jackson 5.) I'm not saying Max and Wilton are Jamerson clones, that they are not. But they share the same kind of sophistication wrt the bass lines they play, and the common thread is that they all are great jazz players.

BTW, for bass in general, if you want to go back to find out who really took the bass out of quarter note walking lines, the guy who many would credit is Jimmy Blanton. He played with Ellington and is very highly revered, he also died young as I recall. So perhaps James Jamerson is the Jimmy Blanton of Bass Guitar.


So studying the approach to constructing walking bass lines makes a lot of sense, and then applying the approach to grooves other than swing...

FWIW,

Jim

[jbednarski]

I took this course last year. Everything you need to know about Jamerson's technique:

Cracking The Detroit Code

[jbednarski]

Originally Posted by jbednarski

I took this course last year. Everything you need to know about Jamerson's technique:

Cracking The Detroit Code

That plus SITSOM too.

[sethlow3]

I also bought SITSOM the book and DVD about 7 years ago. The entire book is in notation only, so it's good to learn the basics first. I bought a book on sight reading basic quarter note walking patterns on bass. Then I got a book on sight reading rhythms which basically had me playing one note with a metronome but with focus only on the rhythms like dotted 8ths, tied 8ths, dotted 16ths, tied 16ths, and rests for each as well.

After I got the basics of that under my hands I went through the SITSOM book and only played songs with 8th note patterns like "It's the Same Old Song". Then I would add the next least complicated songs with 8th notes with a 16ths added here or there. Nothing too complicated at first.

One thing to note is that if you really want to do Jamerson's lines right, play flats with a foam mute using the open string position patterns a lot like he did. I was using a 5 string with rounds at the time and using a lot of closed position patterns. I was even using the B string at times which is a big no no for Jamerson purists.

This is pretty much how I left off my Jamerson studies about 4 years ago as I have been busier with a lot of touring since. I plan on stringing up my 4 string Jazz or another bass with flats and trying to do everything with open strings as much as possible.

Playing with one finger only in the beginning was tough for me to do on faster 16th parts because I had drilled into my head to use 2 alternating fingers for years into my playing. After spending years on stage (especially when playing country) using only one finger, I got a lot better at it.

As much as people claim he used one finger only, I have read on occasions he would use two. So just use the one as much as possible at first, and if a 16th line is too hard with one just try two instead for those specific parts.

Jamerson was definitely THE best bass player of all time. I like Jaco and Victor a lot too, but Jamerson is simply the best IMHO. A bass player's bass player.

[sethlow3]

This was the rhythms book. It's an excellent, thick resource.

BassBooks.com - Your Ultimate Online Resource of Educational Material for the Bass Guitar - ENCYCLOPEDIA OF READING RHYTHMS

[Johannes Oehl]

Soul and Funk are interesting styles of music, especially for a bassplayer. There are many great bass lines, most of them are based on 16th notes patterns. One particulary popular musician amongst the ranks of Detroits music scene of the 60s and 70s is James Jamerson. His way of building basslines has influenced countless bassplayers around the world. The combination of syncopated rhythms with interesting, jazz-influenced melodies and chromatic approaches was unique.

In this sample bassline, I have used some stuff that is characteristic for Jamersons playing. One thing is the way of chromatically approaching chords, very much like you do when playing walking bass. Jamerson started on the upright and surely was familiar with this style of playing.

Another thing Jamerson used quite often is to approch a chord with an ascending perfect fourth. I used this in the tenth bar. A highly syncopated descencing movement leads to the major third of the Amaj7 chord, a c#. The c# leads to the root note of the next chord with an asecending perfect fourth.

Funk und Soul - johannes-oehls Jimdo-Page!

[mikedyermusic]

I've been studying "Standing in the Shadow of Motown" religiously recently, and am going to be posting videos of me playing the lines to get feedback from other Jamerson enthusiasts! Let me know what you think of the first one please.

James Jamerson's Bass Line to "Ain't Nothing Like the Real Thing" - (Bass Cover) - YouTube

[Lichtaffen]

^^ That was excellent, man. ^^

Gotta go home and practice now. You inspired me to get back into JJ.

[bassinplace]

Originally Posted by mikedyermusic

I've been studying "Standing in the Shadow of Motown" religiously recently, and am going to be posting videos of me playing the lines to get feedback from other Jamerson enthusiasts! Let me know what you think of the first one please.

James Jamerson's Bass Line to "Ain't Nothing Like the Real Thing" - (Bass Cover) - YouTube

Nicely played, sir.

[mikedyermusic]

Thanks guys! I'm just getting into JJ and I'm loving it!