How do bassist learn songs in 15 seconds at jams?

[Russell L]

Listen to songs on the radio and see how many chords and chord progressions you recognize, not necessarily what the chords are (name-wise), but their relationship to one another. For instance, if you hear I iii vi II7 V7, would you recognize it? That's where you wanna be.

[Andy_D]

I agree with most everything that has been said so far. Great Thread and very educational for me also.

A great place to hone your chops is Jamming on Ninjam. I spend a lot of time there jamming online with people from all over the world. Yes, it has it's limitations but it is almost all playing by ear. There are musicians with talent from all over the spectrum jamming to many different genres. I'm a regular there and have made a good many online friends that I regularly jam with.

Try going here to get sample and check out the forums on how to get started.

http://ninbot.com/

[repoman]

Here's how....http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pidokakU4I

[nitetrane98]

HaHa. Yeah Moondance would be a toughy if you had never heard it before. Here's how you handle that situation. While listening intently to the band, turn the volume on your bass off and start acting as if you are playing, turn around and look at you amp, wiggle your cord, look at amp again and fiddle with something. By now you should have heard enough of the song to get an idea where it's going, turn back towards amp, turn volume up, turn around and join right in.:<)

Just kidding. Truly, that tune would throw a lot of people off, but you can't sit and pout.
At least you know the root and you've heard where it's going next. Do the best you can with it. Ideally the guitar would have started with a riff and like the old "play a mistake twice" idiom you could come in later like you intended to do it all along.

Also, it ain't no crime to say, "Whoa, I don't know that tune, what are the notes?"

[obimark]

Moondance is interesting becuase it is basically a jazz-progression.
if someone calls something at open jams that I totally don't have a clue or that has way too many changes, I just pass, or say pick something else. There is no shame, if there is another bassist there who knows, it he can step in, fine.

[BawanaRik]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dpsbxstwtlg

Originally Posted by bass12

A good bass line is a good bass line, and while it may go a long way in helping to define a song, knowing only the line does not constitute knowing the song. It's easy to play a bass line and still not have a firm understanding of, for example, the song's chord structure.

[Rev J]

I realize that I might already be saying something that's been said a million times on this thread. My apologies if I have.

Realize that there are a million songs with the same chord progression. Or chord progressions. If you have a 12 bar blues there's literally hundreds of songs.

Another popular one is ii-7 to V7 it's like the jazz equivalent to a I-IV-V. In a nutshell a million Jazz Standards.

Then the I-vi-iv-V. Funny thing about that:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pidokakU4I

The secret is that if you know those progressions like you know your own voice you can mix and match and get an incredible amount of material to know and if you get those sounds in your head it will set you up for a million gigs.

C/S,
Rev J

P.S. This is why I should read more than just the first post before I post.

[nonohmic]

Thanks for all the advice gents!

[jmverdugo]

I have been thinking about this thread for a while, I'm actually very decent at " learning" a song in 15 sec, but in fact I never learn it, I just play along with the rest of the guys every time, until I decide to really go and listen the song and learn it, I realized about it on my last rehearsal when they propose to practice xx song and I said I did not know it and they said: " of course you know it, we played it last week!".

I think that in my case one of things that really helped me was growing up playing music as a "fun thing" to do and not taking it that seriously to begin with. For starters, before finding this forum I never thought about "techniques" to play bass, or never thought that some people would learn to play bass without first learning guitar... But I digress, my point is how many people have gone out with their musician friends, put a couple of guitars in the car and just seat at some place and sing songs? I used to do that a lot and people would ask for songs and we would all look at each other and somebody would know something of the song and the rest would follow... Never perfect but what a lot of fun. Then in college things got more "serious" , I joined a band of folkloric music (our version of country music) and the one and only rehearsal we had was for me to pick up the double bass and exchange phone numbers, then it was all:" I'll see you all at the xx club at 6 " ... and once we were there it was: "let's play this one, it starts in C follow me 1 2 3...." Again, never perfect but a lot of fun.

[thatbassist863]

I know how the OP feels. I started playing blues jams after about a year and half if playing bass. Luckily I had the bassist for the host band help me out. Giving me advice and a lot of times guiding me through the changes. Eventually I was able to hear the changes, but his help was extremely valuable.

I still play blues jams and still don't know most of the songs that are called out, but I studied the different progressions that are common in blues tunes. That's helped me to figure out where the song is going and the feel of the song as well.

Ultimately, just keep going to the jams and everything will fall into place. Also, get with the house bassist (or any other musician there) and soak up as much knowledge as you can. The more you learn about music, the more you realize you don't know. That's the beauty of music.

[JimmyM]

Build yourself a library of hit songs bands you want to play with would do. Moondance is a standard and I don't know many people who don't know how to play it in light jazz circles. Comes with time to get them comfortable, but a band full of strangers can jam on Moondance because they played it in other bands 500 times.

As for stuff you don't know, get the key and hang on tight! You either sink or swim in those situations, and I've done both. But it gets easier the more you do it.

[D.M.N.]

For me, I guess I've just reached the point where I can pick songs out by ear. I can't necessarily name the chords as relations to each other (I'm working on my theory). I couldn't tell you "Oh, that's a I iii vi II7 V7" off the top of my head, but I can generally pick out the correct notes (every once in a while I'll be a half step off). And from there, I can sort of just hear the relation between notes, as it were, kind of a instinctual idea of where the progression is headed. It's cool reading people's tips on here, as I have no idea how to go about describing learning that to someone, I just learned by ear and have become practiced enough to pick stuff out.

[Araman]

IMO , if the bassist learns the song in 15s , that's because the song is easy to play , or the bassist already knew it ! ( sometimes , to have heard the melody only one time on the radio helps )
There are lots of tunes impossible to learn in 15s !

[SteveC]

Background knowledge - songs, theory.
Experience - playing lots of tunes for many years.
Good ear - ability to hear where things are going.