Re learning the technique I never learned in the first place!

[Chaser1]

This is my first post, although I have spent a lot of time on this forum reading what people have to say, and it has been extremely helpful in learning.

I have been playing for about 6 months now, and just recently moved so I had to give up my teacher. He was primarily a guitar teacher that taught bass as well and I don't think he was very concerned about technique. I just picked up Ed Friedland"s Bass Method to teach myself until I find a new teacher and it has completely thrown me for a loop. I thought I was getting pretty good then I realized that I have been doing it all wrong. When finger picking I was anchoring strictly to the pickup and just digging at the string almost plucking from under the string upwards. This was my way of trying to avoid hitting the adjacent strings. I got pretty fast at it and started to feel like I was improving (although I quite often struck other strings). Then I pick up this method and I see that its far superior moving my anchor and running my finger across the string and letting it come through to rest on the next higher (or lower depending on how you look at it) string to mute it, but I have lost all my speed and kinda just feel as if I am starting at square one all over again and learning from the beginning. Songs I could once play I can't anymore without going back to my old method which I am trying to avoid. Just looking to see if anyone has any advise or has experienced this same thing when they started un-learning bad habits.

Thanks

[juriscon]

I switched my finger style (from long fingernails to short fingernails) after 25 years of playing bass. After 4 years of the new more traditional style I'm still not even close to playing at the level I did with the old style because I'm trying to undo 25 years of muscle memory. Its much easier to adapt or change your style when you first start out than after years and years of playing. If you are serious about improving your technique then do it now and remember that you got comfortable playing the old way so you'll get comfortable playing the new way it just takes some time and effort. Once you get up to speed the new style should makes things a lot easier so you'll be able to take your playing to a higher level.

[JimmyM]

a lot of times, people won't see instant results when unlearning bad habits so they revert back to their old ways. you've got to be patient and give yourself some time, and accept that before you get better at it, you may get worse for a little while. but just like correcting problems in your swing when you play golf, you might have to wait a month or two to see the results. so be patient when unlearning bad habits, and do your best not to revert back to bad habits.

[steelhead2]

sounds like Duck Dunns style(style meaning a high mount on the body,thumb on the pickup and an upward`pluck') that's where i am at currently,lately i've done (way) more sitting while practising(i always stood and often had the bass down,WAY down with very little wrist bend)

and i'm spending a lot more time on my fretted P than my fretless J that i used to favor parking my thumb on the bridge PU both for clarity(and i guess? the distance between strings is what i'm thinking?) or parking on the E string,now i'm coming to terms with parking my thumb on the neck and plucking from there(used to hate that,didn't think it was tight enough tonally

i've had`rests' mounted on various basses both below for thumb style(tug bar) and above for a thumb`rest'

blahblahblah!,,,then there's those darn`picks', i'd say relax and don't force anything tooo much=keep it FUN most of all and enjoy it! that's what it's really all about=keep us posted

[DougD]

Originally Posted by JimmyM

a lot of times, people won't see instant results when unlearning bad habits so they revert back to their old ways. you've got to be patient and give yourself some time, and accept that before you get better at it, you may get worse for a little while. but just like correcting problems in your swing when you play golf, you might have to wait a month or two to see the results. so be patient when unlearning bad habits, and do your best not to revert back to bad habits.

Well said JimmyM

[Chaser1]

Thanks everyone for the replies, its good to hear people have experience the same thing correcting bad habits. Juriscon changing your technique after 25 years that must have been really hard seeing as how weird it is to correct after six months, I am definetly going to stick with the new technique.