Tabs or music

[oldscarrow]

G'day
a question for all those that have learned to play bass well.
If you consider yourself to be a good bass player,...could you tell me, did you learn to play bass by reading bass tabs, or did you learn to read music. And if you did learn to read music, are you a better bassist because you learned to read music, and any other comments are appreciated, (except for those that might be telling me I have this in the wrong section....get over it, I am still finding my way around this forum) to everybody else...thanks

[onlyclave]

Reading standard notation is the only way to go. If I can read it, I can play it. TABs don't have any way to indicate rhythm. Have you ever tried to play a tab of a song you've never heard? You can't.

[lobey]

Definitely go with learning to read/write music. I wish I had done so when I started playing years ago.

[FutureTense]

I started with tab. I have since decided to go back and learn to read music. It's a bit more versatile.

I still don't know if I consider myself a "good" bass player, though. Decent, sure, but "good" takes a while.

[Jake of Bass]

I started with notation first and anything I composed myself I'd write out in notation. I learnt to read tabs pretty early on but would still write in notation. It's much better for understanding rhythm and pitch, whereas tab is simply finger position on the fretboard, nothing more.

[Joe.shaffer]

Standard notation is the only way to go. I started with tabs, but after I learned to read/write music I really expanded as a player.

[Rudreax]

I already knew how to read standard notation when I started playing bass, so it was a no-brainer which one I would use.

[Grantrudd]

i was a trombone player for 4 years before bass, so naturally i started out reading music for the bass. i have been playing bass for 4 years now, so 8 years of reading bass clef + music theory classes, and i still do not call myself a good reader. in the end, reading music will help you get any gig you want. i have definately gotten gigs over others because of the fact that i sat down and sightread the parts at rehersal. when you read music, you learn the fretboard a lot better. there are many ways to play the same note, so you learn the fretboard after time. i think reading has made me a better bassist, and given me more opportunities as a musician. in all honesty, i think tabs are junk. there are no trumpet tabs, trombone tabs. even the DRUMMER has to read a normal staff with normal notes. why should the bass player have a cheat sheet that tells them where to put their fingers? if you are beginning, sure you might learn the song faster because you wont have to think of which fret to play, but going through and figuring it out and figuring out the rhythm before you even hear the peice, or try to fit the notes to the rhythm will help you tremendously later down the road. dont take the easy way out in the beginning! it will only come back to bite you in the arse later on.

sorry if this is rambling, and incoherent. the eggnog was strong.

[jdp55]

Iv'e been playing bas for over 35 years. I was a bass clarinet player in HS. It's in treble clef so i was always confused by bass clef and never read for the bass guitar. I had music theory so it was easy to play bass guitar by ear. I've finally decided to learn bass clef. It's been a few weeks now and I'm gonna keep after it until I can sight read. It's weird for me since I know treble clef so well. It's only one space down but after looking at the first space and seeing F for so long it's hard to think A. Rock is so easy you don't need to read. I'm going into jazz now and I ain't taking a knife to a gunfight.

[ryco]

Standard notation.

Now if I could only sight-read treble clef. I can stumble through it. Got to where I could read it pretty fluently in college reading it everyday. Not now!

[greenboy]

What's sad about so many tabs up on the net: as limited as tab is in communicating detailed musical info, even the bit that tab can handle is so often wwwwraaaaaoooong. i mean, BAD! So evidently tab attracts a lot who haven't really been doing music too long yet.

I can sightread treble or bass clef equally well... playing bari sax which is a transposed instrument is much like bass clef with just a change of key sig/accidentals. Actually I can read on trombone, tuba, french horn, baritone, as well as most of the reeds, or orchestral or piano scores. That's one thing about notation: it's universal. I don't read as well on fretless bass because I hardly get call to sight read on it, so I pick my way though while looking up at the paper, then down on the neck. But a couple weeks of concentrated effort and I could deal a lot better without the back-and-forth... Right now it's another tool to quickly learn tunes and material I don't have a recording of.

It's good to read even if you don't need to play from charts in realtime!

[Jake of Bass]

Originally Posted by ryco

Standard notation.

Now if I could only sight-read treble clef. I can stumble through it. Got to where I could read it pretty fluently in college reading it everyday. Not now!

I've found with teaching guitar my reading of treble cleff has improved immensely, more than when I was engaged totally in learning the guitar. It comes back to you relatively quickly.

[CatfishStudios]

Dont waste your time with tabs....learn to read and use your ear...both will develop faster without tablature. Tabs almost hinder learning notation...and are a crutch for ones ear.

[SixString]

played trumpet for 7 years before picking up a bass so i knew treble clef. got drafted into schools jazz band to replace bassist who was kicked out so was kind of forced to learn bass clef. I never got very good with it in school but i just picked up standing in the shadows of Motown which has no tabs so i can work on it some more for fun.

[JTE]

I find several major issues with tablature. But first, the accuracy of transcpriptions whether the transcription is shown in tab or in notation is not relevant to the question.

A. Tab divorces sound from the communication. That's the critical downfall of tab. Standard notation (if learned correctly) tells you what something sounds like. Tab only shows you where to put your fingers. It reinforces the whole confusion between playing music on an instrument versus merely playing the instrument.

B. Tab eliminates communication with other musicians. Bass tab only works on bass (and for specific tunings), but you can't show a singer what you want them to sing by showing them tab.

C. It's not really any easier to learn (unless you avoid rhythm, in which case you're ignoring a critical part of the music) so you waste time learning to use a tool that's very limited.

It's a valid and useful shorthand for showing someone where to put the fingers. But it's a short-cut and a crutch for real learning. We make too much of the physical aspects of bass playing and too often eschew the real music part of it. Tab contributes to that fallacy.

jte

[mambo4]

Originally Posted by oldscarrow

G'day
a question for all those that have learned to play bass well.

not sure i qualify but i'll answer anyhow

did you learn to play bass by reading bass tabs, or did you learn to read music.

That's kind of a false choice in my case. I learned to play pretty competently without fluency in either, and eventually I began to pick up on notation. Tab is always confusing to look at for me.

And if you did learn to read music, are you a better bassist because you learned to read music, and any other comments are appreciated

without a doubt, reading has improved my playing, primarily in regards to my awareness of Rhythm. I cannot emphasize this enough. The more you refine your sense of exactly where the eighth notes and sixteenth notes fall, the tighter and more consistent you will be. It's easy to learn the pitches indicated on the staff, but mastering rhythmic notation is ongoing for me. I found exploring notation with Latin bass lines very helpful in rhythm reading.

[Jefenator]

Originally Posted by oldscarrow

If you consider yourself to be a good bass player,...could you tell me, did you learn to play bass by reading bass tabs, or did you learn to read music. And if you did learn to read music, are you a better bassist because you learned to read music, and any other comments are appreciated, (except for those that might be telling me I have this in the wrong section....get over it, I am still finding my way around this forum) to everybody else...thanks

I learned to play bass first & foremost by ear. But written music also played an important role. (That summer I spent slowly picking through an entire fake book full of Jazz melodies has served me well.)

I'm definitely better for having learned standard notation. It's expanded my vocabulary and improved my understanding of the nuts & bolts of music. Sometimes the reading gigs make the difference between paying & not paying the rent.

One of the several major problems I have with TAB is that it spoon-feeds you your LH fingerings. Contrary to what the TAB gives you, there's usually at least two places to fret a particular note, half a dozen ways to play a pattern. If you're improvising a walking bass line or a melody, that kind of expanded awareness is super important IMHO.

[mwiles30]

Standard notation is the only way to do it. Also, I've been playing piano for half of my life (and still do), so I've been reading long before I picked up the bass. Also, because of this, I'm a fluent with treble and bass clefs.

And my argument against die-hard tab users is as follows: if violinists, violists, cellists, doublebassists, and classical guitarists have all been reading standard notation for the last few centuries, why should it be any different now? String players have been reading some very complex works for a long time, so use of TAB is just asinine.

[JazzyJames]

Learn music. I wish I knew how to read it. You are a much better bassist if you do.

[theshadow2001]

If you get to a certain professional level then yes I'm sure it's very useful. I can't sight read I can eventually work a piece out given enough time. Which is convenient if running through a work book (which a lot of the time just requires you know the basics not even being able to sight read). But since most of them come with a CD I usually get it by ear first. I've never communicated a piece of music via nototation with someone else because I don't know any other musicians that can read. On an amateur level I think there are more important aspects to concentrate on like ear training, theory, working off of chord charts etc. etc..