Playing bass and singing simultaneously

[Fezzey]

Who among you sings and plays bass at the same time? Lead and/or backup vocals...

A bass player for whom I have great respect, a guy who makes his living as a musician, once told me that he learned, early in his long career, that if you want to work, it's not enough to just be a good bass player, you need to sing as well.

I know professional (those who actually make a living at it!) bass players who don't sing much and still work a lot, but it does make sense that you'd be that much more valuable and marketable if you could play bass and sing well.

What are your thoughts?

[Illbay]

Originally Posted by Fezzey

Who among you sings and plays bass at the same time? Lead and/or backup vocals...

Man, am I glad you started this thread!

I have never had ANY problem playing guitar (acoustic fingerstyle or strummed chords) and singing, but I have the toughest time playing bass while singing!

Why is that, I wonder?

And what can I do, if anything, to overcome that obstacle?

[thesteve]

I do background vocals in my band...though they're pretty simple (how complex can BGVs be for a alt/punk band?)

I've found that the big thing is to just practice singing while playing alot...until you can play on autopilot and tweak the vocals the way you want them.

[Stinsok]

It is relatively new to me. In a past life I sang BGV's as a drummer. I'm in a 3 piece band now (on bass) and I want to do my fair share but it's tough to find material that I can do. I tell them I will try anything, but it usually comes down to a 3chord tune where I chug out 8th notes (like "Sharp Dressed Man.")

[Oren Hudson]

I've played guitar, primarily bass, for 44 years and was the lead singer in my earlier days and now do 30-40% lead vocals. On occassion, I do rhythm & lead guitar as well as keyboard. My observations; when I was younger, learning bass lines and vocals seemed easier and I think it was because I didn't know any better. For example, I played (and still do) Midnight Hour by Wilson Pickett and sing the lead. If you know the song, you know that it's not the easiet bass line around, particularly since I've always doubled up half of the pattern. If I were starting to learn it know, I would get someone else to do the lead vocals because I'd think I'd be too busy concentrating on doing the bass lines. Additionally, in many songs, the bass part is way more busy than most all other instruments, so I find, especially now, doing lead vocals on most anything other than bass is easier.

[jive1]

Bassist's Guide to Singing

[kesslari]

I sing and play bass. Some songs are easy to learn, some are more work to learn, and some I just can't manage. But some I can, and it's a major chunk of fun

Funny you mention "In the Midnight Hour" - I find that the prototype of the "easy to sing and play" songs. But maybe that's just me...

Just did my first recording of my new band with me singing on one of the tunes - I'll be interested to see how it comes out.

[tplyons]

Originally Posted by Illbay

Why is that, I wonder?

And what can I do, if anything, to overcome that obstacle?

I've found that I can't play bass and sing at all, but guitar isn't a problem. I think it's because the vocals tend to follow the guitar melody more, whereas a typical bassline, unless you're playing straight eighths, is so different from the vocal lines.

How Geddy does it, I have no clue.

[william3]

I am enjoying with my guitar by singing and playing.

[Lesfunk]

I've been singing lead and playing bass professionally for 18 years, and I have gotten a lot of work because I have the ability to sing and play. Even if you're not a great singer, the more you can do, the more employable you are.

[Fezzey]

Some of the bass players I admire most are the guys who routinely play bass and sing at the same time, McCartney, Sting, Peter Cetera, Jason Scheff, etc.

[Valerus]

The second I start singing, I start playing wrongly.

Man, I need to work on that.

[peterbright]

I can't sing whether playing bass or not! I wish I had that problem.

[lbanks]

As long as I have reverb and low volume, I'll sing my @ss off.

[Alan U]

I think the problem is that the bass seldom follows the vocal line.
As a former drummer of twenty odd years I had the same problem, in that when I tried to sing, either the singing became stacato or the drumming wanted to become 'longer' and more legato.

Drummers refer to 'independence' which means the ability to separate the process of playing diffent times with all four limbs.
To sing and play bass at the same time needs the same application.

I've recently started with the Ukulele, and have no problem. The big difference is playing/strumming chords which coincide with the vocal melody and often have the same timing, falling on sylables.

So hats off to Mc Cartney who sang the lead and played tricky lines like 'I saw her standing there'.

[kesslari]

Drummers refer to 'independence' which means the ability to separate the process of playing diffent times with all four limbs.
To sing and play bass at the same time needs the same application.

Bingo.

Learning theory describes a sequence of learning process (once you start to learn something):

"Conscious incompetence" - you know what you want to do, but you can't do it (yet). Like when you're just learning a song, but don't have it down.

"Conscious competence" - you can do (play) it right, but you really have to concetrate (consciously)."

"Unconscious competence" - you no longer have to think about it, you can just do it.

The goal of most practice is to move a skill to unconscious competence.
With singing and playing, you have to do that in a big way for 2 separate skills (the singing and the playing of a particular song).

As mentioned in a couple of posts, it really helps to get each part down separately (e.g., get really good at being able to play the bass part without thinking about it, and be able to sing the song without too much thought) before putting them together.

[guitfiddle0409]

I have to sing and play bass. We've gone through four singers in the last four years and auditions for replacements have been a joke for the most part. So now we're a three piece blues/rock band with myself and the guitarist doing all the singing. I actually got used to it long ago by learning what Jack Bruce did with Cream. If you can get through Sunshine of Your Love playing bass and singing then other stuff starts to work too. I may not be the best singer ever born but it's a hell of a lot better than some non-musician that thinks he can "sing" and makes his audition an embarrassment.

[Spector_Ray]

I find that if I rehearse the song a couple of times, I can get into the groove. Once that's established, I can usually nail the vocals unless there's some offbeat syncopation.

[lawsonman]

I do all the singing in our band except for 3 songs.I sing 48 songs,play bass,plus run a digitech vocalist 2 with my foot for harmonies. I'm pretty well shot after a gig.

[ElectrAcoustic]

Practice, Practice, Practice.. there's really no secret to it.. the more you work on it, the easier it gets.. check out this thread, there's a wealth of info there.. a couple tricks I can share though..

1) Get comfortable holding a song down alone with just the bass and your voice.. you may need to start with a really simple bass line (just enough to get the song across, whole notes, whatever as long as the song is there) while keeping the focus on your vocals.. as you get more comfortable, make your bassline more complex and syncopated.

2) For some reason, it all clicked better when I started using a muted-palm thumb technique, instead of fingerstyle. Not sure why but once it clicked, it was easier to switch to fingerstyle..

3) I drive alot so I started singing and playing bass lines while driving.. my steering wheel has two nice finger grooves in it and you might feel silly if people look in but screw it, it'll help you tons in the long run..

Good luck..