Double Bass Transcribing

[Dr_Bassius]

Eric V asked these questions in the Q thread:

"What should a player transcribe? Why should they transcribe? What should they shoot for achieving as they do this? What long term benefits come out of transcribing not available elsewhere?"


To me, music is a language and i use that analogously as i teach music to my students, weather they play bass or not (i teach jazz improv too)

Let's first talk about language...

In asking the questions about music, parallel them to how you learned your indigenous language, mine is English.

First i made sound and learned how to use my instrument *mouth, tongue jaw etc*
secondly i was immersed in the language and began imitation. (this is where transcription starts) and through some miraculous brain event said my first word (mine was apple at 9 months) and got a response from parents. excitement, encouragement and reward (apples!)
through total immersion and practice (imitation and repetition) i was soon speaking English...


Now if we take that same kind of path to music, it's quite easy to attain skill and ability that is deeper and mature at a "younger" age (playing time logged)
so,

learn how to use your instrument properly.

"What should a player transcribe?" Whatever you want...what do you want to be able to play? Think of the music you listen to as your parents to bass playing...
listen listen listen to all kinds of music and try to play it. it's really simple.

"Why should they transcribe?"
like learning a language by total immersion, it will stay with you forever...i couldn't stop speaking or thinking in English if i tried...
if you transcribe a solo or song it will never leave you.

What should they shoot for achieving as they do this?
being able to play the music exactly as you hear it is key...you can learn to read a french word if you speak English...but your pronunciation may be silly. SOUND like a native

What long term benefits come out of transcribing not available elsewhere?"

I can play every note of john patitucci's solo on Sister Sadie on the GRP all-star big band album (studio)...I haven't played it in years...but i can play it. and if need be, write it down...

it stays with you. just like a language.


now there is a caveat...you have to transcribe by means of total immersion.

now i'll explain.

How to transcribe

This is a very different approach to those that i have met in the music ed biz. so with an open mind and an experiment on your part, you may find it useful.


Step #1 Listen

select and listen to your "solo" all day every day. As I'm learning a new piece or solo, i'll listen to it 100 times a day or more if time permits. Your goal with step one is recalling the solo in your mind... why do songs get stuck in your head? you've heard them over and over. Make it a point to do this with your project.

Step #2 Recall level 1

In your mind hear the sound of a train, or a cat, or a telephone ring...or your personal cell ringtone...you can do it! Now after you have listened for several hundred times, in this manner with the other sounds, try to recall and SING your solo out loud without your instrument or the recording. it's HARD. once you can do this (sing it) move to #3

Step #3 Recall level 2

Sing the solo with the recording...pay attention to articulation and other small details, not just rhythm and pitch.

Step #4 Recall level 3

Play the solo on your instrument from memory recall only (no recording) this is very difficult but valuable. be like unto a little child, mess up a lot. it's ok to suck at this.

Step #5 Recall level 4

after a few days of step 4 you should be able to play a good portion of the solo...start playing along with the recording until you have it polished.

Step #6 Recall level 5

write it down from memory...if you want.



why write it last? many people transcribe by playing and pausing the CD or using a slow-down program. and writing things out first. Then, using the manuscript to learn the material. This is no different from reading and learning french from a text book. You gotta move to FRANCE (or wherever) to learn that language. learn by immersion.


-denson

 

[quenoil]

Thanks for this - I like your steps for transcribing a lot. I'm going to introduce them to some of my students (and myself!).

 

[Dr_Bassius]

awesome!

 

[Rick Auvil]

"What should a player transcribe? Why should they transcribe? What should they shoot for achieving as they do this? What long term benefits come out of transcribing not available elsewhere?"

What?
I would answer, something that's fun for you to transcribe! My earliest transcriptions were cartoon themes. I did them in junior high school by recording them on a cheap little 3 inch reel to reel recorder, listening to them 20 or 30 times, and writing them down in notation. Don't stick to bass lines, transcribe whatever you like! This made transcription fun for me!

Achievement?
Your rhythmic and "harmelodic" accuracy will be nurtured; intonation and audiation ability is much improved; you gain insight into the mind of the composer; music theory skills are put to practical use; pride in your accomplishment and ability! There are few musical learning activities that rival the process of transcription.

Long Term Benefits?
Big ears; development of a higher order musical intellect; ability to notate your own ideas more accurately; respect for the artist and the art.

This is by no means complete, but I hope it encourages you to transcribe!

 

[damonsmith]

I am one of those not so into transcribing. I am for it as a kind of ear training, but there are other ways to work on ear training as well.
I think if you are curious about something - figure out what it is and learn what you need to from it, I am more into that than a forced transcription of a whole tune or solo.

Also, as a teacher I have never felt it is the best use of a students limited practice time - there are always so many technical and musical issues time is better spent on other things.
I think learning tunes the slow way + practicing Bach and Simandl - for example, is almost always a better use of time!

Also, if you are listening it happens naturally. There is a lot of material in my playing that comes from other players - I know every sound Peter Kowald ever made on record, for example, without doing direct transcriptions. I play a ton of Red Mitchell and Dave Holland licks, too.
Mostly, I feel it interferes with the "art" side of things, if you let it happen naturally as above you will more often come to your own version of the idea which will ultimately be more useful.

 

[fergus currie]

As part of advanced technique I would suggest transcribing top class solos from other instruments and working out how to play them on the bass. A few years ago I made several trancriptions of solos by Keith Jarrett, Chet Baker, Tal Farlow, Gerry Mulligan, Lou Donaldson, Sonny Clark etc and then worked them up for the bass writing out all the fingerings and position changes. Then I started to disect these solos and extract phrases from them, transcribe these phases into different keys and incorporate them into my own solos. I really felt the benefit of this work even if I did it for only six months I would say that it's the most important study in jazz bass I ever did.

I'll try to find some of these (in the attic) and put them up on the net and link them to this thread.
Cheers
FC

 

[jweiss]

How to transcribe

This is a very different approach to those that i have met in the music ed biz. so with an open mind and an experiment on your part, you may find it useful.

I am one of Denson' students. I just wanted to say that this method has been very valuable for me. I have done several transcriptions now using the method and there is great value in learning to hear (and sing!) the whole solo before learning it on your instrument or writing it down. Definitely write it down last.

As for Steps 1-3 - I use the Transcribe software to make a mp3 consisting of just the part of the recording that contains the solo, and then I play it on repeat in my car stereo when I'm driving around. If you have a 30 minute commute you can get 40-60 listens to the solo on the way to work! Start singing it as soon as you can.

Cheers,

Jeff

 

[njwelch75]

Question for Bassius.

Let's say I want to transcribe an entire song that is rather long (10 minutes and up) using your approach. Would you still listen to and memorize the song as a whole, or would you break it into more manageable pieces (4 or 8 choruses or whatever)?

Thank you

 

[Dr_Bassius]

Question for Bassius.

Let's say I want to transcribe an entire song that is rather long (10 minutes and up) using your approach. Would you still listen to and memorize the song as a whole, or would you break it into more manageable pieces (4 or 8 choruses or whatever)?

Thank you

i'd probably work at it in sections. however it's comfortable for you.

I have, however done songs as a whole. it's more time consuming because of the # of listenings, but it still works.

 

[Bruce Lindfield]

I go to Jazz Summerschool each year with some great teachers who are all UK Jazz pros and they are all very keen on transcribing in a "practical sense" - as in , you have a group of musicians - let's listen to a recording, transcribe what we need and then put on a performance!

So - get the chords down, get the melody and any intro/outro or riffs - get the feel etc. - then use that for the band to play the piece.

One teacher on the course who has transcribed a huge amount, suggested the way to do this was to work from big to small - broad brush details, to finer details!

So - listen to the piece - how many bars are there, how many notes to the bar, what's the feel? What's the structure - AABA or something else? Then - what are each of the chords' root notes - what is the quality of the chord? Then move on to the melody and any other parts essential to the piece...

 

[Chris Fitzgerald]

What should a player transcribe?

Whatever most moves you - that's the beauty of it. In general, I try to transcribe the things that make me feel like I just heard something amazing and I want to know exactly what it was. It doesn't always have to be jazz. If you want to open your mind up sometime, try transcribing a movement from a Bach cello suite using Bassius' method (in the OP) from a great cello recording (you can play it down an octave if it suits you better).

Why should they transcribe? What should they shoot for achieving as they do this? What long term benefits come out of transcribing not available elsewhere?

The only good reason to transcribe that I know of is because you want to learn what the music has to offer. By transcribing, you are kind of saying to yourself, "anything I hear, I can choose to absorb and make it a part of me". Transcribing is like singing along with a recording, only on a more detailed and (hopefully) deeper level.

Educators often argue about the value of writing transcriptions down. I don't argue this point - I just do it and get it over with so I can get to the intuitive/spiritual absorption phase. Ask yourself this: in your native language, if a great genius in whatever field were giving a speech and you wanted to be able to really, truly understand the meaning of all of it (not just the overview you'd get by listening once), do you think you'd have any trouble writing down the words if you got a chance to stop and start a recording of the speech? Of course not... because you speak the language. If you find that you can't do this with music, then writing down transcriptions is a wonderful way to improve your language skills while listening to and beginning to absorb something inspiring at the same time.

Notice I say "beginning to absorb". Writing the music down on paper is only the beginning. To truly absorb the music, you have to get to the point where you become it, or meld with it. To take the language analogy one step further, learning to do this is like learning to exactly imitate a dialect and/or accent of someone else speaking. If you're an American, think of it as trying to catch all the inflections of an Australian or South African. It takes time, and some inflections are more difficult than others. (Meryl Streep is a master of this) To do this in music, I try to do the following:

1) Write the music down (I sing while I'm writing, but I won't belabor that point)
2) Sing along until I don't need the paper anymore
3) Record myself playing or singing along with the original and listen for places where I "come apart from" the original.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

I'll try to post a couple of audio examples of this process later on today or tomorrow. Great thread!

 

[Dr_Bassius]

try transcribing a movement from a Bach cello suite using Bassius' method (in the OP) from a great cello recording

HAHAH i've been doing this right for a few days now



suite 3

 

[chicagodoubler]

Transcription is the *best* way to accomplish an "authentic" jazz feel and vocabulary. If you aren't attempting to play jazz in the established tradition this may be less valuable to you, but it is incredibly rare to meet world-class jazz musicians who haven't invested a considerable amount of time working on transcription. John Clayton's studio at UCLA is by far the strongest jazz bass studio I've ever heard. The bulk of each masterclass is transcription performance. Proof is in the pudding as they say.

David Baker teaches:
1 listen
2 sing
3 play
4 write

Attempting to do this on large chunks of material can be incredibly frustrating to the neophyte. One note at a time is perfectly fine. Even beginners can transcribe well recorded bass lines one bar at a time. I've posted quite a bit of information on the specifics, including free software that facilitates difficult passages.

Shed!

 

[tZer]

Am I misreading some of the posts or are some suggesting that 'transcribing' is something other than 'listening to music and writing it out'?

I ask because it seems that some are saying you can transcribe music without writing it out - what I know as "learning by ear and playing from memory".

I am not asking to be controversial - I am curious if the word 'transcribe' is commonly used to mean both writing out music as well as simply memorizing without any writing?

 

[damonsmith]

Am I misreading some of the posts or are some suggesting that 'transcribing' is something other than 'listening to music and writing it out'?

I ask because it seems that some are saying you can transcribe music without writing it out - what I know as "learning by ear and playing from memory".

I am not asking to be controversial - I am curious if the word 'transcribe' is commonly used to mean both writing out music as well as simply memorizing without any writing?

It seems to mean both - I think it may be because most jazz solos are more laborious than learning most songs by ear. Or for whatever reason - you are correct.

 

[jsamuel]

very relevant and detailed article on the subject Link Removed by Dave Leibman, who feels very strongly on the subject.

I've been struggling with transcription for years, I keep trying but always find that I gain next to nothing from memorizing vast chunks of other peoples imrovisations. It just doesn't seem the most direct or efficiant way to learn...

In the past year or so i have been lucky enought to attend workshops with both Dave Leibman and George Garzone. I was interested to note that while Dave Leibman was almost violently passionate on the subject, Garzone (a player of comparible standard) admitted that he's never really bothered memorizing solos. From my experience there seems to be a rough 50/50 split between musicians at any level. Maybe it's not the best way for everyone to learn?

Please correct me if i'm talking bollocks, I'm just wondering if anyone else has similar feelings?

 

[Marc Piane]

Definitely an interesting question and one with lots of conflicting opinions as we can see. I think developing your ear to the point where you can transcribe anything is important. At some point it really just turned into melodic and rhythmic dictation for me if the solo didn't speak to me. A mechanical and boring task for me. I went to a professor and told him of my problem because I thought maybe something was wrong with me. After all jazz players are supposed to transcribe great solos right. He told me that his favorite use of transcription, whether it be for writing or playing, was anytime you are listening to a recording and something jumps out at you... Figure it out. But without having the chops to be able to hear and relate it to an instrument this will be very hard.

 

[jsamuel]

Interesting what your professor said, I wonder if he meant figuring it out instantly - that is, hearing it and knowing by ear what the melody notes are against the harmony - or being able to sit down with your instrument and work it out... I don't see the challenge in the latter option, that is how i got the majority of my jazz education...

I guess i just don't see the gain in the massively time-consuming process of memorizing whole choruses of improvisation.

 

[Marc Piane]

Your rate of 'figuring stuff out' increases as your ear improves. It's a continuum not a former/later.

 

[jsamuel]

good point... but what about memorizing? that's the real problem i have, i just don't see the point in memorizing entire solos...