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Carol Kaye dilemma

#41
I emailed the great Darryl Jones a few years ago about materials that he had used, that he would recommend for up and coming bass players. He was good enough to email me back with a couple of good resources. One of his recommendations was the Carol Kaye material. This is what he said about it...

The Carol Kaye Bass books
I don't know if these books are still available but I'd check ebay for copies if they aren't. Monster basslines and great reading excercises in a style(boogaloo
) that's still important today. Hicky-burr is in one of these books which is the famous title song from the first Bill Cosby show( from the 70s ?)Carol played the bass. Quincy Jones did the music. Quincy's been brilliant for a good long time. Bill's vocal performance about as improvisational as any jazz musician I know. Totally killer.
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#42
Andrew McGregor said:
The books are great, but Carol is… well, a character. As has been said, take what she says with a kilo of salt, but what she writes in notation or records, take as gospel.

Part of what she says, though, matters: gear is only important in so far as there's something wrong with it. Once it's properly functional (meaning, correct action and intonation, and capable of getting a sound that works musically for what you want to do), you can forget about the gear and start playing it. That's an important antidote to the perennial beginner electric guitarist's obsession over what precise gear is in famous artist X's setup. Bass players are less prone to that particular failing, but it's still important to know that it's a fallacy that gear is everything. Kind of like Ken Rockwell saying that the camera doesn't matter in photography… it does, but most of the game is in the photographer's head.
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You participate at Talkbass and can make that statement? :D
 
#43
Jamerson was a better player, reportedly not a very good guy and, as far as I can tell, never taught anyone. Barry Gordy ripped off a lot of musicians, Jamerson and Kaye included. Read about Bob Babbitt some time, as well.

Carole Kaye is right there with Mel Bay as the seminal bass teaching material. She had books, etc. out when nobody else did. I'm glad for this, as I used them a lot when I go started. She's an icon in the teaching world. Since you probably won't ever meet her, I really wouldn't worry about the rest of it.
 
#47
Basshole said:
Is it "HARD" to tell the sonic difference between a longscale bass played fingerstyle, and a shortscale bass played with a pick? I mean really "HARD"??

:rolleyes:
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Back in those days, both James and Carol played P-Basses with flatwound strings.

Between the two, the differences in gear-related tone aren't as telling as differences in note choices, musical approach, and overall feel. This is where James clearly has the upper hand, as a genius-level legend obviously does.
 
#49
cowsgomoo said:
you're not impressed by her personality or the claims she's made about tracks she says she's played on... and because of this you're having doubts about her teaching materials?

you dont have to LIKE someone to learn from them... if someone can teach me something, I'll take it regardless of whether I believe they played 'I Was Made To Love Her' or not
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Thread could have stopped right here. Right at the beginning. Unless you're interested in a debate?

But about playing bass... this is a good post, one could learn something from this. As well as from Carol, and James, and Bob and cowsgomoo and....
 

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