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Double Bass Hearing Basslines for Transcriptions

colliningram

colliningram

Mar 9, 2011
21
0
Fort Collins, CO
www.reverbnation.com
#1
Recently I have been trying to transcribe the basslines of my favorite players. In particular I want to get in the head of Jimmy Garrison and Israel Crosby. Having looked at other peoples transcriptions I have become really interested in their harmonic support and want to research it further. My problem comes when I try to transcribe their lines. The mix on the recordings makes it very difficult and impossible at times to accurately hear what they are playing. I find this problem in particular with Garrison as I can rarely clearly hear him over Trane.

I have a fairly nice set of computer speakers with a subwoofer but I am still having a very difficult time picking out the bass.

Any ideas, technological or otherwise, that I could use to hear the basslines more clearly?
 
#2
colliningram said:
Recently I have been trying to transcribe the basslines of my favorite players. In particular I want to get in the head of Jimmy Garrison and Israel Crosby. Having looked at other peoples transcriptions I have become really interested in their harmonic support and want to research it further. My problem comes when I try to transcribe their lines. The mix on the recordings makes it very difficult and impossible at times to accurately hear what they are playing. I find this problem in particular with Garrison as I can rarely clearly hear him over Trane.

I have a fairly nice set of computer speakers with a subwoofer but I am still having a very difficult time picking out the bass.

Any ideas, technological or otherwise, that I could use to hear the basslines more clearly?
Click to expand...

I'm guessing you've tried using your EQ controls to boost the bass/low-mid and/or cut the top end of the spectrum? Transcribe! is software with a good EQ for this kind of thing, as well as allowing you to slow down the track with minimal effect on pitch -- anathema to some transcribers, but very useful in places. Decent headphones are usually better than computer speakers, and some near-field monitors are good, too.
 
#3
Get an application like "Transcribe" from seventh string software.

It will let you adjust the phase and the panning, so if you are lucky and there was more than one mic used on the recording, or they panned the bass a little left or right you can isolate it a little and make it much easier.

Trane is freaking loud though, and if they just used one mic for the recording, you are probably just going to have to eq trane out of the mix if you can. And then there is elvin too you have to worry about, volume wise...

That and just listen to the parts over and over and over. I know this all sounds obvious, but I don't really know of any magic bullets. Just repetition.
 
#4
Can I suggest using Audacity to slow the tracks down. I can't believe I never thought of this until recently. Use the 'change tempo' feature which does its best to slow down the track while keeping the pitch the same. IMO it does a great job for bass. Things like piano and horns get a bit warbly but the bass stays pretty well intact. I'm trying to transcribe Art Davis' solo on 'There Is No Greater Love' on McCoy Tyner's 'Inception' album. Slowly making progress but it definitely hastens the process up and makes it much less frustrating.
 
#6
colliningram said:
Recently I have been trying to transcribe the basslines of my favorite players. In particular I want to get in the head of Jimmy Garrison and Israel Crosby. Having looked at other peoples transcriptions I have become really interested in their harmonic support and want to research it further. My problem comes when I try to transcribe their lines. The mix on the recordings makes it very difficult and impossible at times to accurately hear what they are playing. I find this problem in particular with Garrison as I can rarely clearly hear him over Trane.

I have a fairly nice set of computer speakers with a subwoofer but I am still having a very difficult time picking out the bass.

Any ideas, technological or otherwise, that I could use to hear the basslines more clearly?
Click to expand...


Software like "Transcribe!" or "Amazing Slow Downer" and others help a lot in several ways.

I use Transcribe! and it offers useful EQ options, part selection options for repeats (create loops of selected parts), speed slow down and pitch shift options. (extreme use: isolate bass using EQ, loop a section, slow it down, and transpose it up an octave.)

For difficult transcriptions, start with a quality sound file, as mp3's have a lot of data thrown away. If you're having trouble hearing parts, go back to the CD and re-import an uncompressed version. If the CD is a re-master then all the better as first gen CD's were often using the masters of LP versions, and did not sound has good as they could have. CD's made with new masters created for CD's can sound better and are labelled as such.

Which song / CD are you working on?
 
#7
Not knowing your skill level or anything about your bass playing, I'll toss out a suggestion that helps me. I almost ALWAYS try to learn the tune before I transcribe a bass line for a recording. That way, It almost always helps me make better sense of what the bassist is playing, and puts everything into a context. If I can only "hear" 80% of it, there's a good chance that I'll be able to estimate what they're doing on the last 20% if I really know the tune.
 
#9
Headphones and preparing a transcription document with changes already in place would be my first two suggestions. Like DKZ mentioned, having the context of the changes often makes it less of a mystery and has the added advantage of allowing you to immediately benefit more from the transcription by more readily seeing the subjects choices as related to a key or chord.
 
#10
i agree with everyone about using good quality headphones. However, depending on your level, i would caution you on becoming too dependent on technology. Many years ago i thought i would be a better transcriber if i could somehow hear the bass "better". After going through a lot of ear training in school and working on transcribing, i have found that the recordings were not the problem. This is a slow and painful process, but well worth it. Work hard and be patient, it will come.

By the way, you've selected two excellent bassists to transcribe. Crosby is fairly clear on the Ahmad Jamal recordings. Garrison does tend to get buried at times. i love his unaccompanied solos from Trane's later years. These are great to transcribe if you like that kind of thing.
 
#11
thanks for some suggestions guys. i am moving slowly from guitar to bass, and i am noticing how much bass i can't hear.

a lot of what i hear seems to be low end boom, which can sound kinda cool in the big picture of things, but when it comes to learning the parts, it gets hard to hear what the bass is actually doing.

i have pro tools, and i use elastic pitch and elastic time to figure stuff out, and to make sure i don't get buried, i use my P pickup and a pick. i figure i can use my J or my fingers or both for less definition.

anything to help me hear notes better?
 
#12
I transcribed a lot of old recordings when I was in school. The fidelity was none too good to begin with, they were fuzzy and scratchy, and they were monophonic, so there was no way to isolate the bass. The bass parts often sounded as a dull thud of ill-defined pitch. In those cases, using software such as Transcribe! to raise the pitch an octave without speeding up the tempo made the bass line much easier to hear and the pitches easier to distinguish.
 
#14
gordabega said:
thanks for some suggestions guys. i am moving slowly from guitar to bass, and i am noticing how much bass i can't hear.....
Click to expand...

You may still be listening to the guitar tracks and not focusing on your newest, best buddy, the underlying bass line. Simply and accent the rhythm, take the listener to the next chord, etc...
 
#15
Sometimes helps when you change the whole records pitch to higher! Sounds funny, like a mouse band on a cartoon, but much more easy to identify the notes of the bass and differentiate from the kick drum and toms for example. Other, try to transcribe from Jimmy Garrison first time, from records where you can hear the bass better, he plays on quiet albums too ( There is a Lee Konitz - Wayne Marsch album for example ). When you finish numerous of this, you will hear him better than now, because you get familiar with his sound, "you can hear his fingerboard". I transcribed a tons of paul chambers, now when I listen a record featured him, I hear every note in absolute pitch every time. Unfortunately that's not true with other players.
 
#18
Hello, I just wanted to say that I think 'cutting out trane' or putting the bass up an octave or trying to rid the recording of drums completly defeats the purpose of the exercise. You want all of that in , to transcribe something is to learn the language and you subconsiously take so much in by just listening over and over again, you'll find you know what a horn player does to sound good, or how good a groove is with the drummer. Amazing slowdowner is great for looping things and slowing down things. Hope that makes sense
 
#19
I feel that slowing things down is taking a shortcut. Like Darren said, you take so much in by listening over and over again. Making sense of the bass lines in their original context is as close as one can get to understanding what led the player to make that decision. I was transcribing Oscar Pettiford's lines off of Monk Plays Ellington with Kenny Clarke, and noticed that OP was very keen on orchestrating his lines for what's going on around him. The wisdom is not just in the lines themselves but also in the reason those lines were chosen. To take them out of context is to hear them a different way than they were conceived and I prefer to get as close as I can to understanding their intentions.
 
#20
Slowing things down WILL help with trasciptions...maybe not with the feel but if you're not a wizard figuring out fast passages can be learned quicker and more effectively than trying too try and play all the right notes fast. Once learned go back.and capture that feel. Maybe you'll even play it better than the original cause you worked it out.
 

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