In all keys?

[Hambone70]

Bass guitar has got to be the easiest instrument to transpose, especially one with more than 4 strings. Try it on piano!

It's also easier if you never (never say never) play open strings.

 

[DarkStar90]

Ideally, any scale, arpeggio, pattern, lick etc that we learn, should be performable starting on any of your left hand fingers. The means learning everything in multiple postions. No point in learning a lick if the perfect moment to play it passes by because you weren't able to get to the the position you know it in.

Being able to play in all keys does not mean simply moving your hand position and playing the same pattern (which could be evidence that you don't know how to transpose). You dont want to sound like a ukulele just because you have to play in Eb, 11th position. Thats because the key of Eb doesnt start in 11th position, it starts in first position with an F on the E string. If you truly know a tune, you will be able to outline the changes without moving your hand. Keep the hand in the same position when you change keys and walk. Knowing a tune in multiple keys can and should be tested in a 6 fret span, as all 12 notes are available. If you can't walk a bassline to a blues in any key in the same position, then you aren't thinking about voice leading when you create walking lines. A really good way to test your fretboard knowledge and tune memorization at the same time. If you're practicing licks, then you're going to want to be able to play it multiple positions, ideally the starting note should be played with any of your left fingers.


One good way of practicing scale or arpeggios in all keys is to play starting on the same note, but change which scaled degree it is each time a key is played through. Example: play arpeggios up the scale in the key of e, starting on the I chord, Emaj7. Once your done, switch to the key of D and start your arpeggios with the ii chord, Emin7. And so on.

 

[JW56789]

OK, OK, I get it now! I'll go practice American Girl in C#, You Got Lucky in Db, The Waiting in A#, and Don't Come Around Here No More in Bb. Then I'll become a great musician. Don't know what I'll do with it, but hey, I'll figure it out, amirite?

In your original post you asked 'why' ? . . . . and threw it out for us to comment about.

We all do what works for us. If your usual rotation is all off open strings or 'standard' keys as someone else mentioned (I've never heard of standard keys, except at a locksmith), then great, you've got your thing covered and good for you.

We all mentioned from our experience and gigs we've played and bandstands we've been on why it was something regularly encountered and used by a lot of us to cover our gigs. Maybe you don't run into this. There's no implied 'better or worse' standing as a picker in this, except maybe . . . . by you.

For a lot of the rest of us, it's a fact of life and one more tool in the box we need. If you don't, there's nothing wrong with that and good for you. A lot of us don't have the luxury of being in the same situation for long, we had to move around and play with lots of different cats, if we wanted to keep playing.

I'm certainly no Titan of Theory or some amazing jazzer, I have to stop and think about it more than I'd like to admit. I just know I've been on enough bandstands where someone called out a song I played a million times in E or G, suddenly in F-sharp or A-flat, and I had to deliver, RIGHT NOW.

 

[Jeff Hughes]

There is a scene in the Documentary/Concert Film “Hail, Hail, Rock and Roll” starring Chuck Berry and Keith Richards, among others, where in the midst of some Chuck Berry song, Chuck can be seen whispering something to Keith mid song, and Keith shakes his head “No.” Apparently Berry wanted to modulate in the middle of the song at the concert. Singers and front people can be funny people.

When my front man pulls out a harmonica or capo, I know it is going to be an adventure.

Usually navigating verses and choruses in a new key is not too bad after one or two passes, but bridges and little turnarounds that happen once in the song can get dicey. Knowing the “shape” of typical chord progressions helps you survive. But I really think that learning things on the fly is one of the best ways to learn if you have to. Of course preparation is ideal if possible.

And if you play a wrong note, just play it again, and people will think you meant to do it.

 

[Real Soon]

Let's say you've landed a sweet gig with a cover band full of talented and chill musicians. The gigs are good (obvs a hypothetical scenario currently!) and the audiences come to wherever the band's playing.

The singer has an awesome new song choice on hand but really wants to nail a certain high part, so wants to transpose the song down by a minor third. That gets it in his/her money range.

Alright, you can handle E Major, the song's original key, just fine. But this transposition would put the song in Db Major. And yes, it's got licks that take more than just moving the pattern down.

What do you do? Put your foot down, it's gotta be in C or D Major? Struggle to work thru it because it's in a totally unfamiliar key you refused to work on, making progress grind to a snail's pace till you get it re-memorized? Or say hey, I know my Db Major scale, arpeggio, roman numerals, scale degree chord tones, etc bc you're already doing that with the sharp keys and thought it'd be good to finish off the circle of keys, so with a few notes and maybe shedding for next rehearsal, you've got the song down and ready to rock?


Weird as it might sound, knowing your way around the odd flat keys can and will help you with rock songs placed in the classic sharp keys, too. There's literally no drawback whatsoever to learning them, it stretches your brain (which I'm bold enough to accuse us all of having a use for), and it prepares you for new opportunities while strengthening your command of whatever's in front of you currently.

 

[Real Soon]

Also once, many years ago, completely inexplicably, the guitarist in a group I was in started a song off. That wasn't so unusual as he started most of that group's songs; however, this one was in A minor...and he started it in Bb minor. Looked at me with a horrified expression when he realized what he had done. The vocalist had joined in and my entrance was nigh. We couldn't stop now!

I had to learn that song, very quickly, in Bb minor. Haha... it was simple looped changes with a few riffs, and we survived, albeit a bit messily.


No one noticed besides the singer.

 

[lowphatbass]

I’m not sure what the problem is. You move your hand like and inch or two. When people ask if I can do it in “this key” my response is always the same, “Yea, I got frets”.

The reason I can probably do this is from playing 4 or 5 different types of scales in fourths across all 12 keys for a half hour every day when I was a kid.

 

[drumvsbass]

Too much is made of transposing because it is substantially more difficult on some other instruments.
Unless it's a signature part that uses a lot of open strings, it's as simple as moving your hand over an inch.
If you were just thinking melodically, is it wrong to play in Bb major, but be thinking Amaj just always one fret higher?
Is there some different fingering (other than open strings) between different major scales?
Nope you can use the same fingering literally EVERYWHERE.
So if you can play in Dmaj, why would it be any different to play in C#maj?
Your band picks up a new song, it's in Eb minor, suddenly you cannot cope? C'mon.
I'm with the OP on this one, I can play in any key but I don't practice playing everything in them all. What's the point?
And if you have some paranoia about being on a bandstand and having to play something hard in some abstract key on demand I would also suggest playing your entire repertoire with a missing string, as that is also very likely to happen.
But ya know 33 years playing bass, what the hell do I know? No one has ever asked to play YYZ in F.

 

[LBS-bass]

Oh FFS. If you can play in one key you can play in them all. The pattern is the same. It’s just a matter of knowing when you can grab an open string and where the most convenient location of the next root note is.

Sssssh! Stop giving away the secrets; it takes some people forever to figure this out and someone's gotta do those gigs!

 

[phillipkregg]

It’s mainly for ear training purposes.

Every time you play something in another key, it sounds different and wires your brain up to recognize the chord changes better.

Just like changing up exercise programs periodically will cause your body to adapt and make you stronger.

 

[arbiterusa]

Wallowing in your own ignorance. It’s the new black.

 

[jlo95]

Chris Potter once said, you need to know 5x more than you'll ever be required to do. It will not hurt you to be able to do more than you'll ever be asked or expected to do

 

[Joebone]

Some thing I don't get. Whenever someone says to practice something they always say "in all keys". Why? I can see it for jazzers, why always seem to play in flat keys, but as a strict rock player everything I play is in the key of E, D, G, A, or C, with the occasional F or B. Why would I want to learn something in a key I'll never play? I'm pretty proficient with major and minor pentatonic scales in the keys I mentioned, and it seems to work well in the songs I play.

Because you get caught with a singer who can't bring it in the original key?

 

[aprod]

OK, OK, I get it now! I'll go practice American Girl in C#, You Got Lucky in Db, The Waiting in A#, and Don't Come Around Here No More in Bb. Then I'll become a great musician. Don't know what I'll do with it, but hey, I'll figure it out, amirite?

The more you write it becomes obvious you know very little about music.

 

[Brad Johnson]

It's a flexibility many don't need. On the flip side it never seems to cease to amaze people when you get in a situation where you need it. And it's not limited to jazz...

"Can we do this in "x" key instead?".
"No problem".
"Need a minute?".
"Nope".
"How's about a chart?".
"Nope. Count it off".

 

[Brad Johnson]

But what about songs that only make sense to be played in the lowest possible position on the neck? 24K Magic, a crap song, is something the wedding band I played in would do often. you need open Eb notes, so I tuned down rather than play it all up higher on the neck. I did not want to get a five string. Bought one of those Digitech Drop pedals for random half step down stuff as opposed to retuning. We also played “I Wanna Dance with Somebody” which singers do in Eb up to the original F#. That one is easy to play wherever since it is synth bass I think.

This is where a five comes in handy.

 

[Brad Johnson]

Bass guitar has got to be the easiest instrument to transpose, especially one with more than 4 strings. Try it on piano!

It's also easier if you never (never say never) play open strings.

Agreed... except I don't avoid open strings.

 

[DJ Bebop]

ok, ok, ok!

let me get this straight: you start a thread looking for other points of view, you get them, but they have no value because they're not the same as yours, and you were right all along!

my apologies, sir! i just didn't understand. good luck with those sissy* keys!


* just kidding! but the key of G is kind of lame.

Welcome to TalkBass.com!

 

[juggahnaught]

I'll weigh in (unnecessarily).

You should be able to play in all keys.

It's not as difficult as some would have you think.

Transposition on bass, as many have said, is mostly a matter of changing hand positions - the intervals on bass are regular and have constant spacing, so fingerings don't change. Changing key may have an effect when you're up against a boundary - the highest frets of your bass, the nut, the highest string, or the lowest string. (Essentially, if you had a bass with infinite frets and infinite strings, you'd realize that there's actually just one big seven-string pattern that tessellates. The issues only come about when you're at the edge of a finite fretboard area.)

Musicians who play instruments without constant spacing (brass, woodwinds, piano) or instrumentalists who may rely more on "absolute" positioning than "relative" positioning (some players of fretless instruments, perhaps in specific disciplines) may find it more beneficial to practice something in all keys. Generally, this is more important when you're playing a lead line and less important for accompaniment (read: bass players) unless you are playing a polyphonic, multi-voiced instrument like piano. Because we as bassists generally play single-voice accompaniment lines that generally provide a harmonic foundation, I believe we have a lot more leeway in what we are allowed to do (and what we're allowed to get away with) without affecting the core of the song or making it unrecognizable. (Jazz, where learning all keys is important, is essentially built on this idea. Repertoire, on the other hand, is the opposite, but in that case, you'd be sight-reading. Even in popular music - rock, R&B, etc - where a song may have a specific bassline, it would likely still be recognizable without it.)

In short, I think it's more important to understand what you're playing, be able to transpose by ear, and understand the keys enough to play and improvise in all of them (either using theory, or simply by ear). Essentially, become a good musician. If you're able to do this, then transposing a line or playing in different keys doesn't require work and learning - it just happens, and as such is a non-issue.

If playing in all keys will help you to achieve this goal, then yes, you should do it.

 

[JimmyM]

Don't look for excuses to be lazy. There's a reason people tell you that.