This is borderline goofy because when he is "playing the notes evenly," he is still clearly swinging beats 2 and 4. I have been a fan of Jeff Berlin nearly my entire adult life, but dude will argue for the heck of it.
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Jeff Berlin: Sir, you are still swinging 2 & 4.
- Thread starter Dr. Cheese
- Start date
This is borderline goofy because when he is "playing the notes evenly," he is still clearly swinging beats 2 and 4. I have been a fan of Jeff Berlin nearly my entire adult life, but dude will argue for the heck of it.
Not quite sure what he was conveying or disagreeing on but when I'm swinging, I add that little 'b-da' (is that the 'swing' he's referring to?) on all the notes at different times playing the note volumes evenly. At first he played the 2 and 4 lower than the 1 and 3. I would never play like that. Maybe someone played it like that to him and that was what he was referring to.
I think you may be confusing "swinging" with emphasizing. Berlin seems to be advocating for uniform dynamics and articulation, not uniform timing...and "swing" is (mostly) a function of temporal placement, aka timing.
The real red herring though is all these supposed folks on the internet claiming that a walking bassline should emphasize 2 and 4. Who are those folks? And why is Jeff Berlin even bothering to address them?
Point taken; as for Jeff Berlin, argument against a person or straw just seems to come naturally to him.
This. He's addressing dynamics, not swing.
I think Jeff is right. In his "straight" clip, he played a couple of ghost notes* that didn't amount to swinging, but probably draws attention to the "jazziness" of the line. Or maybe implies the presence of a swung 8th note just before the next note.
Also, I'm not exactly sure you can swing quarter notes, at least not in a 4/4 passage. But never mind. He was talking about artificially emphasizing the 2 and 4 to imply the swing, which seems unnecessary to me as well.
* I got kicked out of audition for playing ghost notes like that once. It was for Disney, to be one of the strolling musicians at the parks. They gave me a piece of sheet music with a walking bassline on it and asked me to play it. I did and used a few of those articulation ghost notes where I figured any jazz player would. The lady doing the audition stopped me and told me to start again without the "extra notes." Which I did, but the damage had been done.
Also, I'm not exactly sure you can swing quarter notes, at least not in a 4/4 passage. But never mind. He was talking about artificially emphasizing the 2 and 4 to imply the swing, which seems unnecessary to me as well.
* I got kicked out of audition for playing ghost notes like that once. It was for Disney, to be one of the strolling musicians at the parks. They gave me a piece of sheet music with a walking bassline on it and asked me to play it. I did and used a few of those articulation ghost notes where I figured any jazz player would. The lady doing the audition stopped me and told me to start again without the "extra notes." Which I did, but the damage had been done.
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Swinging quarter notes is a vibe rather than an actual literal interpretation of the phrase. I play differently when swinging than I do playing straight time. So my advice would be don't get all hung up on the mechanics and feel the vibe of the song. Think swing.I think Jeff is right. In his "straight" clip, he played a couple of ghost notes* that didn't amount to swinging, but probably draws attention to the "jazziness" of the line. Or maybe implies the presence of a swung 8th note just before the next note.
Also, I'm not exactly sure you can swing quarter notes, at least not in a 4/4 passage. But never mind. He was talking about artificially emphasizing the 2 and 4 to imply the swing, which seems unnecessary to me as well.
* I got kicked out of audition for playing ghost notes like that once. It was for Disney, to be one of the strolling musicians at the parks. They gave me a piece of sheet music with a walking bassline on it and asked me to play it. I did and used a few of those articulation ghost notes where I figured any jazz player would. The lady doing the audition stopped me and told me to start again without the "extra notes." Which I did, but the damage had been done.
If I'm going to snap my fingers through a walking line (obviously played by someone else) I'm going to snap on the 2 and 4. I guess this is the sort of emphasis being discussed here? I've never been clear on how swing is a timing thing when walking quarter notes either, but I also do that little "ba-dah" thing for emphasis, often on one or both of those beats. So far nobody is complaining about my swing playing even though I have no idea what I do that makes it swing.I think Jeff is right. In his "straight" clip, he played a couple of ghost notes* that didn't amount to swinging, but probably draws attention to the "jazziness" of the line. Or maybe implies the presence of a swung 8th note just before the next note.
Also, I'm not exactly sure you can swing quarter notes, at least not in a 4/4 passage. But never mind. He was talking about artificially emphasizing the 2 and 4 to imply the swing, which seems unnecessary to me as well.
* I got kicked out of audition for playing ghost notes like that once. It was for Disney, to be one of the strolling musicians at the parks. They gave me a piece of sheet music with a walking bassline on it and asked me to play it. I did and used a few of those articulation ghost notes where I figured any jazz player would. The lady doing the audition stopped me and told me to start again without the "extra notes." Which I did, but the damage had been done.
Perfectly valid point made by Jeff. He's not talking about swing, he's talking about dynamic emphasis and how the bassist doesn't need to emphasize the 2 and the 4 when playing a walking line.
There's a Carol Kaye video out there; she discusses using your metronome to mark 2 and 4 versus every quarter note. To your point, there is something about anchoring to 2 and 4 that has defined western music, both jazz and otherwise.
The topic is clearly dynamics/emphasis - his video shows his point pretty clearly. If you want to criticize other things, like his timing of the color of his socks, go ahead, but I think it's a simple succinct, to the point explanation of one thing - I think we need more videos like that.
Man who is that cranky old guy? Someone should tell him to shower, brush his hair, and change out of his jammies if he's going to be posting videos from his mom's guest room arguing with strangers on the internet.
Speaking of arguing with strangers on the internet; I'll take my lessons on walking bass lines from listening to guys like Ray Brown, Paul Chambers, etc. They seem to most often, though not always, have some kind of dynamic emphasis on beats 2 and 4 in their walking lines.
Speaking of arguing with strangers on the internet; I'll take my lessons on walking bass lines from listening to guys like Ray Brown, Paul Chambers, etc. They seem to most often, though not always, have some kind of dynamic emphasis on beats 2 and 4 in their walking lines.
Oh thanks for posting that video! Seeing Jeff reminds me that I need to stop on my way home to get my hair cut. 
Effin' A! James Brown has taught us that the FUNK lies on the ONE! Ditto for walking as well.
I've played a lot of jazz and heard a lot of bass players play jazz. I can't recall ever hearing someone playing the 2 and 4 loud as heck compared to the and 1 and 3 like he demonstrates at the beginning. I have no clue where he came up with that.
As an aside it doesn't make much sense to base your lines around what a hypothetical drummer might be doing, especially nowadays when so many working jazz gigs will be drummerless in a lot of markets.
As an aside it doesn't make much sense to base your lines around what a hypothetical drummer might be doing, especially nowadays when so many working jazz gigs will be drummerless in a lot of markets.
I don't hear him swinging 2 and 4 in his second example. It's even level, and he can add as many little walking bass grace notes as he wants, but the primary notes in his second example sound metronomically perfect to me, not swung, and even in level. I understand exactly the discussion he's talking about, and I do tend to emphasize 2 and 4 very slightly (very... you might not even hear it) in level in jazz as it was what I was taught and picked up from other players.. but it depends on the song and genre of jazz and tempo. But I'm afraid that I don't hear any swinging of the rhythm in any of the playing he did - it's all right on the beat - and I don't hear any emphasis in level on 2 and 4 in his second example.
Maybe it's youtube playing tricks with our ears.... ?
