Sing Everything You Play

[Andrew.Glose]

My problem with trying to play what I'm singing (sing a melody then go find it) is after more than 3 tries to find the note, I lose the note I was originally singing. I can't seem to track more than 3 notes at a time...

And I'll be durned if I can hear someone sing a melody and then go find it on the bass . Working on it.... cause my guitar player or singer will often sing me the line first and see if I can find it. Would be nice to not have to have them pick it out for me... (I'm referring to times when I'm doubling what they're doing). And I want to get to a point where I can mirror the vocals with the bass in order to do a solo......

I don't feel *too* bad though, even musicians that've been playing for 30+ years still have to go poking around if I sing them something to play . They just get more notes right faster !

Spend some time with it, man. It's easy for me to hear a melody and find it on my bass. I'm now to the point where I can hear a simple melody/bassline, and map it out on my bass in my head, before I touch the instrument. So when I pick the bass up, I can play it correctly on the first try without fishing around and finding it. Sometimes, I even manage to get the key right(!) I don't have perfect pitch, either. I've just spent time with it.

 

[22pauld22]

I guess its a pretty personal thing the singing thing ..
i first picked it up when I was learning brass .. you have to pitch in your head while you blow or you have no chance ..

I was then told to sing out loud by a really great older jazz player when i was learning upright in high school .. he said especially when you were jumping to thumb position

I then took it over to fretless electric
as said before you write completely different lines when you are singing and you can actually then write anywhere .. carry some kind of recorder with you and you can take anything down .. I've never wanted to play anything that I couldn't sing .. if you would call it singing as once you are getting some reasonably fast jazz stuff happening you can end up with your singing sounding a bit bibity bobity if you know what i mean (I remember leaning to sing donna lee and learning to solo over it singing before I had the head under my fingers because I could do it on the walk to school) .. but still its having it in your head rather than playing a few shapes and licks that you have down or even worse just screaming up and down a few scales hoping that the notes will sound ok or that your playing so fast that no one is going to notice it sounds like rubbish

singing while you play either helps your singing or your playing so its a win win isn't it
I thought I was never going to sing before I started singing along with my bass .. after a few years of that I was singing backing vocals in a band and later taking the odd turn singing lead vocal in a duet

good luck to al the bass playing singers

 

[Just J]

Hum it, anyone can hum in pitch.

ooooh, I like this. I've been trying to play what I sing, and it just hasn't been working out. I'm way to critical of my voice so I'm always too timid using it. Never sure if I'm singing the right pitch, even if I am, so lately when working on songs I just play it till I can hear it clearly in my head then find the note on the bass.

I'm gonna try the humming idea, easier to tell if I'm humming in pitch.

 

[BruisedOoze]

Hum it, anyone can hum in pitch.

Double that. That was my instructor's response to my bad singing comment.

Also if you play Cranium, you'll notice pretty much anyone can do humdingers despite not being able to sing.

 

[Andrew.Glose]

Double that. That was my instructor's response to my bad singing comment.

Also if you play Cranium, you'll notice pretty much anyone can do humdingers despite not being able to sing.

Cranium(!) Awesome game(!)

 

[keillor]

Although this has been said in a way already, I should reiterate that playing what you're singing helps your phrasing in a HUGE way. I remember my high school band director getting the trumpet section to take turns playing a difficult part and then asked the band why one guy sounded better than the rest. We didn't know. The director then told us "he's in a choir too." End of story. Good singing ability typically translates to a natural airiness and "shape" (dynamic, etc.) to your phrasing that makes you sound better.

Also, in terms of getting pitches right (fretless anyone?), I can speak from experience that the whole "hearing the note in your head before you play" approach is completely necessary for playing brass (french horn for me), especially as you expand your range.

Now, I just need to learn how to sing on pitch...

Just my $0.02 though!
Cam

 

[kesslari]

Just had a breakthrough in doing this today.

"Sing what I play" has always been on my list of "I really oughta do that" stuff, but I never really made it happen.
Today listening to the subdudes I just heard something that made me start scatting, and I rushed in from the car (when I got home) and picked up the bass and started playing it, and then just playing along as I sang.

It was freakin' cool.

Now to keep doing it. Funny how my fingers want to just take over and play "what they know". Keeping it real, singing it first, is kinda tough for me.
But I can see some good places that this can go to.

 

[DocBop]

Just had a breakthrough in doing this today.

"Sing what I play" has always been on my list of "I really oughta do that" stuff, but I never really made it happen.
Today listening to the subdudes I just heard something that made me start scatting, and I rushed in from the car (when I got home) and picked up the bass and started playing it, and then just playing along as I sang.

It was freakin' cool.

Now to keep doing it. Funny how my fingers want to just take over and play "what they know". Keeping it real, singing it first, is kinda tough for me.
But I can see some good places that this can go to.

Doing what you did is a great start. Sing a bass line or solo line and then grab your bass and figure it out. Then analyze the line to see the notes involved. like b7, root, b3, etc. That start the process of relating ear, to mind, sing, to hand. Singing what you play eventually becomes playing anything you can sing, that becomes playing anything you can hear in your head.

There are websites posted many time to help work on hearing intervals and chord, but what your doing is a great practical start.

 

[kesslari]

Then analyze the line to see the notes involved. like b7, root, b3, etc. That start the process of relating ear, to mind, sing, to hand.

Yeah, I left that out. This one was interesting because it started on the 5th, and went between major and minor pentatonic. Very definitely, figuring out "what" it is, is as important as figuring out how it goes... let's you apply the ideas in other ways.