Trying to play by ear?

[JimmyM]

Amazing songwriter that writes stuff that gets crowds on the floor and moving. Although a lot of his recordings are mostly synth bass, he also has one of the very finest bassists in the genre in his live band.

That would be Jamareo Artis, who does more playing on Bruno's stuff in the studio than you may think. He uses a few effects that lend themselves to sounding like synth bass, too.

 

[inanimate_carb]

That would be Jamareo Artis, who does more playing on Bruno's stuff in the studio than you may think. He uses a few effects that lend themselves to sounding like synth bass, too.

Jamareo's not even listed on the album credits for "Versace on the Floor" or the entire "24k Magic" album, but thanks for the 411.

 

[JimmyM]

Jamareo's not even listed on the album credits for the "Versace on the Floor" or the entire "24k Magic" album, but thanks for the 411.

Might be because Jam is working on his own thing and working with others as well. Can't imagine Bruno canning him.

 

[GlennRH]

Practise scales all over the neck e.g. all the positions you can find for G maj ascending and descending followed by all the positions you can find for E min ascending and descending.

Practise scales all over the neck over and over. There's no such thing as too much of this.

Eventually, you'll discover that you've picked up everything you need to play bass like a bassist. Really.

Nobody who follows this advice refutes it or claims that their time could have been invested better.

 

[inanimate_carb]

Practise scales all over the neck e.g. all the positions you can find for G maj ascending and descending followed by all the positions you can find for E min ascending and descending.

Practise scales all over the neck over and over. There's no such thing as too much of this.

Eventually, you'll discover that you've picked up everything you need to play bass like a bassist. Really.

Nobody who follows this advice refutes it or claims that their time could have been invested better.

Sigh. A player that follows this advice always sounds like they've been running scales the last 3 months because that's all they did the last 3 months. Scales aren't music and music isn't scales, and scales are a small part of a much larger concept.

Are the people winning Grammys, writing memorable songs, or playing big stages doing it because of how hard they worked on scales? Answer this honestly.

As the OP requested, playing at the level he wants to achieve on bass after playing sax for decades isn't found between the letters G, A, B, C, D, E, F# or their relative minor scale. Sorry. Running scales is only technique and a small part of a larger picture almost everyone on this forum is oblivious to.

The time is better invested learning songs and transcribing. Phrasing, motifs, ideas, sequencing, rhythm through time, call and response, and flow are learned by copying better musicians doing what it is you want to do. None of this has anything to do with practicing scales. If you neglect this important stuff because you're running scales all the time, there is such a thing as too much scale work.

Nobody refutes this advice because it's how great musicians - not gear owners - learn how to play.

 

[White Beard]

Thinking "bass" is thinking "music." It's just in the sub-division. inanimate_carb even backed up my initial assessment in one of his posts on this thread by saying something like, 'playing Charlie Parker lines aren't going to get you gigs.'

 

[White Beard]

Why edit a post when you can just respond?

 

[craigie]

Saxophonists are almost always better trained than bass players. You already have a lot of what you need. The proof is in the responses here. Most of them are just guesses from bassists that don't or can't play what's shown in the video, as opposed to actual time-proven methods.

Ultimately, if you want to play in the style of what you hear in Bruno Mars tunes, transcribe the bass parts you hear in Bruno Mars tunes. Once you have that down, do the same with other material that informed the Bruno Mars stuff. It's that simple, and some of the advice here is so far off track that you may as well be asking the same question in a Dungeons and Dragons forum. Honestly speaking, rolling 12-sided dice may be less of a time waster than some of the stuff you've seen (and will see) here already.

In bass parts like this, there are stylistic devices and approaches that can only be absorbed by studying them and how they work over the existing harmony. No matter how many arpeggios, modes, scales, "saxophone songs", or other such studies you try to do, none will help you learn to play like that if you didn't do the transcription work. It has to be BASS transcription work, because learning Charlie Parker solos on bass will only get you fired. You have to immerse yourself in the music you want to emulate, and what has been recommended to you so far won't really help. Musical style and musical grammar are two different things, and ideas are more important than 1-3-5-7. You learn ideas from transcription and they, in turn, fuel your own. The flawed scale and arpeggio advice, no matter how well-intentioned, will continue, but transcription is the key to the lock.

Every bassist I know (myself included) that really does play in this style learned it from other players and copying from records. If you go to a club and see a guy playing like this, he'll say the same thing. He won't say he got it running scales and arpeggios.

Scales, modes, and arpeggios won't help you at all with rhythm, note choice, note length, and compositional techniques, which are as important as the notes themselves.

The Bruno Mars bass parts you hear are not groundbreaking material - it's sourced from Stevie Wonder and Parliament/Funkadelic synth bass parts, as well as Pino Palladino, Anthony Jackson, and James Jamerson electric bass parts. It's obvious the people that wrote those Bruno Mars bass parts loved and studied that music. Bruno Mars himself certainly did. None of it was created in a vacuum - there were influences. If you spend time listening to the music that this bassline material comes from and learning it verbatim, you will eventually figure out how those players did it themselves. There's no shortcut except to do that. Just copy the masters.

I remember hearing that Scott lafaro developed his style transcribing bird's solos, but he doesn't really sound like bird either.
P.s. you are 1000% right.

 

[craigie]

Unless the song is not a song that grooves. Then grooving is right out.

Did you say that in a Monty python voice?

 

[craigie]

I have a suggestion that maybe nobody else has said but I skipped to the end because it is so brilliant and I am a genius:

You have no problem playing melodies on the sax? So play the sax and visualize the bass fretboard while you're doing it! That will make a connection between your muscle memory on the two instruments.

But also do what everyone else says about lifting bass lines and such.

Then play them on sax and visualize on bass!!

 

[Jimks]

Long time sax player .... so understand. Difference is, I first learned to play guitars... chords, leads, runs and then jazz progressions, rock-in-roll songs, and blues. So, when picking up a bass, I knew where the notes were ... runs to make, scales, etc. You are jumping to bass, without learning some of that. I suggest learning some scales , jazz progressions, etc first. I still wrestle if I want to play a specific song ... exact note by exact note at times ... depends upon the song... but not many times to do that on a bass, but .. good practice. Eat A Dog Gone Bad Egg .. only way I could remember the strings on a guitar. 4 - string basses lower string an E , in a 5 string - lower string starts with a B. So, it's different with a 5 string then a guitar. And I play 5 string now. So, that was just remembering to shift my mind a string.

 

[IamGroot]

The OP could get an EWI and set the midi controls to bass and play bass using sax fingering.

 

[Kro]

Here's your problem: you're thinking like a saxophonist. In all your years of playing saxophone, did anyone teach you to walk under a chord progression, or did you always solo over chords?

Actually, a lot of working sax stuff is really very support oriented, and kind of not all that far off from bass as far as mentality is concerned. I say this from personal experience, and knowing a handful of bassists that also played sax before switching over. I've always been of the mind that bassists and saxophonists are wired similarly.

Anyways, lots of good advice in this thread. My personal suggestion is to just play the instrument if you're passionate about it. Here's what I mean by that: when I was younger, I was so enthusiastic about playing bass (and also guitar), that I typically always had one in my hand, even outside of dedicated practicing or working on a song.

Even just sitting on the couch watching TV, I had my bass in hand, and would just noodle and riff on whatever my heart desired - but all that time spent was probably equally worth any other more focused work in just familiarizing myself with the instrument and having it feel second nature. Highly recommended!

 

[Bondobass]

Sigh. A player that follows this advice always sounds like they've been running scales the last 3 months because that's all they did the last 3 months. Scales aren't music and music isn't scales, and scales are a small part of a much larger concept.

Are the people winning Grammys, writing memorable songs, or playing big stages doing it because of how hard they worked on scales? Answer this honestly.

As the OP requested, playing at the level he wants to achieve on bass after playing sax for decades isn't found between the letters G, A, B, C, D, E, F# or their relative minor scale. Sorry. Running scales is only technique and a small part of a larger picture almost everyone on this forum is oblivious to.

The time is better invested learning songs and transcribing. Phrasing, motifs, ideas, sequencing, rhythm through time, call and response, and flow are learned by copying better musicians doing what it is you want to do. None of this has anything to do with practicing scales. If you neglect this important stuff because you're running scales all the time, there is such a thing as too much scale work.

Nobody refutes this advice because it's how great musicians - not gear owners - learn how to play.

Yeah, endlessly running scales, probably not the best route. Knowledge of scales probably a good thing though. Knowledge of chord tones, probably a better thing.

But like you said transcribing is the best thing hands down that I've personally done to improve musically. Anything from timing and rhythm issues, chord changes, walking, nuances, technique(yeah)….it's all in there.

OP, you want to use a program to slow down music, take small bits of the music, loop it.

 

[GlennRH]

If you neglect this important stuff because you're running scales all the time, there is such a thing as too much scale work.

The suggestion that practising scales repeatedly enables only scale-playing is prejudicial, ignorant, and silly.

Repeatedly practising scales enables what this person refers to as "important stuff" much as a good foundation enables building a stable house. If you skip digging a hole to the right depth and dimensions then filling it with well-placed, load-bearing material, then, no matter how lovely a house you build atop, that house will lack stability.

Practise all of the scales all over the neck, ascending and descending, repeatedly. This will lead you to discover much about playing anything on the bass. You will inevitably develop a good ear, a quick and accurate sense of where to find notes, the facility to play rhythmically reliable parts (good meter), a creative readiness to syncopate rhythm, and your own voice for melody.

Practising scales repeatedly pays more and richer dividends the more you do it. Do this with the intent of improving as a bassist overall and you'll experience the truth of these words for yourself.

 

[inanimate_carb]

The suggestion that practising scales repeatedly enables only scale-playing is prejudicial, ignorant, and silly.

Repeatedly practising scales enables what this person refers to as "important stuff" much as a good foundation enables building a stable house. If you skip digging a hole to the right depth and dimensions then filling it with well-placed, load-bearing material, then, no matter how lovely a house you build atop, that house will lack stability.

Practise all of the scales all over the neck, ascending and descending, repeatedly. This will lead you to discover much about playing anything on the bass. You will inevitably develop a good ear, a quick and accurate sense of where to find notes, the facility to play rhythmically reliable parts (good meter), a creative readiness to syncopate rhythm, and your own voice for melody.

Practising scales repeatedly pays more and richer dividends the more you do it. Do this with the intent of improving as a bassist overall and you'll experience the truth of these words for yourself.

The very fact that you're so emphatic and passionate about promoting scale practice as the universal answer for marked musical growth shows how little you know about the subject at hand. You're so far off track that you think that the guys ahead of you are actually behind you.

The remarks I've shared are sourced from years of playing scales, determining that mindless repetition of the same content all over the neck isn't helpful in long-term development, and looking for other ways to grow. This led to me finishing a music degree, and studying with a series of Grammy-winning bassists and other instrumentalists in the NYC area. It may be neither here nor there, but I've been made to understand it's a little more musically diverse, busy and competitive in the Big Apple than it may be in Canada.

Those world-class guys I mention, and every single accomplished player I've ever met don't talk like you or hold the same viewpoints, so if they're all wrong, I don't want to be right.

As always, you're entitled to an opinion but you're not entitled have your views treated as serious candidate for truth. You're only entitled to what you can argue for, which ain't much.

As a challenge, I'd encourage you to ask the very finest improviser or overall musician on any instrument you have access to and ask them what the most important thing to study is, or what activity will lead to the widest and deepest understanding of music. I promise you the reply won't be scale study.

Have a blessed day!

 

[GlennRH]

...music isn't scales...

I took my first one-to-one bass lessons from a jazz guitarist in the summer of 1984. He told me, "All music is scales, ultimately - just like all written words are ultimately arrangements of the same 26 letters."

What was a jazz guitarist doin' teaching bass? My father, who paid for the lessons, followed the advice of a couple of local pro bassists. I accepted his choice knowing that Noel Redding was a jazz guitarist converted to bass.

That music teacher showed me how to hear chords as arpeggios with the notes played at once. He taught me to find the notes of arpeggios (chords) by hearing the root of each chord and the note intervals. This led me to recognize the key of any tune and its chord progression(s).

In other words, he showed me how to teach myself how to play the bass part of any tune by deconstructing it based on a knowledge of scales.

With hands on the strings and ears listening, I became a better and better bassist and improviser and writer of music the more I studied the basis of all music: scales.

 

[GlennRH]

...mindless repetitions of the same content isn't helpful in long-term development....

You and I are in total agreement on this.

I advocate attentive, mindful study of music from the foundation up. That is, from knowledge of scales up.

 

[MrLenny1]

Play off the root and groove with the drummer.

 

[JimmyM]

Well you have to know your scales to know how chords are formed, but once you get that figured out, then I have to say that I find practicing scales to be mind-numbingly dull. Good for warmups, but IMHO, that's about it.