Walking bassline technique on BG (looking for DB players inputs)

Try relinking the video, i do not see it in your post.

 

DB's do a lot of left hand pull off accents you don't do on EB....

 

I think most of us here mostly listen to people like Oscar Pettiford, Paul Chambers, Ray Brown, Red Mitchell, Scott LaFaro, Sam Jones, etc. when we're getting our walking concepts together, rather than Jeff Berlin, with all due respect. Listen to those guys, get THAT sound deep in your ears and then try to emulate the sound and feeling in your own playing.

For me, walking bass is about 3 things:
1. Defining the harmony
2. Propelling the harmony forward
3. Doing the above in a way that can stand alone as a quarter note melody
Sonny Dallas is great example of how to do all three elegantly.

You didn't link to the video, so this is all speculation, but it sounds like he is speaking more to emulating the sound of a double bass walking, rather than specific improvisational approach. So it's likely that he's trying to use more legato playing, longer note duration, etc. to overcome the disparity between the immediacy and decay of the note on a bass guitar and the attack and bloom of a note on double bass. All I would say is that you're going to be more "convincing" if the line shows that you're hearing the "arc" of the progression and hearing/playing notes that reflect your own intent/internal conception/hearing of your immediate aural environment than playing a mechanical line and striving for some "left hand principle"...

 

What I hear in that clip is Jeff's definition of right hand walking is staccato whereas left hand walking is legato.

 

+1 on all those bassists. Ray brown could make such an amazing melodic, contoured, interesting bass line it just blows me away. Built up, conceptualized, tension and release like an amazing solo with the fluidity of breathing.

 

I had never listened to Jeff Berlin, so I searched and found found a clip of him playing Softly, As In A Morning Sunrise... Personally, for a BG walker, I'll prefer Chuck Rainey.

 

Yeah Ed's got it; that it's about a quarter note legato line. All the ornamentation is going to sound like crap if it doesn't swing.

It's a good video. I've heard that advice before to practice things to expand one's playing, not to regurgitate or perform well on stage.

 

Flat wounds with kinda high action and using more flesh with your right hand and playing closer to the fingerboard than the bridge will help you get a better sound for walking. My 2 cents: the best slab walkers ever are Bob Cranshaw (check out Sonny Rollins recordings), and John Lee (Dizzy).

 

(BG-ist) Jeff Andrews always strikes me as an el. bassist who can function in a straight-ahead situation.
Thanks.


EDIT: My Mistake - (el. bassist) Lincoln Goines co-authored "Funkifying the Clave - Afro-Cuban Grooves for Bass and Drums." (Which is terrific, BTW/IMFO.)
Sorry.

 

By right hand technique, I think he refers to the simple plucking of the notes, without hammer ons or pull offs made by the left hand. With left hand technique, he's talking about the groove -- where you precede a lot of notes with an open string, after which you hammer on the note with your left hand. Also pulling off notes with the left hand to achieve a similar groovy, funky effect. This is what puts feel into the walking bass lines. I learned this when I learned to play "It's a Shame" by the Spinners from the book "STanding in the Shadows of MOtown" book about James Jamerson, the father of the electric bass. Although it's not a walking bass line, if you can learn to play that bass line, you'll take your groove and feel to a whole new level, even with walking bass lines.

But he left out some walking bass line right hand technique -- like using your right hand technique to rake across the strings that are either muted, or left open with your left hand...

 

Because I've heard him talk about this before, I'm pretty sure he's specifically talking about playing ghosted off-beat eighth note lead-ins to the next beat by pulling off with the left hand rather than plucking it with the right hand.