• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

What is your most difficult challenge in playing bass.

#201
Core Creek said:
And here starts the debate between musician and artist. Musicians aren't certainly required to create anything new. You can be a completely competent musician, maybe play in a cover band, do things exactly as they're recorded, in time and with feeling. That's a great musician. But that is different from being an artist. An artist creates something new. Or at least something new in their head even if it isn't re-inventing any wheels.

I think you're selling yourself short if you're trying to live up to some kind of "perfect musician" in your head. As long as you're happy making music.... even if it's not your own, that's good enough in my book to be a great musician.
Click to expand...
SteveCS said:
Which is why I place live music above all other art forms. As an aural form, music truly exists only in the moment of creation, is witnessed only by those in earshot, then is gone forever. Be it the Berlin Philharmonic playing Mozart, any Glastonbury headliner, a cover band filling the floor at bar, a bloke with a guitar busking in the street or whatever, great live music has an immediacy and intimacy like nothing else. It demands attention - blink and you miss it. And anyone part of creating that is, without doubt, IMHO, a musician.
Click to expand...

You guys have clearly never heard me play in a live setting. Even when my hearing was ok and I was playing a fretted bass with the notes at least in tune.....

Playing covers never gave me any trouble; I do ok and do enjoy some cover playing, but that wasn't what I wanted to keep doing going forward. But the irresistible force of wanting to be a musician/artist finally met the immovable object of you just don't have those instinctive, creative abilities to do that. And plus you're going deef standing right next to that drum kit all the time. I kept it up for some time, and finally decided after many years of hard effort with no progress that it just wasn't going to work. I haven't played in a group since, though I still enjoy playing as a hobbiest and as a gear nut and so on. I might even end up collecting perhaps, or relearning repair or go into luthiering, etc.

Jeff Berlin talks a lot about a similar division, his concepts of "academic music" vs art, and the importance he places on keeping those two separated properly. I have done searches here on JB, though, and seems like there was a lot of fighting about his approach to music, so I won't go into anything about that here at the risk of dredging up another battle over JB's approach. Except to say that I also recognize the differences between what I call the "craft" and the "art". One being the tools you use and the other the artistic output from putting the tools to use artistically.

Otherwise, the OP asked an honest question and that's my honest answer, as best as I can render it....

L
 
  • Like
Reactions: SteveCS
#205
HumanLarvae said:
I hear you on that one man. I came across a technique that Steve Harris uses. Volume/Gain up, and just barely tap the strings with your plucking fingers. Allows you to play faster and without straining yourself at all. Good Stuff.
Click to expand...

Speaking of Steve Harris, is it true he's always plucking with his index and middle fingers? I had always believed (for decades, until today) that the 3-finger Technique was one thing he was famous for!? (And stripey pants! ;))
 
#209
Neil Folkard said:
I feel about the same on that. Luckily for me, I'm not really interested in slap, so it doesn't matter if I can do it, or not, lol.
Click to expand...

I hear yah but it's often like a prerequisite to playing bass. If some youngster happens to have rhythmic hands (yes I believe it's a natural gift) and can put on a slap show he's instantly regarded as a bass master to the regular masses.

What you can't do that? Well I guess you're just so so then.
 
#210
saltydude said:
I hear yah but it's often like a prerequisite to playing bass. If some youngster happens to have rhythmic hands (yes I believe it's a natural gift) and can put on a slap show he's instantly regarded as a bass master to the regular masses.

What you can't do that? Well I guess you're just so so then.
Click to expand...

Well, I do play fretless almost exclusively, so that gets its own form of attention. And since I play in originals bands for about 10 to maybe 50 people per show (when opening for a popular covers band, lol), the masses don't enter into my equation.
 
  • Like
Reactions: roccobass, WestyBassBob and saltydude
#211
Since I've played so much original music or improvised versions of covers over the years, I had an incredibly hard time trying to learn how to play bass in a studio setting as a hired professional.

I had hoped to turn my passion for bass into a full time job, playing both in a studio setting and also for a full time gigging band.

But alas, those are skill sets that I quickly figured out I didn't really have. There are so many bassists in the Chicagoland area who are extensively fluent in music and can perform flawlessly on demand, live and in studio. Professionals need to be as close to perfect as possible. Time is money in the studio, and band bandleaders don't need bassists who stumble their way through songs they don't know.

It became obvious that developing those skills would take way too long at the pace I was going.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: ghostinthemach
#214
Another big challenge is being distracted by these two .... /c:
nord lead 2x.jpg
mojo.jpg
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back