In this issue:  A Semi-Scientific Look At Guitar Cables | Beyond Sight Reading | 
Bass Guitars | How to get a gig with Mike Stern - Play like Tom Kennedy | 
Tom Kennedy's solo on "Softly as in a Morning Sunrise" | Country and Bluegrass Bass: Expanding Your Creativity While Still Doing Your Job

Country and Bluegrass Bass:

Expanding Your Creativity While Still Doing Your Job

by Ryan Tilby

I have a friend who says there are two things everyone will do in their life, at least once: pour concrete, and play bass in a country band. Now, both those things sound easy enough, but speaking as a bassist who had to pour an R.V. pad last summer, there are some simple concepts that when followed, make the job go smoother, work better, and be more professional.

Country and bluegrass music is simple music, in a lot of ways, but that's the catch – each instrument has a job so carefully defined that a musician who doesn't understand his role in the bigger picture might easily play out of line – either stepping on someone else's toes, or leaving some crucial element of the style un-played. This applies to bassists as much as anyone. The biggest mistake we bassists make is underestimating the crucial role we play in creating "that sound".

So what is "that sound"? Well, it's a lot of roots and fifths, that's for sure. But besides providing tonic and time, the bassist can do a lot for the feel of country music. We can build energy, we can build tension, we can provide resolution, and if it all comes together right, we're the ones that get people out of their seats to dance. In this article we'll talk about things that bassists don't often think about on the country gigs: note duration, using inversions, adding embellishments, and substituting chords.

Note duration is a powerful tool. The space between your notes is every bit as important as the notes themselves when you're trying to build a song up, or mellow it out. Don't let your quarter notes always be full quarters, back-to-back. For example, experiment with treating the quarters as eighths with eighth rests between them:

Then let the quarters use the full count, with no pause in between. Notice the different effect this has when you're playing with a band.

Your technique and tone will also have a profound effect on how note duration affects the feel. Try being percussive on the more staccato notes; try using your thumb on the longer ones.

One percussive technique that country and bluegrass can't get enough of is the muted "chick-a" from the classic "boom chick-a boom chick-a" feel. Let me explain:

The first 16th note of each pair is your index finger landing back on the strings (along with the rest of your hand). So if you're looking at the three I's in a row and wondering if bluegrass has warped my mind for good, yes, but not in this instance. Your index plays the eighth note, floats up a little (this is the natural movement of the hand), then lightly slaps back down on the string and is perfectly poised for the second dead 16th note. Repeat until you have a casual swing to your rhythm, and cowboy boots feel strangely comfortable to you.

Now let's look at a basic progression, and see how we might approach it if we want to make it more interesting while still outlining the basic chord. Using inversions of a chord is a great way to do this. We do this more often than we think, but in our minds we think we're walking from root to another root, or using passing tones. Remember, first-inversion is a fancy way of saying we're going to play the chord with the third as the lowest note, not the root. This works best when we've already established the root of the chord, otherwise the third doesn't denote motion, it just sounds weak.

Here's the simple way to play a basic progression:

Here it is using with some movement into the first inversion of the G chord. Note that I'm using a G an octave higher to maintain the tonic, and it creates a nice constant as I move into the C:

There's no quick way to summarize chord inversions – I learn more about what works in one hour of jam session with a band than all the solo practice I can fit into a week. Experiment with landing on different parts of the chord and see what you like. Notice which notes feel like they need resolution and which are best used as a passing tone on your way to another tonic. Here's the progression again, but moving all around between the root, 3rd, and 5th of the chords:

In the next round we'll venture into embellishments and chord substitutions – what works, and what your guitar player will beat you up for trying. In the mean time, remember that you're playing country right when your playing is in time, establishes tonic, has tone, creates movement, supports your band, and maybe even gets people dancing. Hey, that's not so hard.

You could be pouring cement.

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About the Author
At the age of nine Ryan Tilby was informed that he was to learn a musical instrument, and would he prefer the piano or the clarinet. His response was speedy and succinct: banjo. That single life-altering decision thrust him down a path filled with festivals, jam sessions, vanagons, and hippie-dancing. When he realized chicks didn't dig banjo, he learned guitar. When he realized there were too many guitar players in the world, he switched to bass.

Ryan studied jazz at Dixie State College and Utah State University, freelances as an audio engineer, and plays bass for Ryan Shupe and the RubberBand.

www.shupe.net
www.ryantilby.com

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