Anyone dabbling in any bluegrass with your bass? Lots of root & fifths but was wanting to learn some different walk ups or downs. Just curious if anyone else is a fan or just me. You have to be so tight because of no drums so it’s a lot to take in. Any help would be appreciated! Stay frosty.
Also looking at an upright bass
2 Likes
Hail @greggejustin !
I’m your guy here.
I toured with a folk/bluegrass/americana outfit for about 10 years. I played upright in the group, but all the songs and info work great on electric.
It’s either root-root, or root-fifth!
Make sure you can do the two shapes for root fifth - the fifth above the root, and the shape with the fifth below the root.
For the walk ups and walk downs - get two scales down!
Major scale (the ionian mode) and the natural minor scale (aeolean mode).
Most every walk up I ever played was 1-2-3 on the way to 4, or 8-7-6 on the way to 5.
You can also do the fancier version of playing the 3 chromatic notes preceding your target. For example, if you want a walk up to C, you’d play A,A#,B, then C (the target!)
The most important thing is - as you mentioned - being able to hold rhythm in a maelstrom of jangling strings without a drummer.
And also most important thing is - knowing the material! The genre expects that you’ll know the classic songs, so do your best to get to those jam sessions, the parking lot sessions, the late-night campfire sessions, ask questions, sit in and learn them tunes!
And then…
(my favorite part) the vocal harmonies!
But that’s bonus material.
11 Likes
You sir are a true hero! Can’t thank you enough for this.
2 Likes
my pleasure!
The bluegrass/folk music community was, to me (and to almost any bassist with an upright who is breathing) very welcoming, patient, instructive and down to earth.
It’s such fun music.
1 Like
Hey Gio! Searched the forum for “bluegrass” and found this thread. Sounds like you are the right person to pose this question to. I play a Yamaha TRBX304 and am learning some bluegrass (Emmylou’s Roses in the Snow album). The Yamaha sounds good when I am practicing, but I thought it may be fun to pick up another bass if I continue down this rabbit hole. If I was to pick up a bass that was more tailored for bluegrass, what would you recommend? Right now, it’s just me playing to a backing track through my DAI, so not too concerned about playing out, but wanted to get a nice bluegrass sound. Does a Kala UBass make sense or some other type of bass? Thank you! Hope all is well.
2 Likes
I am absolutely not the right person to bring any expertise to this question but I’d think some like an old school Fender 51P or something that would work for motown would work well for bluegrass also?
2 Likes
Thanks @faydout for that recommendation…that would be great if a P bass would suit that music well because that is what I was honing in on as my second bass before even thinking about bluegrass.
1 Like
If it’s normally played on an upright, I’d think the easiest and closest you’re going to get with a normal electric bass is going to be something like a P bass with some thumpin’ flats on it. Kind of my thought process there.
2 Likes
Hail @JohnF !
Your idea of getting a Ubass is a great idea.
Those sound killer and very much like an upright when they’re plugged in (they are fun to play by yourself unplugged, but don’t make enough sound to play unplugged with other musicians).
However.
As much as I love (and own) Ubasses, they’re more of a unique instrument. They don’t look like what people think a bass should look like, so it’s weird to bring them into other musical contexts, and they won’t make the sounds that you’d really want for a pop/soul/funk/whatever-else kind of band.
They do upright bass roots and fifths really well though.
If you want something that will sound decent as a bluegrass bass but will be versatile enough to use for tons of other things, I fully agree with @faydout - a vintage model P bass would be ideal.
Put some flatwound strings on it, roll the tone down, put a piece of foam under the strings down by the bridge, and you’ll be in bluegrass/country/old-school heaven.
2 Likes