I’ll throw this one out there, if anyone’s up for it! It’s kind of a mean one, well, ok, it’s totally cruel, but, you are completely allowed to slow the tempo down, and only do the first 4 or 8 bars or however many you’re comfortable with. It’s a throw back to Josh in a tux! And no, it doesn’t have to be perfect - try your best. The Bach Cello Suite 1 Prelude. And he gives us tips on this one in another video on his channel. Plus the tabs to an arrangement he created. Let’s see if anyone wants to try it - it’s a really beautiful piece of music, and the fretting hand’s gonna get a real nice challenge with it!
Post your video or audio files! No, you don’t have to wear a tux
But I can hear TwoSetViolin rolling their eyes: “GUUYS! There is more in the Cello reportoire than just Bachs Cello Suite!”.
It’s the go-to cello music for anything in tv/movies and they were reviewing classical music in cartoons. Side Note: Old cartoons were f$#"*ing ART. Bugs Bunny, Tom and Jerry. New Cartoons are mainly bullshit.
Yeah, I just started trying to learn it yesterday, and, I’m not used to playing those frets either! - you can move it down an octave too, and start on the G that’s the 3rd fret of the E string, instead of the one that’s the 15th fret, just to get a feel for finger positions on the note changes.
I think the best advice Josh gave in that video is: take it 1 bar at a time. Lol, for sure! Each bar is like a mini riff to learn. I’m hooked though. Ok, just 35 more bars to get through without forgetting the first ones
Wow, way too much of a challenge for me at the moment
One thing that might prevent some from participating is that you need a 24 fret bass to play along
Ok, here is my initial progress before dinner time!
As I said, I’m not comfortable. I have to have the bass in a weird position to have full access to those frets. The thumb is supporting part of the weight of the bass and limits my hand movement ability.
Looking through @JoshFossgreen’s tabs, I’m missing frets 21-24 from my bass
Ugh, yeah, though, looking ahead, you could probably make it quite a ways before it’s a big issue, except maybe bar 7, where you’d have to sub the note for the same one on a higher pitch string. If anyone makes it that far though, the challenge was probably helpful in some way!
I think you’re right though, depending on your bass, and the cutouts, some frets could be hard to hit. I have to play it standing for it to work, or my wrist starts hurting, but my bass is an Ibanez with similar style to Josh’s Peavey.
I’ll take this on tomorrow.
I still have to practice the songs of the band I’ll go to practice test-wise. Well the finished build should free up some time and I was interested before but now that I hear that I have an advantage with a 24-fret bass I’m even more hyped
Or, another option for 20 fretted basses I saw was to transpose it to the key of E or Eb, ( just move everything up 3 or 4 frets) - looks like by bar 19 you need the lower notes again. But again, if you make it that far, that’s an accomplishment. This is one that’s not done in a day - unless you’re a bass god!
E is not enough, I’m still missing a 21th fret. I just transposed it to E♭. Not quite sure how to translate that last bar into the software. That -1 on standard tuning will require a dynamic string detune or a custom tuning setting .
@Jamietashi, my bass has got enough frets to do the cover. The problem might be the one handling it
The thing is I just started to work on my first cover song and I will need to work on the technical part of recording as well. So that might take quite some time.
If I manage to get through it fast enough, I might give the challenge a try, though I must admit that those high frets look a bit scary
So I started practicing and found it useful to have the tabs in Noteflight:
I imported the whole Suite as Midi into noteflight and then created tabs for the first two bars by hand but if you want to continue you can use this as a starting point for your own noteflight sheet.
As I am still practicing I would recommend doing that because I currently still change tempo often. According to the sheet music I found the tempo is allegro (80bpm) if anyone is interested as it isn’t noted in Joshs Tab.
I also had a look at the original and it’s… different. I assume Josh adapted it for bass.
I don’t know guitar pro and what it can export but Noteflight can’t directly import them.
Regular Midis and something called “MusicXML” which is a standard I never heard of. Maybe export format of noteflight or something?
Just don’t assume it’s correct! Did my best to write it down, it’s possible something escaped. I know for sure the last bar is lacking something but my limited notation knowledge can’t put a name to it
Okay I haven’t checked but at least the first few bars are in order so here is the full prelude as written by josh, copied by @gcancella to guitar pro and then imported into noteflight:
Few adjustements I had to make:
It didn’t know the instrument from the XML so it played on a piano.
I had to cut out the Tab line, change the Instrument Part to “E-Bass” and then added another part “E-Bass (Tab)” and inserted the tab line there.
Compared to Joshs Notes it was an octave up but it was an easy fix as I just could select the whole part and move it an octave down.
Since you mentioned the last bar I compared to Joshs Tabs and a slur or tie was missing on that chord but I don’t understand what it means as it usually should be connected to the next note. I guess the transition to the low note should be smooth or you let the chord ring just a little longer!? I dunno. But I don’t think I’ll get that far soon anyway.
Oh also I was wondering about the 76bpm tempo. Did you adjust that for yourself or why is it at that tempo? As said as far as I can tell it should be 80bpm for the original.
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