Thanks!
Very good. Now, where can I, church bass player, ask for help Right now we have upcoming “A Mighty Fortress is Our God”, in A of all keys. We keep our things pretty simple, so I would like and easier progression for it.
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Great song!! Such a distinct and defined bass line!…. Playing in the key of A is just a half step down from the standard of Bb…. Not sure I’m understanding what you’re looking for as far as an easier progression. Do you already play it in Bb?
FWIW: 
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Thanks
For sharing this @EdwardM…. Each video shows how uniquely this song can be played on bass…. Some of our greatest challenges as worship group bass players is trying to figure out bass lines that are originally written as piano or organ bass clefs…. THEN, when you are playing in a worship group that has the piano or organ, trying to fit in without over stepping that piano or organs space!!..
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Yes, it’s an interesting selection.
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In keeping with the larger topic, I came across a really interesting website yesterday that may be of interest to you all and is certainly worth checking out:
https://getmxu.com/?utm_medium=email&_hsmi=394773190&utm_content=394773190&utm_source=hs_automation
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In the BassBuzz Discord there is now a channel devoted to worship music.
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Cool! I can never get into that site.
I’d like to suggest we think about building a library of worship songs with tab and instruction and videos, similar to what Josh has done with the 100 songs that are part of B2B, where the songs are classified as Easy, Intermediate, and Advanced. How would we go about that?
We could start by aiming to build a library of 40 songs. I’m completely new to worship bass and know nothing about the genre and only know the songs I like because I’ve been introduced to Bethel Music and Elevation Worship and Phil Wickham and Kari Jobe and Charity Gayle and Chris Tomlin and their likes very recently. My personal goal is to play bass live on Sundays at services and I get the sense that working on developing a library like this for our community could take me a long way towards preparing me to do that.
Thoughts?
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All great artists!! There are so many great Christian songs and artists/groups out there…. Just a few I enjoy playing are:
Headed For The Mountain by Micah Tyler
The Blessing by John Wallers
And even some mainline Country like:
Headed For The Mountain by Craig Morgan
When it comes to “Worship” however…., all standardized tabs, sheet music, etc are pretty much nonexistent because you (as a Worship Group Musician) have no idea as to how or where any worship song is headed….. In Worship, music can (and will) change course at any time - you just need to be prepared for those changes…. I sometimes refer to playing in Worship Groups as a “Big Beautiful Spirit Led JAM”!! And many times it is…!!! And as such provide (as a musician) a most fulfilling experience.. No way to put that type (or kind) of music to standardization…. Granted, there are many standard “Worship” songs, but they are all played and sang differently….
Keep On Thumpin’!
Lanny
Hunh, wow. Thank you. I look forward to checking all those songs out.
I play at my church and only ever use chord charts. We use click tracks in our ears so we’re not quite as free form as Lanny but I would love that. I usually start by learning the basic chord progression and rhythm of the song and then try to let the Spirit lead me through chord changes and fills. We have services on Saturday evening and Sunday morning and it’s not uncommon for me to play a song differently each service.
That said, when I started out I mostly just played root notes and stayed locked in with the drummer. If your goal is to help people worship then my advice is to talk to the worship leader and ask for help to get you there.
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We mostly use chord charts at my church. I have the freedom to either be as simple as root on the one- write something simple myself- or my preferred method- with stuff like Bethel or Elevation or the other big names- I try to play the same bass line as the recording. Not too many tabs to found out there, but there are some, I even saw a few on Songsterr. I generally go to Youtube and find the artist live version and do my practice play alongs there. I also have a Worship Artistry membership- that’s primarily what I use for complex keys parts (I switch between the two on the Worship Team). But they have bass tutorials too. We use a click and do some limited “flow” moments if the congregation is feeling it- but usually just added choruses. I haven’t tried TOO hard to find bass tabs out there though. I guess I just hadn’t thought of it. But this is a good discussion.
I’ve used IEM’s a couple times in the past when I sat in with one of our local church worship groups. Really kinda cool! Using a click track really helps keep everyone in time also!…. Things have certainly gotten technical over the years..
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I have found the same when I have looked…. Actually, when I really want to learn a specific worship/gospel song instead of trying to find tabs is to upload the song into Moises and pull the recorded bass line out and just go from there…. That’s when I began to realize that wow!!.. I needed to move to a 5 string since I heard so many low notes being played on that B string…. And, with the worship groups I’ve played with, having an extra bass or two on stage is not an option…. Way different than when I play with my blues/rock “Old Dudes” jam band!!…
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Hey that’s a great idea- I’ve never tried Moises. The closest I’ve got is listening to a stem partial on Multitracks.
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I use it all the time. Use it with my blues jam band, use it to learn new songs, use it separate tracks when I’m working with my grandson (who I’m helping to learn guitar) so that he can learn to relate his ear to his fretboard….
As such, I never use online tabs to play bass lines. Moises has helped me quite a bit, but that’s just me I guess…. In my opinion, it is a great tool to use for both learning, and as a “live” tool when your “Old Dude” band doesn’t have a vocalist!!
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I use Songster.
In the paid version, songster will create tabs from youtube ; you can then adjust to ease the playing
My process is
- Receive the song list 24h before
- Go to songster to get / create tabs
- Realise how complicated they are
- Realise that I have no time to practice them enough
- Finally doingonly - Root / Chromatic approaches / Root Fith / Pentatonic and trying to stay square (in the pocket would be an overstatement)
And repeating this process 2 times a week (for Wednesday night and Sunday) 
I started +/- 9 month ago and I get better in terms of rythm, fluidity on the neck (you need to move your hands without looking at it when you don’t know the song . ) and sometimes do simple fills successfully… but he gap in speed and precision btw worship songs that I discover and more traditional songs that I rehearse a lot (and play in front of 5 people max) is simply gigantic … it can be demoralising as well but I guess this is normal and that with time I’ll get more and more at ease with improvising
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Get out! I never knew you could do that with Songsterr- I’m on the paid version, too. Just never explored the capabilities. That is huge though- I can take my Youtube vids and get them tabbed- awesome. Thanks for chiming in with that.
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