• My Advice To A Student About Learning Songs

    in Playing By Ear,Playing songs

    After yesterday’s post, I received an awesome comment from Chris Johnson.

    I quickly replied and after re-reading our exchange, thought it appropriate to share with you.

    Chris wrote:

    Well you’ve done it again Jermaine. You know how close I am to my goals! I pretty much do all of this already but I still struggle at times and I always struggle with the bass.

    I have all of these skills under my belt except for picking out those darn bass notes!

    I think I’m still trying to do it all in 10 minutes… Trying to do it too fast ya know.

    When I get home tonight, I’ll pick a song and really bare down on the bass because I know this is where I get lost.

    Example: I’ll pick a few out and then I’ll get lost somewhere along the line and that’s usually the end of my personal training as far as understand a song in full. :)

    But I just gotta stick with it like I did with everything else. I’m so close… so close….. But I’ll get there. You know I’m not giving up, not at this point!

    My reply to him:

    Thanks for your comment Chris.

    The cool thing about it is the more you pick out songs, the bigger repertoire of patterns you build. The same patterns are going on over and over.

    It’s not a random picking of bass notes. Once you’ve found your key, you’re down to 7 notes that will most likely occur. That’s not to say others won’t because we use bass notes outside the scale to take us to various places. If a chord outside the scale is present, you’ll hear it… like the b7 or the b6. Those are borrowed chords.

    Also don’t forget about the circle of fifths. Majority of movements will be to next door neighbors on that circle of fifths chart. Search for “circle of fifths” in the search bar above for more pointers. If you remember this order of notes, you’ll find more often than not, your bass moving in this direction (there are exceptions as there are with anything in life):

    C F Bb Eb Ab Db Gb B E A D G C

    And if the bass isn’t moving like that, it’s moving relatively close… from one tone of the scale to the next tone of the scale up or down… maybe leaping over a note or two at most (if not moving in circle of fifths flow).

    Use your ear to hear up —or— down. Ask this ONE question first:

    “EAR, did the bass go up or down?” Answer that question internally, then remember what I’ve said about:

    -circle of fifths movement
    -next door “scale tone” movement
    -very close movements (at most, usually 2 notes of scale)

    And you’ll be golden. Perfect practice makes perfect. Repetition is the mother of skill. Just keep at it. And retain what you learn because it will most certainly come up again. All songs draw from the same pool of patterns.

    After learning a couple dozen songs across different genres (or probably way less), you’ll probably have every chord and progression you’ll ever need.

    Keep up the great work Chris,
    JG

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    Hi, I'm Jermaine Griggs, founder of this site. We teach people how to express themselves through the language of music. Just as you talk and listen freely, music can be enjoyed and played in the same way... if you know the rules of the "language!" I started this site at 17 years old in August 2000 and more than a decade later, we've helped literally millions of musicians along the way. Enjoy!




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