Bilbo

I agree with mcgraham. The noodle until you hit something good smacks of giving an infinte number of monkeys an infinte number of typewriters and hoping for the best. It also limits your choices to the individuals usually narrow view of the options. The thing is to remember that the ultimate test for the usefulness of a theoretical concept in the context of a piece of music is, and always will be, the composer's ears - if it sounds good it is good and if it sounds bad, it is bad. But the theory allows you to go directly to the problem. A good example is when Sting was working with noted arranger Gil Evans (Nothing But The Sun). Sting was struggling with a composition and asked Evans for some help. 'This note is wrong but whatever I do I can't get it to sound wrong' says Sting. 'It's not that note that's wrong' replies Evans, 'it's the one before it'. Job done. That kind of wisdom comes with knowledge and study and not from the magic music pixie (who I am beginning to like in spite of myself)

Sueno Vivo by Renaud Garcia-Fons

I recommend learning piano yourself, if you can find the time. Not virtuoso stuff, just arrangers piano. Opens up a whole new world and makes you listen differently!

The G alt is the seventh chord of the Ab melodic minor scale so it would sound good. Its the source of a zillion bits of good jazz.

Percy Jones has done the solo with backing tapes thing. Michael Manring of course. Dave Holland has done 2 cds of solo bass (Emerald Tears and Ones All) but I am not sure if he ever gigged solo. Glen Moore of Oregon fame has done solo gigs and duos with singers. Rob Wasserman has done the duo thing. There's a guy in Newport, S. Wales called Andy Long who is trying to nail this kind of thing but I have only heard one piece that was badly recorded? Jeff Berlin does his Dixie/Imagine/Tears In Heaven set at music fares. Renaud Garcia-Fons?

Patrick Suskind’s ‘The Double Bass’ – ISBN 978-0747537236 ‘The Double Bass Mystery’ by Jeremy Harmer - ISBN 9780521656139 Tanya Grotter and the Magical Double Bass. Associated Press -- MOSCOW -- From the jagged, jumbled lettering of the title to the picture of a youngster flying through the air framed by pillars, the book looks fantastically familiar. But the figure on the front isn't Harry Potter - it's Tanya Grotter, heroine of a Russian series that has the boy wizard's backers crying plagiarism. While Tanya Grotter is an 11-year-old girl and rides a magical double bass instead of a broomstick, she shares several attributes with her near-namesake: Like Potter, she is an orphan, wears glasses and has an unusual mark on her face - a mole on her nose. And like the Potter books, the Grotter series is full of fanciful magic words that set spells in motion. The author of both Grotter books, Dmitry Yemets, said his work was "entirely independent." However, he also said it was meant in part as a parody of the Harry Potter series, but with roots in Russian culture and folklore. "It's a sort of Russian answer to Harry Potter," said Yemets, a philologist by training and a specialist in Russian folklore. He said he sees his books as being in a "cultural competition" with the Harry Potter series, which has sold about 1.2 million copies in Russia. Saying the resemblance goes far deeper than the cover, lawyers for Potter author J.K. Rowling, her Russian publisher and Warner Brothers have threatened to sue Eksmo, the publisher of "Tanya Grotter and the Magical Double Bass," unless it withdraws the book and promises not to print any more.

Did a jazz trio gig last Sunday; great bass sound (with the SWR/GK hybrid), great playing, creative soloing, good interaction etc. Did another gig last night; same trio, same gear - it sucked. Played like a t****r. How d'ya fathom that?

Don't forget your bass or your bow!

Snot the point!! Play these suckers on a bass and you'll get more technique that you 99% of the bass players you will ever hear and ears like an elephant! Much more fun that transcribing basslines!!

Dozens of saxophone solos transcribed by saxophonist Charles McNeal, including everything from Cannonball Adderley and Stan Getz to Michael Breacker, Bob Mintzer and Bob Berg. Much more use than double thumbing [url="http://www.charlesmcneal.com/"]http://www.charlesmcneal.com/[/url] Remember - these transcriptions will be in Bb or Eb so transpose them up a whole tone (Bb) or down a minor third (Eb) accordingly!!

The learning of theory is important. I have made my feelings known about this already. But there is another aspect of becoming a fully developed musician that is both easier and harder to come by and that is the development of a sophisticated Critcial Sense. What I mean is that we all, as human beings, have to learn to evaluate the information we are given and to assess its validity, importance and helpfulness. If a music teacher tells us something, we have to not only learn it on the obvious level but we need to establish its relevance in the overall momentum of our development. If a tutor tells is something like, 'if a piece is in the key of C, all featured notes have to be from the c-major scale', we need to be able to take that and use it but to revisit it periodically in order to establish whether it still rings true. In fact, it is a useful way of teaching the theory but, in practice, it is not an absolute (you can, in fact, use all 12 notes (and some others) when you are in the key of C major - it is a question of degrees of tension - telling that to a learner, however, would not necessarily, in the short term, be helpful). This Critical Sense applies to all information, however, and that includes every post on this forum including mine. Read, listen, think, assess, evaluate and use or discard as you see fit. You can always pick stuff up again later. But it is important to recognise when what people say is fundamentally destructive - 'you don't need to learn theory' is one of those statements that can be potentially deeply destructive and can put someone back for years. There are others; 'don't bother with tapping or slapping', 'don't use metronomes', you can't study 'grooving' - are these statements 'true', 'helpful', 'constructive' or not? My opinion doesn't matter; we all need to figure this stuff out for ourselves. Teachers can be brilliant but they can be awful. We need to learn to recognise the diffference.

It only matters that we get a different audience!

[quote name='artisan' post='280533' date='Sep 9 2008, 05:03 PM']do you know, this thread has been a damn good read & has got me thinking (1st time for everything ) more about my playing, especially after playing countless 12 bar tunes at my local jam session last night. i decided that my musical arsenal (no not arsehole) was actually more limited than i realised it was. i.e. i was more or less playing multiple variations of essentially the same thing-does that make sense ?. o.k. it was all very fluid & fitted in well with the songs but i was struggling to come up with anything that sounded much different,which made me think about this 'ere thread. so you buggers have got me thinking about learning a bit-just a bit mind-of music theory,my good friend & jazz bass playing hero has offered to -"gulp"- give me some jazz lessons now look at what you've done............. i'm hoping this will open up my mind to a lot more playing options & maybee revitalise my overall playing skills.[/quote] Then my work here is done....

And a very considered and worthy opinion it is! I think you have hit on an important point, Mark. A musical mind is required to make creative use of the information made available through study. Totally agree - an unmusical mind will make as much mess with the theoretical knowledge at their disposal as without. A musical mind without that knowledge can, alternately, make very good music without all that technical stuff clouding the issue. But I guess my point is that a musical mind with that information should (in thoery ) be able to make something REALLY special happen! So, when asked do I need to know that theoretical stuff, my answer would always be an unqualified yes.

OK - your point is completely valid - you don't need to understand 'grammar' to speak a language (a French friend of mine doesn't get this 'masculine'/'feminine', le/la stuff any more than I do) and there are many people who don't understand theory who can 'hear' the more complex and 'advanced' elements of some jazz. I have no argument with that but I think that any player who wants 'be the best that they can be', the study of theory opens doors that may be otherwise difficult to access.

I understand everyone's 'live and let live' attitude. Its all very pro-social and positive and is fundamentally where I stand also. Unlike a lot of people, however, I make sense of the world by talking and arguing and debating and pondering and re-visiting issues and arguing some more. It helps me keep enthusiastic and interested. Agreeing to disagree before you have disagreed with me gives me nothing to deliberate on! You can disagree without being disagreeable! So, kindly rant on and feel good about it!!

Isn't being reasonable so bl**dy [i]reasonable[/i]?

Not really. If you try read a book in a language you don't understand but you can't make sense of it, you will not know what you are missing. If you can hear those 'weird' changes, they are subjectively more beautiful than the simple little diatonic major harmonies in most poular music. If you can't, you wouldn't know.

But those that don't know what they don't know can only want to know what they don't know if they have a very real sense that they don't know what they don't know. If they knew that, and knew that they knew that, then they would want to know, you know?

The proper study of theory would inevitably improve your ear. I particularly found this with the melodic minor scale and associated chord theory. You would be a pretty special musician if you could find your way around that sucker without proper study. C D Eb F G A B C = melodic minor = C Min/maj7, D Min7sus9, Eb Maj7sharp5, F7sharp11, G7b6, Adim, Balt (b9, Min3shap9, b11, b5/sharp11, b13, b7). Of course, you learn it, internalise it then 'just play' but the important part is to LEARN it not wait until the magic bass pixie delivers it fully formed.

Well, I definitely learned something today Although, in my defence, I would point out that there are 208 words in that post and I got one wrong. That's a 99.52% success rate. If that was anything medical, I would go ahead anyway!!!

I have my own agenda here (NO!!!) I have always been frustrated by the desire of some quarters to 'dumb down' everything, be it music, books, films, tv, art - whatever. I have always preferred excellence in any discipline and, whilst I do expect everyone to be 'the best', I like to see some sort of desire in the individual to develop, to learn, to grow. It is that tendency that makes people interesting (whether they are musicians or not). The absence of that instinct generally renders people pretty one-dimensional and, frankly, boring. That is why the popular media is so bad; most people don't want to be challanged. I started in HM bands, as I have said elsewhere, and have played in all sorts of different situations in all sorts of locations. In my experience, those musicians who are educated (and self-educated is still educated) are generally (and that word is important) more motivated, quicker, more creative, more respectful of the musicians around them, more professional, easier to communicate with, less frustrating, DEFINATELY better improvisers, more responsive, more open-minded and are more rounded. They are, in a nutshell, more interesting to be around. The celebration of mediocrity is going to kill all Art; its already disabled it.

I HATE IT!! I HATE IT!! I HATE IT!!! It should never be played again by anyone ever. If you have a chart, burn it. Now.

My experience tells me that I will never get past just competent. Everything I ever learned reveals at least two more things I didn't know