faceman

This video has to be one of my favourite pieces of music ever and has some fantastic bass work from Marcus Miller. This is a live version from the excellent Night Music The actual music begins around 2:20. It looks and sounds like an active fretless Fodera bass, favoured to the bridge pickup, would I be right? If not, any thoughts? Any thoughts on how to get a similar fretless tone on something a little cheaper?

[quote name='Doddy' post='863083' date='Jun 10 2010, 11:21 AM']Glad it's working out well for you. Getting the shows in the 'real world' is the same as any other gig. Get recommended by someone that's already doing them,do a good job,get asked back. I started of by depping one night of 'Little Shop of Horrors' for my old teacher. The MD liked what I did and offered me more work,so it all went from there. It's great that you want to persue some more of this work-it's great fun. Be aware though, that there won't be anywhere near the amount of rehearsal time that you've had for this one. Pretty much every am-dram I've done has had just a band call on the Sunday where you first see the charts,tech run and dress rehearsal on Monday,doors open on Tuesday.[/quote] Fun times, now that really seems like a challenge! I think its all practise and I'm sure once you get on with it that you could go straight into it, knowing the tunes is a massive help From my initial uncertainties I'm so glad it's all come together. Off to the cast and band rehearsal now!

Thanks S.P. and Gareth. West Side Story, now that sounds like a challenge I'm just running through my score privately to sort out a few niggly areas. This has actually become so enjoyable I defiantly want to keep doing this when I leave university. Would be great for amateur stuff probably, how does one find these things in the real world?

So since the last time I posted it has all picked up at a furious rate! From Friday-Monday, we put in 21 hours of practising to get through the first and second halves on a day each. The first half is defiantly longer and harder, while the second is mostly acoustic stuff and reprises of the first half. There are a few areas of tunes that I need to look over but on the whole, I'm there! A mixture of hours of learning and dodging in rehearsals have got me through. Tonight we've had a run through of the second half as a band with the cast and it's defiantly sound awesome. I had to do four songs I've never played before and managed to get them without failing or any stops from the MD, all by sight reading! I'm amazed as I can now read most tunes, it's just those quick runs that get me out, so I often just do something of my own. Massive thanks has to go to Gareth Hughes for his help with Santa Fe. I managed to adapt his finger positioning to something I could actually do and can now play the riff in time with the bongos. I sent him how I was playing it and he pointed out some small changes that have helped me nail it. It's just the movements up to D, then down to A, then up to D, then E, then A, G, F* and on and on.....great fun It's also been announced that we are (just very possibly) going to perform Seasons of Love with the entire cast at a music festival in Durham. My band happens to be playing with my keyboardist so half of the pit band's gear is on stage so this could be excellent fun. It's more working out do we have enough microphones or not?! There's two soloists that defiantly need them! Tomorrow is the first full run through with the cast. Just a reminder from a mate that tomorrow is Thursday and the show opens Tuesday, fun times! This week we're running it as many as times as possible with the band on Friday and a tech run through on Sunday, dress rehearsal on Monday and maybe a run through Tuesday again. Apparently, this is normal in musical theatre (or at least student productions). Now that I've moved on from the shitting myself oh-my-god-I-can't-play-I'm-going-to-get-kicked-out phase, I'm loving it. The show has some great lines that have improved my playing and some beautiful eight part harmonies. And for giggles, here's cheeky me in posed-concentration mode at tonight's run through...

1. I just listened to a recording of Epiptah on NPR, what a piece of music, Something like 4,230 bars! 2. It was composed by Charles Mingus in 1966

My jazzy trio are giving Jamie Cullum's Frontin' cover a go and I was wondering if anyone had played it and had some chords, bass transcriptions of sorts? I'm going to give it a go by ear in a bit You can find a live version here - [url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyHyR5wopy4"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyHyR5wopy4[/url]. It sort of feels that it is just a chord progression with the bassist improvising over it?

I love the tone I get with my Little Mark II and Ampeg 15" cab. It's got a deep thick low end but it's not mushy at all and cuts through well. With my Rickenbacker, I play with a little mid boost and a touch bass and leave the rest flat and it's a fantastic rock tone with both pickups on. Cutting to the bridge gives a Jazz-esque growl and the neck gives a smooth double-bass-ish tone. Yet to play the StingRay for a gig but I suspect a little mid-boost as I like to get that presence. My amplification seems to make anything sound good!

I have literally just sold mine of these for £550! Not sure I'd pay that much but it's a very nice Jazz bass

Good idea Rich, I await with interest! After playing or owning a Lakland Daryl Jones, Fender Geddy Lee, Fender 08 American Jazz and my most recent Fender CIJ '75 Jazz, I'll be interested to see what others thing. The next Jazz I'd like to try some day is the Marcus Miller. i've played one the shop and it felt miles better than a Geddy Lee. Stick in a Sadowsky or East pre-amp and you have yourself a Super Jazz right there

So the second rehearsal and we were told in advance to look at Another Day, I'll Cover You and You'll See. Then we got an email the night before changing it to Tango Maureen, Santa Fe and Another Day. Not that any of them are massively hard but I only had a few hours. I got my mate around and we almost worked out Santa Fe so hopefully we can give it a go sometime soon in practise. The riff itself (as pointed out) appears several times so it needs to be nailed. So in the rehearsal we started off with Another Day. Mostly this seemed straight forward but there is a lot of fills and scales done in the song. I wasn't able to sight read where the root notes were so I really did struggle. The MD had to stop several times to ask say I was wrong but we got through the song. I'm going to have to sit down and work out properly. I felt very embarrassed because I kept getting lost. I dislike this number I will say now! Tango Maureen was easy with various chords alternating to its third (e.g. C -> G). We didn't do the whole song because it was easy but I managed to nail most of it. Then we took a look at I Should Tell You which sits in between the two parts of La Vie Boheme and has a beautiful Rhodes/EP sound. I managed to sight read all of this pretty much straight off and was very impressed. In my mind, I'm still using F-A-C-E for the spaces in the bass clef and then working out, I also know the top line is A and the bottom is G and things like that so it's getting much better. I still can't do a song straight off but it's getting much better. There's loads of 'little' songs that I doubt we will cover much as they are just filler so I think this is where the sight reading will come into play. So although I wasn't great in places, another successful rehearsal. We ran through the title track and Light My Candle from last week without trouble. And next week we are taking a look at two big numbers - Seasons of Love, La Vie Boheme and Christmas Bells. At least I'll have a bit more time to give them a practise!

So we've had two rehearsals but I've been so busy applying for jobs (eek!) and revising that I haven't had time so here's the summary of the first practise... I wasn't told in advance of what songs we were going to do so decided to practise the biggest ones. Not knowing the musical, I took a guess. I took a long look at La Vie Boheme (it has a nice bass part that doesn't alternate much and is in-sync with the piano), the title track and a few others. We did do title track which is thankfully quite simple and although I hadn't made it all the way through the song, I picked up the rest quickly from the band and reading. So far I've gone gone through and written the relevant chord or first note in the bar to make sure what I play is right. 'Light My Candle' was also a single four-chord song that has some interesting fills. I managed to get this mostly straight off. An observation was that the MD tended to do much referral to pauses and bar numbers, whereas my other band we work in 'rounds' or riffs In terms of sight reading, I had to completely do one track without practise - 'Out Tonight'. Thankfully pretty easy, as the bass only comes in during the choruses. At first I read an F# 8ths as an F and it sounded wrong and the MD asked if I was ok after it obviously sounded wrong. Taking a longer glance I noticed and got it the next time. During a break, he sat we down and we talked about Santa Fe riff and the associated apearances and said we'd give it a break till after exams so I had time to practise it. He showed me some shortcuts from playing it. I had mistakingly found a tab and was using this prior to the music arriving and shocking, it was wrong. So all went well! The drummer is top quality and I think between us we have a pretty good rhythm section. The keyboardist I already know very well, as he's from all my other bands. The two guitarists I've both worked with before and they are both excellent! His Strat matches my StingRay very nicely Onto week two now and this is where the fun starts...

Playing the StingRay feels great and I just love the feel of the neck of it! However, it is harder to stretch those distances because of my hand size. They aren't particularly small, nor particular big. The Jazz and StingRay are polar opposites. I'd say overall the StingRay does feel nicer (the Jazz is a bit too glossy for me) but no I couldn't do very fast pentatonic scales (although I'm not sure when that is actually useful).

Sorry to bombard with another vs. thread but thought your input might be interesting. I've got two basses sitting behind me at the moment and one is staying, one is going, the bank says so. I'm 90% sure that the '75 CIJ Reissue Jazz bass is going to be heading off to 6stringbass tomorrow as we are doing a meet up in Yorkshire for him to buy it and I would be keeping my '83 StingRay. However, I've been practising a tune today from Rent and the size of the neck of the StingRay has hit me. The Jazz is so much smaller in comparison and for this particular tune, it's got a very quick line that is so much easier to do on the Jazz than the 'Ray. I got a mate of mine along to have a play and he said personally, he'd choose the Jazz as he needs that manoeuvrability to do quick runs and stretches across four frets. However, I pointed out the tone of the 'Ray is so much better, it will cut through anything, it's deep and I love it. I'm probably going to be able to crack this line on the Ray eventually but the point is that it seems to restrict my playing as my hands are quite small and it does have a big neck! So what do you think is more important? An amazing deep tone or a bass you can run around on and tackle any lines. Much bass love

I've played the 'they look the same' game before with going from a Sunburst P to a Vintage Antique Red Sunburst Jazz, from a black Fender Jazz to a blue Darryl Jones. I need to figure out of a Squier Precision Red --> 83 MusicMan Stingray. Hmm this might be hard

Here's one of my bands covering Enola Gay... and playing our original Bayou Town! Even though I usually player finger style, here are the two pick songs in our set I play. What the song needs and all that

For an upcoming gig, I need to learn this baby for a month or so. It sounds sound too hard but the interplay between the Wurlitzer and bass is important so I was wondering if anyone had a full transcription, scores or tab are fine with me. All the ones online from Guitar Pro are incorrect. I could learn it by ear but this would save so much time Much bass love!

[quote name='Ou7shined' post='844101' date='May 21 2010, 01:20 PM']Excluding different pup combos, yes but there may be minuscule differences. I had a MM p/g on my SUB - it was a 99.999% fit.[/quote] The screw holes don't 100% meetup but it basically still fits! So, is the lack of fit due to this strange bridge then? And I do need the big screws but don't need the brushes because they still appear to be in the body, yes? I'll let you know what deal I agree with the fellow on the EB forums. I've learnt so much about MM basses in the past few days!