This video starts with a quick explanation of the blues shuffle beat. Typically, the pulse is felt swing eighths. Or you can feel it as four triplets (that could also be interpreted as 12/8).
You don’t always have to play swing eighths, though. Sometimes it’s better to just play quarter notes on the beat and not play the weaker eight after each note. It’s good to have some different ways of playing over a standard blues pattern.
In the video I’m talking about different notes and scales you can use to form blues basslines and solos. I said “minor pentatonic” about 50 times when I meant to say “blues scale” – just so you know, I mean to say “blues scale”. Whatever.
The important thing is that if you’re playing a Major or Dom based blues tune, you can solo in the relative minor (minor scale three frets down from the root) as a blues scale. Also, you can add the notes of a blues scale right into the Major or Dom7 root scale and use them as ‘blue’ notes.
If you wanna play blues bass, it’s a good idea to listen to some. Check out some recordings by Muddy Waters, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Albert Collins, Albert King, Freddie King, BB King,John Lee Hooker, James Cotton, Jimi Hendrix, Buddy Guy, Charlie Musslewhite, Johnny Copeland, and the list goes on and on.
Different regions of the country developed different blues styles. Stevie Ray Vaughn’s Texas style blues sounds a bit different from Muddy Waters’ Chicago style. The history of The Blues is pretty fascinating stuff and worth checking out. Not to mention it makes you a better player. Nothing can replace busting out some tasty blues licks and in the pocket blues bass lines.
This video features random info on playing blues bass. A lot of the topics could be entire videos themselves, but I wanted to try and cover as many aspects of blues bass as I could. The topics I’m talking about here are what I consider to be some of the most important parts of playing blues bass in a band.
Firstly, the bass is where the band gets all its forward momentum, especially in blues. The drums are helping to form the rhythm section, but it’s the bass part in particular
that provides the propulsion that the rest of the band can ride on.
When you play blues tunes, it’s best not to play too busy during the main groove and verse parts. You can loosen it up for the solos, but mostly there’s are certain walking bass lines over a shuffle beat that gives blues music it’s sound and drive. Note wise, a simple Major triad (1st, 3rd, 5th) works very well over Major or Dom7 based blues tunes. From there you can add in the 6th and/or b7th step of the Major scale.
Those are the notes, now what about the feel? The beat is called a blues shuffle and it workd best with a very steady, pumping walking bass. Don’t get me wrong – there’s all kinds of ways to play some blues. I play funkified blues all the time, but for straight ahead Mississippi Delta/St Louis/Texas/Memphis/Chicago Blues songs it’s all about that walking shuffle.
A super important thing is shifting from the basic Major scale finger setup (middle finger on the root note) to get at the lower notes and shifting back. It makes playing walking bass lines really easy. Just shift your pinky onto that root note where your middle finger was. You can put your index finger three frets down. That’s the root of the relative minor.
Bass walk-ups are huge in blues and some other genres (like country). Usually there’s a walkup into th four chord. Walkups are a way to guide the listener into the chord change. It’s very common and effective. In fact, people get so used to hearing the bass walkup in popular tunes that one time, I had the riot act read to me by an overzealous band leader when I left it out. It’s like they need to hear it.
A good way to play the walkup is (on the last measure of the I chord – before it changes to the IV) start with the root on the downbeat, then go up to the second note of the scale (a whole step, or two frets) on the next beat, and then the next two frets in a row on the other two beats. Then right up into the root of the IV chord on the downbeat.
Be sure to check out Part 2 of this video for a whole bunch more Blues Bass Tips
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