RE: A brief history of bass guitar virtuosity...
It's been awhile since I listened to him and I can't listen at the moment. I'd say it was kind of a Jazz fusion if I remember correctly. Yet really a lot of these instrumental virtuosos don't really have a STYLE you can label as one thing. They have their own style. Yet I have NEVER encountered or heard a excellent player that appears to be a master of all styles of music related to their instrument. They are usually exceptional at one or two, good at maybe a couple more, and there are some that they are typically not so good at.
When I say good it is about MORE than knowing the scales, chords, and techniques. Every style of music seems to have some nebulous FEELING which I tend to call "The groove" that you either have it or you don't.
For example: I know chords, pentatonic scales, modes, bending, sliding, etc and all the techniques required and utilized by Blues guitarists. Yet no matter how much I play it, it always sounds like rock, and is lacking a nebulous FEELING/GROOVE. I've hit it once in my life but couldn't determine how I did it later. So if you want me to shred some blues along the lines of Yardbirds, Cream, Clapton style I can probably pull it off. If you want me to pull of Hendrix, or Vaughn then I can hit the notes and techniques, but something is missing.
Yngwie Malmsteen is a monster when it comes to Neo-Classical and is almost untouchable in that genre. Yet I've heard him try to play blues and he has the same problem I do.
From what I've seen every musician seems to have something like this.
Yet, regardless... BEST EVER is a crock. They may be the BEST OF THEIR TIME because other people watch, listen, and learn from them and then they take it beyond where they found. So there is always someone watching and learning from the greats that takes it further.
Thanks for sharing this useful information!!! Very interesting, I am taking the courses on www.studybass.com have you checked it out?
Nope I haven't checked it out. I started playing before there were web pages, so by the time their were web pages I was off and running. I wish there were web pages back when I was learning it would have made things a lot faster.
The teacher on there basically says the electric bass is very unique and its best to learn it differently. He says that you need to think of yourself firstly as a musician/artist who simply uses an instrument to express himself/herself.
Wise advice. I agree.
Cool....why did you start playing electric bass?
The second part of that Cliff Burton post actually has Flea who you mentioned talking about him at the induction into the Rockin' Roll Hall of Fame.
Interesting... I saw this one cool bass solo of him once.
Yeah there are a lot of boot legged videos of him tearing it up. Sadly he died before they got really big, and he didn't really care about videos and things so most of what we have video wise of him is pretty poor recordings.
I only played it some. I wanted to start playing bass, and all I had was an acoustic guitar. This was about 3 decades ago. I learned on that, and then I just stuck with guitar. I wanted to play bass because of Cliff Burton.
I ended up being friends and roommates with bass players while I played guitar and I'd often play theirs. Really I don't play just one instrument. I also play Cello some, though not particularly well as guitars are my interest.
I don't currently own a bass, but I want to buy one. I am going to shop for a new guitar today, but I'm thinking of going for a 7 string. I may buy a bass after that though as I've wanted one for awhile.
Here are some old posts I wrote about the guy that made me want to play bass. I didn't know of Jaco back then I was very young. I actually learned of Jaco from my bass playing roommate a couple years later.
Here is my two part post on Cliff Burton from last year.
Who was Cliff Burton? - Some musical history - another great - another tragic loss
Who was Cliff Burton? - Part two - Bass player, amazing and gifted person, tragic loss.
He died... and at the time he died he was very unique and doing unique things. I think he would have gone on to inspire a lot more people.
Thanks sounds interesting.... Where are you from?
Colorado.