{"id":11730,"date":"2017-10-30T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-10-30T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/?p=11730"},"modified":"2017-10-30T07:01:03","modified_gmt":"2017-10-30T12:01:03","slug":"jaco-pastorius","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/article\/jaco-pastorius.html","title":{"rendered":"How to get the Jaco Pastorius Portrait of Tracy sound"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Some bass players consider Jaco Pastorius&#8217;s sound heard on <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em> to be the ultimate bass tone. It&#8217;s totally clean and totally organic. Every note is heard as clear as a bell, volume balance between notes is near-perfect, and the more you listen to it, the more you say to yourself, &#8220;I <em>want<\/em> that sound!&#8221;<\/p>\n<h3>Understanding <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em><\/h3>\n<p>Here is the original studio recording:<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><iframe height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/nsZ_1mPOuyk?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"560\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The first thing to know here is that <strong>this is a free form jazz piece<\/strong>. This style of music does not follow a specific metre. It is up to the musician to dictate where the music flows, so to speak.<\/p>\n<p>The second thing to know is that musically, <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em> makes a lot more sense to the brain when you hear it played on actual piano:<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><iframe height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/BmDHdaBzZgU?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"560\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Once heard on piano, you get a much better idea for what Jaco was originally going for with the song. He was taking what he most likely heard on piano, translated that to the electric bass and from that created his own sound.<\/p>\n<p>However, there&#8217;s a third thing to know. It&#8217;s not really possible to emulate a traditional acoustic piano on the electric bass&#8230;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;but it is possible to make an electric bass sound like a Rhodes electric piano, an instrument that was popular in the mid-1970s at the time Jaco recorded <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>When you listen to a Rhodes played free-form style, you can definitely tell it had some influence on what Jaco was doing:<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><iframe height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/cnzICutH_sE?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"560\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Making an electric bass sound like a Rhodes electric piano is difficult to master. Certainly not impossible, but not easy. Plenty of practice is definitely required.<\/p>\n<p>Saying &#8220;it&#8217;s all in the fingers&#8221; has truth to it, but the follow-up question concerning <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em> is &#8220;&#8230;and what are you trying to <em>do<\/em> with those fingers?&#8221; The answer is that you&#8217;re aiming for a Rhodes piano style sound.<\/p>\n<h3>Do you need a Jazz Bass?<\/h3>\n<p>Some believe that the only way to get the Jaco sound is to use a Jazz Bass. <\/p>\n<p>True? Partially.<\/p>\n<p>What makes the Jazz Bass so good for this particular tone are the two single-coil pickups, allowing you to shape the sound just about any way you want it. The combination of two volume controls and one tone control, while simple, is a very good design. <\/p>\n<p>With <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em>, you will notice in the song that the bass frequencies are rolled down a fair amount, indicating the rear pickup was favored for the recording. How much was the rear pickup favored? We&#8217;ll never know for sure. But it&#8217;s probably true the rear pickup was rolled up full, the front pickup rolled back to about 25% and the tone control rolled back at least 50%. <\/p>\n<p>Bear in mind this is all speculation. Your guess as to where Jaco had his controls set to would be just as good as anyone else&#8217;s guess.<\/p>\n<p>In the end, what matters here is that it helps greatly to have a <strong>really good rear pickup<\/strong>. So even if your bass only has a single rear pickup, if it&#8217;s a good one, you can get the tone.<\/p>\n<h3>What does &#8220;really good rear pickup&#8221; mean here?<\/h3>\n<p>It means a pickup that promotes good string balance.<\/p>\n<p>An example of this would be the <a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/bartolini-b-axis\">Bartolini B-Axis<\/a>. Yes, it&#8217;s a modern pickup made with modern tooling, but where string balance is concerned, this pickup nails it. It&#8217;s offset pole pieces really help bring out the notes without any &#8220;wavering.&#8221; And when going for the <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em> sound, those offset poles really help to get the tone.<\/p>\n<p>Would the <a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/nord-big-singles\">Nordstrand Big Singles<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/nord-big-splits\">Nordstrand Big Splits<\/a> also work? Yes (especially if you want a soap bar and not a Jazz size pickup.)<\/p>\n<h3>Is the compressor effect required?<\/h3>\n<p>Something to know about the Rhodes electric piano is that the way one works is in fact from the use of a pickup. There aren&#8217;t any strings in a Rhodes, but rather metal tines. The tines are struck and the pickup amplifies the sound.<\/p>\n<p>A Rhodes naturally sounds like a compressor effect is in use, however what you&#8217;re actually hearing are the tines vibrating\/ringing, and while it may sound compressed, it isn&#8217;t.<\/p>\n<p>With the electric bass, you&#8217;re obviously using long strings and not short metal tines, so to reproduce the natural attack and decay of a Rhodes, a compressor effect can help if used lightly.<\/p>\n<p>Something not present in <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em> is thump, so if a compressor is used, attack would need to be set to a minimal level.<\/p>\n<p>Better compressors to use would be the kind with the most tone shaping options possible, namely the <a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/aguilar-tlc\">Aguilar TLC<\/a> and the <a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/mxr-m87\">MXR M87<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Best reason to use a compressor for Jaco tone:<\/strong> If you&#8217;ve tried everything possible to get even string balance but you just can&#8217;t seem to get the sound, a compressor will &#8220;squash&#8221; your tone (in a good way) so that notes have even volume. Experimentation is of course required to find the right squash, but in the end it should help out quite a bit, because compression, generally speaking, does even out note balance volume. <\/p>\n<h3>&#8220;I already have a preamp that adds in compression. Is that enough?&#8221;<\/h3>\n<p>Maybe.<\/p>\n<p>Some preamps color sound in a way that adds compression while others are engineered to purposely not do that. If you have a preamp be it on-board or external that compresses when engaged, that may be enough to get the Jaco tone you&#8217;re looking for. Your ears will tell you for certain whether you&#8217;ve got the sound or not.<\/p>\n<h3>&#8220;What frequencies should I be aiming for?&#8221;<\/h3>\n<p>Mids. Again, there&#8217;s really no thump and not a lot of crisp treble heard in <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em>, so aim for the mids. <\/p>\n<p>Jaco favored the Acoustic 360 amplifier, which undeniably gave a huge bump up in the mid frequencies for his Jazz Basses. That being true, it can be arguably said that you can&#8217;t get Jaco tone without really paying attention to those mids and making them heard very clearly.<\/p>\n<p>Go for the mids, and you&#8217;re on the right track.<\/p>\n<h3>Is this the de facto way to get <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em> tone?<\/h3>\n<p>This is just a guide.<\/p>\n<p>You&#8217;ve learned the type of song <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em> is, and given a few ideas on how to get the sound with modern equipment. After all, not everyone has $9,000 or greater to buy a mint condition Acoustic 360, never mind a pair of perfect vintage &#8217;60s Jazz Basses, one fretted and one fretless (the total cost of which we wouldn&#8217;t even dare speculate.)<\/p>\n<h3>Do you know a better way?<\/h3>\n<p>If there&#8217;s a way you know how to get Jaco&#8217;s tone on <em>Portrait of Tracy<\/em>, please share what you know by posting a comment below. What worked (even if somewhat,) what didn&#8217;t work, things you&#8217;ve tried, basses that worked well, and so on.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some bass players consider Jaco Pastorius&#8217;s sound heard on Portrait of Tracy to be the ultimate bass tone. It&#8217;s totally clean and totally organic. Every note is heard as clear as a bell, volume balance between notes is near-perfect, and the more you listen to it, the more you say to yourself, &#8220;I want that &#8230; <a title=\"How to get the Jaco Pastorius Portrait of Tracy sound\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/article\/jaco-pastorius.html\" aria-label=\"More on How to get the Jaco Pastorius Portrait of Tracy sound\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":11729,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11730"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11730"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11730\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}