Welcome to the first installment of my new series with Best Bass Gear, \u201cTheory Thursdays with Andy\u201d<\/p>\n
I thought I\u2019d start you all off with a pretty basic and common concept that many of you readers may already be familiar with, and apply to your playing all the time.<\/p>\n
Positional playing is a concept that I have always tried to stress to my students. This topic may be old news for some of you, but a good refresher anyway.<\/p>\n
One of the most important things to constantly take into consideration in all areas of your playing; reading, improvising, etc. is the minimization of movement. My theory is that the less you have to move around the neck, the more accurately you can hone in the attack of your notes.<\/p>\n
Most stringed instruments are tuned in such a way that every note is available in one octave or another inside of one position. Consequently, what this means, is that if you know your way around the fretboard enough, you can play anything, in any position.<\/p>\n
The idea of a positional playing is this; you have 4 fingers that you can play the bass with at any one time, and whenever possible, you should assign each of your four fingers to a set of four consecutive frets. We refer to this set of four frets as a \u201cposition\u201d.<\/p>\n
Positions are named after whatever number fret your first finger is assigned to.\u00a0For example, if your first finger is assigned to the 3rd<\/sup> fret, your 2nd<\/sup> to the 4th<\/sup> fret, your 3rd<\/sup> to the 5th<\/sup> fret, and your 4th<\/sup> to the 6th<\/sup> fret, you are in \u201c3rd<\/sup> position\u201d.<\/p>\n Stay tuned for more concepts in music theory!<\/p>\n