{"id":2458,"date":"2012-11-16T21:43:00","date_gmt":"2012-11-16T21:43:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/?p=2458"},"modified":"2017-11-13T05:33:13","modified_gmt":"2017-11-13T10:33:13","slug":"should-bass-players-never-solo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/article\/should-bass-players-never-solo.html","title":{"rendered":"Should Bass Players Never Solo?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p align=\"center\"><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/2U2cOVgaKBM?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Victor_Wooten\">Victor Wooten<\/a>, a phenomenal bass player that many of you know, has an interesting opinion on whether bass players should solo or not.<\/p>\n<p>The first thing to note that Victor says is that the bass player is <em>supporting<\/em> other musicians; this is a very good thing to bear in mind because traditionally, the bass is not a lead instrument.<\/p>\n<p>He doesn&#8217;t say <em>not<\/em> to solo, however he does say (albeit indirectly) that the bass must keep the rhythm going in order for an audience to stay interested. And that is, pun intended, sound advice.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What does &#8220;groove&#8221; mean?<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In the absolute simplest terms, groove when used as a musical term means a musical progression (usually a repeating one) that an audience can follow along with. Concerning you, the bass player, it simply means rhythm and bass. Or to put it even simpler terms, drums and bass.<\/p>\n<p>And yes, it&#8217;s drums and bass in that order and not bass and drums. The drums provide the beat that starts the rhythm, and the bass player supports that rhythm.<\/p>\n<p>Your job as the bass player is to, as Victor says accurately, keep the groove going so the audience stays interested.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s a popular belief that &#8220;groove&#8221; in terms of bass playing only applies to specific genres like funk or jazz. Not true. No matter what style of music you play, if you want to include a bass solo, the general rule of thumb is to keep that groove going.<\/p>\n<p>As an example, here&#8217;s a solo by Geddy Lee of Rush fame:<\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/RmTOAUEZRBo?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The above style Geddy is playing is <strong>totally different<\/strong> from what Victor plays, however notice that Geddy is soloing in a way that <em>follows the rhythm<\/em> &#8211; even when he does off-notes. He keeps the groove going, supports the song even in the soloing position and totally gets it right.<\/p>\n<p>As said above, groove applies no matter what style of music you play. Keep that in mind, and your bass solos will work. If on the other hand &#8220;everyone gets out of your way&#8221; as Victor says, the audience will get really bored really quick.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Victor Wooten, a phenomenal bass player that many of you know, has an interesting opinion on whether bass players should solo or not. The first thing to note that Victor says is that the bass player is supporting other musicians; this is a very good thing to bear in mind because traditionally, the bass is &#8230; <a title=\"Should Bass Players Never Solo?\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/article\/should-bass-players-never-solo.html\" aria-label=\"More on Should Bass Players Never Solo?\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"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\/2458"}],"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=2458"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bestbassgear.com\/ebass\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}