The Jazz Bass Book: Technique and Tradition

More than a player's manual, this book portrays jazz bass as a vital element of 20th century American music. Citing examples from key recordings in the jazz canon, the book defines the essence of the musical contributions made by more than 70 important jazz bassists, including Ray Brown, Eddie Gomez, Charles Mingus, Milt Hinton and many others. Bassists get expert guidance on mastering proper technique, practice methods and improvisation, plus new insight into the theoretical and conceptual aspects of jazz. The companion CD featuring bass plus rhythm section allows readers to hear technical examples from the book, presented in slow and fast versions. It also offers play-along tracks of typical chord progressions and song forms.

CONTENIDO:

Foreword, by Ron Carter
Preface: Bass is beautiful
Intro

Section 1. The history
1. Walking through the years
2. It's got to be bop!
3. A matter of trust: five classic rhythm sections

Section 2. The players
4. The early New Orleans bassists
5. Welman Braud
6. John Kirby
7. The tuba in jazz
8. Walter Page
9. The Basie bassists
10. Bob Haggart
11. Slam Stewart
12. Milt Hinton
13. Benny Goodman and the swing bassists
14. Jimmy Blanton
15. Israel Crosby
16. Oscar Pettiford
17. The beboppers: Curly Russell, Gene Ramey, and Tommy Potter
18. Eddie Safranski
19. Chubby Jackson
20. Ray Brown
21. Harry Babasin
22. Afro-Cuban bass
23. The cello in jazz
24. Paul Chambers
25. Doug Watkins
26. Sam Jones
27. Percy Heath
28. Charles Mingus
29. Red Callender
30. The Thelonious Monk bassists: Ahmed Abdul-Malik, John Ore, and Larry Gales
32. Jymie Merritt
33. George Morrow
34. George Duvivier
35. Red Mitchell
36. West coastin': Leroy Vinnegar, Monty Budwig, Monk Montgomery, Joe Mondragon, Curtis Counce, Albert Stinson, and Joe Comfort
37. Scott LaFaro
38. Jimmy Garrison
39. Coltrane and beyond
40. The '60s mainstays: Bob Cranshaw, Butch Warren, and Larry Ridley
41. Charlie Haden
42. The avant-garde
43. Ron Carter
44. Richard Davis
45. Eugene Wright
46. The Bill Evans bassists: Chuck Israels, Gary Peacock, Eddie Gomez, and Marc Johnson
47. Dave Holland
48. Peter Ind
49. The Europeans
50. Wilbur Little
51. Rufus Reid

Section 3. Technique
52. Practice, practice, practice
53. Play in tune!
54. Chord symbols and what they mean
55. Form, key centers, and compositional styles
56. The IIm-V7 progression
57. Minor chords and the minor IIm-V7 progression
58. Melodic walking bass lines
59. Adding rhythmic interest to walking bass lines
60. Dominant 7 chords and scales
61. Bebop scales
62. The dominant 7 étude
63. Altered dominant sounds
64. The altered blues étude
65. Arpeggio exercises
66. Major melodies
67. Where do you start?
68. Mind your threes and twos
69. Sight-reading tricks and tips
70. Playing standards
71. Études based on common jazz standards
-Ode Drip
-What Impresions?
-The Megafun IIm-V Blues
-Rhythm Étude
-You Are All the Things
-Le cannet, solo transcription
-What's Up, solo transcription
72. The Coltrane progression
73. Thumb position
74. Bowing techniques

Section 4. Concepts
75. Swing is the thing
76. Integrity, dedication, respect, competition, and honesty
77. Are you versatile?
78. Are you creative?

Epilogue/Dedication

On the CD