"Bass" Video Transcript

Video Transcript: Bass

Three key instruments they're not really the key instruments I suppose the piano and voice and guitar. They're the really the key instruments but these three instruments we're going to talk about in the next three sessions are sort of up and coming and the first one is is the bass. Why is bass becoming a standard instrument for worship music? 

Number one, the piano is slowly or was slowly replacing the organ in churches, the pianos easier to play, it has more punch in a way, organ's are kind of lethargic, they're harder to play some of the peppier music, it's hard to get a distinct sound out of the organ so piano for many reasons slowly took over the organ but the organ had that big powerful bass, these big pipes that produced some thumping bass and the piano often if it's especially if it's does not mic doesn't have as much bass. So in a way that bass guitar is sort of taking on that that organ bass quality. 

Number two, contemporary music is too high in terms of pitch, or too low. When a Chris Tomlin or someone like that does a song, he sings it really high. And then you would think the bass part would also go high, but the bass part guts go so high that that really you want to drop it down an octave lower. And now when it's an octave lower, it's too low. for human bass person can sing it, and a bass guitar can play lower than a person can sing. So the bass guitar takes it over or some of the songs are lower in key. And then it gets so low that again, the the human bass singer can't sing that low. And again, the bass guitar is more versatile, I can get low, it can get high. And so what's happening in contemporary music is the bass part is being taken over by the bass guitar. And, you know, when we sing a contemporary song, we have the melody, we have the alto and the tenor, but really the bass guitar or maybe a cello or some other violin sound on the keyboard. So that takes over that bass role. 

And number three people like bass, people buy speaker systems for their car and they put up a sub, there's this thing called the sub. Now, before you know when I grew up, as a kid, I didn't know what a sub was, it was just a speaker. And then you turn the dial to base to get base. But now there's actually a speaker dedicated just for bass. And so people put subs in their car and part of their television system. So people, people today like a little more bass. 

How to use the bass in a worship service. How do you what do you do, 

Number one, let the bass come in, like on the second verse, first verse might be just guitar or piano and then you get to the second verse, little variety of some the bass comes in and it's like, Okay, now we're doing the exact same tune different words, and it feels a little different because the bass is coming in or you bring the bass in, I'm on the chorus and it sort of just takes the music to the next level. 

Number two of the bass adds feeling. It's like, you know, we're at one emotional level and then when the bass comes in, it's it for whatever reason and just tells our brains that we really need it now. 

Number three, don't overuse or people will get bass fatigue. If the bass player is playing on every single note, every single verse every course there's no contrast in the music. People get used to that and this is vs vs. avi versus the same every song is the same. And soon the bass doesn't add anything it does. All the emotional stuff just sort of evaporates. If you have a bass player playing and you have the EQ high for the bass on the piano, and the guitars, there'll be a lot of bass overload because everything is now playing the bass loud the guitars playing it loud, like pianos playing it loud and other bass players playing it. And it's just too many people playing the bass part. If you have a bass player playing the bass let him play the bass part and turn the EQ down on the guitar and the piano.

Well, how do you play a bass unlike the guitar that can play a single a single notes or chords could be many strings at one time the bass player tends to play only one note at a time. The note a bass player bass pair player plays is the name of the card so if you're playing a D chord, the bass player is playing not the D card. But the D note, the only exception to the above is when the chord has an alternate note in the bass. So everyone's playing the G chord. But in the lead sheet, it has the letter G, then a slash a D, and what that means is we're going to play the G chord, but instead of a G in the bass, we're going to put a D in the bass, so everyone was playing the G chord, but the bass player is playing the D note and, and that's often a passing chord, or it just makes for a really interesting chord. 

Other items on the base, a passing notes, there's deadening, there's slapping, there's ringing, though there's driving the note. There's the bass, bass played with the bass drum, I'm going to demonstrate some of that I don't have a bass guitar. I'm not really a bass guitar player. But we have the low node of this guitar. And so what a bass player would do if he's doing the passing notes. He let's say he's in the key of G regular guitars playing board, and then you want to move to the chord of C because the bass player is only playing one note. But if he wants to go from the G to the C, he might want to do a passing note. So he'd be playing G, he finally gets to the C. So that's a passing note, it's a way to get from one board to another chord deadening. guitar players do it too, you can let them play in the notes like this and hear it ring.

Ringing the note or you can deaden it and how I deaden it is I just take my hand and I rest my hand gently on the note that I'm playing, but not too hard, or you won't be able to hear it just a little bit. And then you get this, gives it a different feel. There's a slapping style, or the bass player actually slaps at the node to doesn't really work for the acoustic guitar, ringing the node or driving the note, instead of deadening it. And driving the note would be like I'm playing the eighth note.

So the bass player sort of driving the whole song along, sometimes he doesn't drive it, he just hits it once. Amazing. And with the bass, it just rings and just keeps filling the space until you hit the next note. And because of that bass players often use their finger. And they played this way they sort of pluck it. And they pluck it because if they hit the one string, they let the finger first hit that string and then rest on the next string so that next string doesn't vibrate. Because the base is so powerful and the waves are so big, when you hit one string, it starts vibrating the string next to it and then now you get two strings started going at each other. So you hit it, and then you then you hit the one Let it ring. But that's that finger lands on the other one so it doesn't vibrate. The bass is often played with the bass drum. 

So whatever the if the bass player is doing this, then the bass drum has to be doing the same thing they have to be doing if the if the drummer is playing, he's playing the bass drum and it's gone, boom, boom, boom, and the bass player when when playing with the drum, the bass actually makes the drum sound elongated when when the drummer hits that that big the bass drum that he has, it can just be and it just stops. But when the bass player plays with him, it feels like that drum is like lasting longer. So it sort of elongates it makes makes it a fuller sound. So, you know, this is just a brief little thing. If you're a bass player, it's not really enough to to you know, to really improve on and we're actually going to make another video with a bass player and he's going to tell you I just want to do that with the PowerPoints to give you a general idea, but the next video will explain a lot more in detail how you can make bass. Be a help in terms of bringing out the worship in your church.