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Bass Lesson 07 - Blues Up and Down

Note - the bass lines in lessons 1-11 can all be played with E Blues Backing Track No Bass which you can download from the Bass Guitar Lessons home page or here: mp3 wma

Bass Line 07 - Blues Up and Down

07 Bass Line Blues up and down mp3 wma
Drums and bass only. Approx 1 minute, 1.4mb.

The bass line blues up and down is a combination of the bass lines from Bass Lesson 05 - Root Root 7th 5th and Bass Lesson 06 - Root 5th 7th Root. The important thing to take note of here is that we are starting to vary our bass lines. We are doing this by simply taking two simple bass lines we've learnt to play and putting them together.

The more bass lines you learn, create and experiment with, the more ideas you'll have when playing along with a band, or jamming with a cd. The idea is to practice, play, practice more and play even more and experiment with everything that you have learnt to date at any given time.

You want to take things one at a time though. Make sure that you can play each bass line well before you move onto the next. When you have mastered a few bass lines, start experimenting. Get creative and make your own bass lines up. Improvise. This is what music is all about. The more you know the more fun you'll have.

The tab for bass line blues up and down for each chord played on Bass Line 06 is played as follows;

Bass line over the E chord:
G|--------------------------------------------------
D|--------------------------------------------------
A|--------------5--5--7--7--------7--7--5--5--------
E|--0--0--7--7--------------0--0--------------7--7--
Chords
|---E-----------------------------------------------

Bass line over the A chord:
G|--------------------------------------------------
D|--------------5--5--7--7--------7--7--5--5--------
A|--------7--7--------------------------------7--7--
E|--5--5--------------------5--5--------------------
Chords
|---A-----------------------------------------------

Bass line over the B chord:
G|--------------------------
D|--------------7--7--9--9--
A|--------9--9--------------
E|--7--7--------------------
Chords
|---B-----------------------

If you aren't sure which chord is being played when, the progression is the standard blues progression that we used in Bass Lesson 01 - Blues Bass in E which is:

The turnaround in bar 12 for the above bass line is played as follows:
G|--------------------------------------------------
D|--------------------------------------------------
A|--------------[(7) = tied; let previous 7 play]-----
E|--0--5--6--7--(7)--7--7--7----------------------
Chords
|---B-----------------------------------------------

Bass Lesson 08 - Root 3rd 5th 3rd