Welcome to the cosmic, adventurous journey of music, welcome to the electric bass lesson!

Problem no. 1: information

We know that we are submerged by information, distracted by thousands of spurs that come from our digital devices. Internet, the great revolution of a network that connects every part of the world, it deceives us by saying that everything is at our disposal for free.

In fact many useful things are available on the internet, but we rarely find logical and coherent threads that link among them the numerous topics of a specific subject. Too much information that is incoherent becomes a limit, one risks to badly learn how to play an instrument by imitating, like a monkey, the videos on YouTube, of wasting your energy in the endless trickle of internet searching for easy, unaware and fleeting, superficial and effective satisfaction: today, more than ever, we need information (didactics) well structured and competent for a long period.

I want to propose to you a complete, progressive and organized course, supported by digital audiovisual equipment, that will seriously allow you to enter the world of music through the electric bass.

Music and didactics without barriers among genres, culture and instruments

My research has pushed me to explore different regions and worlds distant among each other such as rock, reggae, blues, jazz, soul, funk, Latin, ethnic, classical; all different kinds of music but united by the mystery of vital expression of vibration and rhythm. I have tackled this research with the awareness that the human being is rich of complexity and variety in our way of expression and in the way to convey this, but at the same time, in all of the cultures there is a unity of intention, a common mankind, that we can feel and by which we can meet, enrich, express and evolve.

Every time I approached a different musical genre, I also met different didactics methods, as in the improvised approach linked to the patterns and to the phases in jazz and blues or the technical exactness of the progressive discovery of the instrument for the position in classical music, various methods of learning and writing, as in the world of chord symbols in jazz, the practice of the tablature or the box in rock music.

Even the techniques used on the instrument were changed or even interpreted in a different way, for example the difference between the slap on the double bass jazz and on the funk electric bass or between the classic plucking and jazz plucking.

Another field of very creative research, following the Jaco example, was the study of repertoire, of the techniques and methods of other remote instruments or similar to the story or diapason, first of all the double bass and the guitar, the closest relatives to the electric bass, but also understanding and relating back to the bass things such as the sonority staccato of the bassoon, the delicate variations of the dynamics of the transverse flute or an Indian bansuri, the fluency of the saxophone, the cantabile expression of the violoncello, the ability of a sitarista to slide on a string.

I certainly cannot hide that sometimes cultures are very distant among each other and that it is utopian to think of assimilating all of the techniques and possibilities even only inside one musical genre, this is the basis of the dilemma of our era, submerged in the internet and in the globalization of all territories, the instruments, the artists, the styles and musical genres seem to be available for us to be studied and assimilated. But the immense dimension of information can risk being superficial and ineffectual, incapable of creating an artistic and didactics synthesis that all of the greatest artists have achieved (lets think of Bach, the Beatles or Zappa). Is this the main reason of the current creative emptiness in the artistic world?

But all of this chaos must not stop us in accepting the challenge, trying to build a path, to put the wings on imagination, to experiment and to create: let ourselves follow as in a dancing pursuit, without closing our minds short and in cliché!

Putting yourself under discussion to grow

During the course of more than twenty years of artistic and didactics process, all of this information and research have begun to come together since 2004, in my first multimedia course, which included the use of computerized technology in the music didactics. For ten years I have checked with my students, in person and virtually, the effectiveness of those insights and method. This is when the process of self-criticism and reflection began, I began to understand that one could not crystallize everything on one side or on another. Something more fluid, free, was needed and connected more to the musical experience. This is how I have reached a complete review and a new approach, sometimes distant, both from a boring classical lesson made of impositions and misunderstood teaching, both from the easy carelessness of many publications (or websites) in which one points to an immediate epidemic result, but rarely enables one to reach the true knowledge. I then tried to develop a method, a course that aims at including, in a harmonic way, the different musical worlds and the different didactics approach, being serious and strict and at the same time light-hearted and funny.

Do not separate the seeds from the flower

“Looking around ourselves in the world we can see offerings of various artworks on sale as if they were merchandise. Among the experts there is the tendency to invent various tricks and sell them rather than their own real experience. This way of thinking is like separating the seeds from the flower and appraise less the seeds of the flower. […] They try to earn more by proposing and teaching the trendy subject. […]: a partial knowledge is the cause of disaster”.

(Miyamoto Musashi, The book of the five rings).

These are the words of a great samurai (and master) who lived in Japan between the XVI and XVII century, those works exactly represent my way of thinking of the current situation of teaching the electric bass: one looks for and is given an epidemic knowledge based on the effect, on the striking trick, on the immediate result. We are able to find everywhere on internet, small doses of knowledge disconnected by a context, by a logical consequence, by a historical musical sense and therefore, in a final analysis, without an educational sense. Exactly as Musashi says the seed is separated from the flower. So my idea is exactly this: plant the seeds, provide true knowledge (and therefore true pleasure), guiding the people where they would not even have imagined they would have reached, step by step, without hurrying. Are you willing to embark on this beautiful and adventurous journey?

Be progressive with joy

I have always combined two passions in my life: music and teaching. The following multimedia course is the synthesis of years of research, studies and experience; it is the result of the will to learn, the desire to share the knowledge, the will to provide a tool finally completed and structured, that can become a fundamental point of reference for those who love music and the electric bass, and finally puts in order the ocean of information in which we are submerged.

A method, a course have to have the capability to progressively accompany the growth of the student, putting together in a harmonic way the three basic elements of musical education: technique, theory and the pleasure of playing the instrument (which includes expression, sensor, creativity, movement). This third element, the pleasure of playing the instrument is the most important, it enables us to communicate with the vibrations of the music as soon as possible, it is a physical pleasure, but also intellectual and spiritual.

Often the musical methods are either too practical and evasive or they become boring lists of scales and tunes. The result is passing from one side with the lack of knowledge, on the other side one is bereft of the joy of playing the instrument. The balance between rigour and fun is the main point that is the basis of this course.

The great danger of certain methodical and repetitive studies is that one ends up running across the same tracks that will stifle the creativity, therefore one must try new spurs and different approaches, but always in the consistency of leading to a progressive development which takes into consideration the physical, mental and emotional elements innate in that complex wonder which is playing a musical instrument. Music is joy, music is knowledge, let it echo inside of you.

For who

Generally, there are two categories of people that study music: the aspiring professional musicians (a few) and the lovers (many). The professional musician is the one who has or wants to do it, whether he/she loves to do it, as his/her profession; the lover is keen on music and finds spare time from work, studies and family needs, to dedicate this spare time to his/her passion. As you can see at the basis of this is the same motivation: the love of music.

Another word to define the lover is amateur, this is also a beautiful word, the amateurs are those who take pleasure, in other words they have fun and feel happy in what they do. I believe that each true professional musician should keep inside themselves that spirit of pure joy for music, beyond every economical aspect.

During the course of my experience in the musical education field, I have always felt the need to balance in a flexible way the approach, this enables me to create a method that on one hand offers a basic and progressive didactics course full of cues linked to the joy of playing the instrument, and on the other hand a thorough technical-analysis that are necessary for those who have started off in the profession and (maybe even…) to the virtuosity.

Each of these two categories have taken advantage: the aspiring professional musician with a course consisting of light elements and of synthesis, the amateurs have the possibility to study in detail further topics that they are interested in.

A method such as this enables one to study the electric bass even if you cannot afford it, for various reasons, place, time and money, to attend lessons with a maestro or at a music school (which I hope can always be done), on the other hand for those who already have lessons they can integrate with a multimedia course thereby having another didactics method.

Both amateurs and professional musicians will be certain to have in their hands and on their computer, a method that will guide them, starting from the first steps, in a progressive and logical way in their musical growth without risking to lose oneself in the ocean of internet (but one can use it by having first acquired the right tools to distinguish).

Electric bass, an easy instrument?

There are many jokes about the incompetency of electric bass players (and of double bass players) and there is a common opinion on the simple use of the guitar with only 4 big strings (I see the guitar as a bass with six small strings). Naturally a good bass player must have musical talent and ability as like any other musician, but there is a bottom line of truth: with the bass one can also have an easy approach, enjoy the chord progression by simply playing (in time) the roots of the chord (or the root and the fifth) or play simple riffs. These are opportunities that, especially in the first phase, can be used also to begin to understand the structure of the instrument and develop the harmonic ear. Then for those who want to study in detail there has to be the possibility of dealing with more complex topics and techniques. For a better understanding and enjoyment, one can use the bass to play melodies, harmonies or percussion effects, so by playing this instrument it is possible to discover and have one’s own total vision of music.

There is to learn…

Pentagramphobics

Among the people who love music and would like to start playing and instrument, often meanders the dread of having to practice endlessly in order to learn to read music on the pentagram, squandering at the alter of the reading and theory, the pleasure of playing the instrument.

And there is also the proliferating of methods and didactics that skip, at the right moment, the problem by promising immediate, easy and pleasant results. The writing systems (when available) most used have become the ancient one of tablature, in an abbreviated way tab (from English term tablature which comes from Latin tabula), already used by ancient Greece.

So, I say that all of the effort that one has to make in order to read the tabs, often reaching a scanty result, one can make use of reading the pentagram, that is the only advanced form of musical writing, a European cultural jewel to be proud of.

If one starts to use, from the beginning, with trust and respect, the pentagram, with the aid of a sweet and progressive method, that will allow you to immediately play and feel the pleasure of the music (without spending years of mortifying solfeggio), you will be surprised by the logic, and lastly, by the simplicity of the musical writing system.

And then why give up the beauty contained in ten centuries of history, the possibility to understand any musical theory or scores or harmony books? Why clip the wings from the beginning?

One does not have to become a music reader at the level of orchestra maestros, but learn enough to allow you to calmly read the basics, so that your own maestro can explain the theoretical and practice aspects without using cartoon or metaphorical images, to exchange scores among other musicians like you or aspirants, so as to record a piece to protect your own musical copyrights, in order to feel prepared and competent.

This does not mean that everything runs around the pentagram, the music is something else, improvising must be free of scores, the best way to play a piece is to learn it by heart, it will be important to learn by memorizing and putting the music inside us and not leave it on a piece of paper. Try to reproduce by ear on your instrument a bass line or famous melody is the best musical practice that one can do.

Naturally there can be people that have personal difficulty with the reading of a pentagram, due to various kinds of reasons, in this case the videos, there are plenty of them in the course, can be crucial aid allowing the student to test the visual and sound of the piece or the exercise played.

The ear comes before the score and theory, like the poem recited is more important than the written poem.

That fact is that the writing and theory are great aids of the musical practice that would be deeply regressive and limiting to not use.

Structure

Each lesson is divided in two parts containing topics that are coherent with targeted goals starting from the beginning.

The first part is focused on basic learning, the basic things all of the bass players have to know in order to act well and in a conscious way. It is the heart of the course where the essential elements of the music will be explained (rhythm, melody and harmony) with examples from musical genres, from styles, from musicians, from bass players and from groups that have made the history of music.

The second part is dedicated to the Complementary Techniques: slap, double thumbing, plectrum, tapping, harmonics, double stops, chords. They are not indispensable techniques to play the bass in a normal music piece, but often they form the charm and the specialty of our instrument, besides guaranteeing a higher development in a technical, tone, rhythmic and harmonic sense.

Each part of the lesson is at the same time divided into sections that are re-proposed in every lesson, for example the most are Rhythm Training, Melody Training and Harmony Training (all of which have specific exercises of Ear Training, which is most of the time connected to the use of the instrument), through which it will be possible to develop technique and ear on the principal aspects of music.

Then there are columns specifically dedicated to the most important musicians (naturally not only bass players), to the genre and musical styles. A particularly important and original section is: History of the Electric Bass, where the development of the instrument is put in relation to the music and the customs of the various eras, so that one can consciously connect to what one is playing to its meaning and to its primary energy.

5 & 6 Strings

It’s useless beating about the bush, for certain things I am a bit traditionalist, I consider the 4 strings the fundamental instrument. From the maestros of the double bass, from Pastorius to Wooten, all of the history of modern bass in all of its meanings it has expressed itself, with few exceptions, by the 4 strings. Naturally, I greatly appreciate the musicians that use these instruments, I simply believe that the basis of teaching the electric bass is and must be the 4 strings. Furthermore, having the symmetry of the tuning, each exercise conceived for 4 strings can be related, appropriately extended (managing the muting problems linked to the right hand), on the 5 and 6 strings.

However, I have wanted to leave some space for the 5 strings, an instrument that is widely used, demonstrating, when necessary, the possible adaptation of specific exercises.

Multimedia

The technological means offer the opportunity to create manuals and didactic methods endowed with an efficiency greatly potential in respect to the past. The computer, internet (with cross-references and analysis available on our site or selected on the web), supports videos, audios (mp3, midi file), hypertexts, all of this, properly structured and with the support of ancient systems of writings and pentagrams, has produced a new vision, more detailed and complete of the didactics and musical playing.

The lessons are presented in a PDF interactive file form, that can be used on the computer with all of the advantages of the multimedia, but can also be perfectly printed in top quality, so that in the end one can find him/herself a true paper course book, with the pleasure of studying a true music book. It is important to underline this aspect of the presence of the text and not only videos, for a less immediate enjoyment, but more logical and complete.

Assistance

It will be possible to establish a personal relation, to solve eventual doubts or problems and answer any questions, by exchanging emails or directly connect to the Facebook web page of the Electric Bass Didactics.

It is also possible to have some advice and extra online lessons, with video contact and swap files, on Skype.

Goals

My first teaching goal is to accompany the students along the journey, dealing each difficulty in a progressive and complete way, without leaving anyone behind, giving the possibility, both to the amateur and to whom aspires to the profession and to the excellence, to reach the personal aim that he/she has pre-established.

I am creating that method, that manual and that guide free and flexible, rich, complete, simple in its complexity, which I have always dreamed of having in my hands in order to
teach music (the musics!), through texts, scores, videos, images and sounds, with the same spirit with which one faces in a journey to unknown countries and planets, with the awareness that the most important journey is the one that we face inside ourselves.

I want to provide a method to learn music by playing the electric bass, full of multimedia support, complete, under the theoretical and technical aspects and at the same time capable of offering the lesson with simplicity, because as the great Romanian sculpture Constantin Brâncuși said: Simplicity is complexity resolved.

But in the end the essential purpose of all of this is to reach the joy and incommensurable pleasure that one feels by playing your instrument and by doing it together with others, experiencing the same feelings of freedom, unity and beauty.
This is the goal that I would like to share with you.

Therefore, I want to present the first fundamental and special course, absolutely solid and super measurable, I would say abnormal, in respect to the dimensions of those that will follow (that will not be more than 50/70 pages). It deals with a tribute and an introduction to the electric bass full of information (which I think seem to be absent, in their expression in a systematic form, not only on the web but also in the publishing field), that reflects the basis of the knowledge of the instrument.

This lesson and the others that will follow, always purchasable and downloaded from this site, will sweetly introduce you, but with a steady hand, to the music and electric bass.

The captain wishes you a nice journey to the cosmonaut of music on board the spaceship Electric Bass!

Always stay Into the Groove and the show begins!

Rome, 19 Febbraio 2019

Gaetano Ferrara

Teaching is an art like playing.

Lennie Tristano

You see, if you stop wanting to learn new things non it is as if you were not alive anymore.
And it is so, music is so vast that you will never be able to learn all of it.

Charlie Parker