How To Play Slap Bass #2 - Ghost Notes For Dat Funky Sound

hi again mark here from talking bass net with the latest in my series of slap lessons for bass guitar remember to check out all the other videos on the talking best video YouTube channel and also visit talking bass net where you'll find loads of lessons articles and downloads so the last swap lesson covered the basics of the technique like how to strike the string with the thumb and pull the strings for the pop this lesson we're going to incorporate muting into our slapping first of all if you've never used muted notes or ghost notes in your normal finger style or plectrum plane we'll go over the basics and it should be a useful addition to your overall plane style so when we mewtwo note we aim to get this kind of sound okay so it's a deadened foot of a note with no real pitch rather than a standard full note like this so to do this you just lay your hand over the string that you're playing and hold down just enough to get a thud so just play an open string and then I can open a string just like this now take an open fret hand like this and hold it down over the strings it's a similar technique to playing harmonics and if you ease up on the muting or if you use only one finger you generally do get a harmonic like that so if I continue to put down more force I'll get a full fretted note pull off a touch there's the harmonic use the whole hand get the mute okay we can play them on any string so we can play them on the E string a string D string a g-string and we can mute in any of the positions on the neck like here here here yeah so I can play a note in any position and then mute if I just release off the pressure and deaden the string okay now on the face of it this sounds like a useless stupid noise but if we incorporate it into a funk line you can get lines like this okay now I'll be doing a few lessons devoted to this finger style funk stuff soon enough but for now let's take a look at how we can use these muted ghost notes in our slapping so first of all let's just try to get a single muted slap as I showed you before lay your fretting hand lightly across the string and try slapping the e string you'll get the same doll foot sound as we did with the finger style but with a little bit more attack now try with the a string the D string and the g string okay now let's try alternating between an open string and a muted note with this rhythm okay so we'll go through the E string the a string and the D string and the g string okay so now let's try using two muted notes with this rhythm a string D string we can speed up that exercise to give us a little bit of a thumb workout and it also helps a little bit with the independence okay so each string a string D string g string okay now let's try the following riff that alternates between slaps and mutes so you'll have to work a little bit with the fretting hand to keep control over the note length and the muting so first we'll try with a see here third fret on the a-string okay at full speed so you'll see that the slapping thumb is striking the string on beats two and four as well as the other little mute that our accent in the phrase this is to kind of give that snare drum feel on two and four so you'll you'll see what I mean it's populated again so okay you'll also notice that I'm choking the string with this fretting hand on beat on between the notes on beat three to make those notes a little bit shorter so here's the riff again so that see how the fingers are coming down so we have a kind of flap in action there so let's try that riff through a chord progression so we'll use C for two bars then F then G ok so C two three four C F gee so practice that riff until you feel natural with the muting and the choking of the notes so here I'll try it a little bit quicker just as a demonstration so far we've only muted while holding down a note with the first finger and muting with the rest of the hand but we can mute with any finger while fretting with any finger so here's an exercise going through each finger both fretting and muting so we'll start at the C 3rd fret on the a-string and slap the note then lift the finger just enough to get a muted note then move to the second finger C sharp fretted note mute now try the D fifth fret on the a string with the third finger fretted note mute then we are up to the E flat or D sharp put the fourth finger so fretted note then mute and then we just come back down third finger on the D c-sharp on the second finger we're back so the whole exercise okay this can be done on any string so here we are starting on the G there on the E string third fret exactly the same pattern as we did with the a string okay so we have G G sharp a a shout a C sharp G okay we can also try this on the d-string so we'll start on the F here third fret again on the D string and f-sharp G g-sharp G f-sharp and now let's add another mute into this exercise so again the same exercise from the C third fret on the a string with two mutes okay and slow okay play this exercise slowly and gradually speed up we're not just aiming for high speed instead we're aiming for control at every speed from slow through to fast again we can play the exercise on any string so here it is on the site and on the G on the E string okay now let's incorporate these muted notes into a full two bar bass line this line is going to start on D and it goes like this two three four as always the music and tab is available to download so make sure you have a look through the PDF as well okay so we're going to start with the D on on the a string there with the fourth finger and it's a pickup into the bar so if the count off would be one two three four okay so one two three four okay so the notes without any of the mutes of ghost notes are going to be D with the fourth finger then we're going to play F sharp on the E string second fret G third fret on the E string G sharp or a flat on the fourth finger fourth fret of the E string and then the a with the fourth finger on the E string so so the notes G f-sharp G g-sharp a then we're going to come up onto the a string and play the second fret third fret fourth fret and then we're back to the D so we've got second fret of B third fret the C fourth fret the c-sharp and that's with the fingers one two three and then we're back to four so the fingering pattern is always four one two three four one two three four so it's quite a straightforward pattern ok so now let's add the mutes so we want to mute after the f-sharp so okay and there's one mute between the GGG and the G sharp and the a okay so that's the first bass or go round around that first bar two three four two three four okay and then we just rise up from the air with the same mutant pattern okay so we've got the a then we've got the two mute to the B then one mute to the C one new to the C sharp and we're back to the team okay and full speed okay so there's two ways to play this you can either play all with the first finger and then just using the rest of the fingers to mute or can use fourth finger and then first finger second finger third finger so each finger in isolation okay now let's try adding a pop into the equation so here's a riff where we use mute between slaps and pops of a single octave pan so you want to fret the octave here the C octave so we've got the third fret on the a string there C and the fifth fret on the g string and you want to fret that with the first finger and the fourth finger okay so we're going to play the C down here the low C then we're gonna have two mutes and then the octave okay so that's the action and back down to the sea so very slow okay I'll go even slower okay so I'm using these two fingers the second finger and the third finger really to mute well while I'm prepared for the fourth finger upon the octave so so I'm kind of lying my fingers across the strings as I do this and that fourth thing is they're ready for the octave okay so I'll speed it up a little and at full speed and then for the second part of the phrase we're just going to go for the two mute and the octave so it's the same phrase but just without the lower seat so slow okay once you can play the riff using the C octave pattern on the a in the g string you can move down to the F and the G with the octaves on the E and the D string to give us this complete progression now we can try a little quicker movement between the slaps and the pops many slap riffs use this kind of in out movement with the hand to get a consistent semi quiver or sixteenth note rhythm and it's similar to how font guitarists keep that strumming motion going and it sounds something like this so you can see there that my slapping and just kept a consistent slap pop rhythm going while alternating ghost notes and fully fretted notes so first of all let's just nail this motion just lay your hand across the strings and mute the a and the D string and play the rhythm using a slap pop slap pop motion okay now try the E and D string even though more slapping is done from the wrist this action can incorporate the in/out action of the forearm it can help as we build up speed like this so if I was to just use my wrists for that the forearm starts to come into play so now let's move between the a and the g string and the E and the D string as follows and a little quicker now let's try that same motion but using full fretted notes so we'll use a C octave here from the third third fret on the a string fifth fret on the g string okay okay and now on the E and the D string so we've got the G octave bear now we'll try that same pattern but we'll mute the slapped note so again with the C octave here 3rd and 5th frets on the E and the g string so there's the muted slap let's slow little quicker little quicker fast okay now we'll try the same pattern again but this time with the G octave on the E and the D string mute it again little quicker fast don't worry about getting too fast at the minute just concentrate on nailing the muting with the fretting hand and the in/out motion of the slap now we've got that technique under our fingers let's try this following rip so let's try through that first bar so we've got the C octave here with the first finger and fourth finger on the g string so we've got fretted note on the C and then we've got the slap at the muted slap and then the pop-up at the top just as we were doing with the previous riff so so really slow now after that that we've got to mute a slap and a pop so that slow would babe so we for that we're laying the hand completely across the neck and when I do this I'm going to move down so that I'm ready for this b-flat down here with the first fret so okay see how I'm moving down to here then we've got B flat first fret to the C so be flop with the first finger see there third fret with the fourth finger slow little quick up little quicker okay and on the fourth beat I sometimes put this this muting just to keep time so okay for the second bar we have a very similar riff but it's extended with the mute and two octaves coming up so here it is full speed okay so same again so we've got the octave C slap muted slapping pops up and then we've got four muted slap pops so okay and then we're going to move down to the B flat where the octave then the B second fret octave so we've got okay so the whole riff is as follows so we'll start off slow and build up speed a little quicker full speed now if you refine of any of fleas earlier work with the Red Hot Chili Peppers try speeding this riff up really fast and you'll get that fresh funk kind of feel so that's the basics of muted or ghost notes for slapping I'll be releasing new technique lessons every week so subscribe to the YouTube channel and visit token-based net for loads more lessons articles and downloads you can also find me on Facebook and Twitter just follow me from the links on token-based net okay see you later

Channel: TalkingBass - Online Bass Lessons

Views: 232,291

Rating: 4.9586325 out of 5

Keywords: Slapping, slap bass, Bass Guitar (Musical Instrument), marcus miller, mark king, flea, stu hamm, Larry Graham (Musical Artist), Fender Jazz Bass (Product Line), thumb technique, bass technique, slap and pop, Sly & The Family Stone (Musical Group), Red Hot Chili Peppers (Musical Group), Ghost Note, Funk (Musical Genre), Bass (Musical Instrument)

Id: XqbxybR6Q6Y

Length: 23min 14sec (1394 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 09 2014