tonight's (ALL: electric bass) four eclectic set lists (6 - 10 PM)

[bloke]

Much of this is new to/for me.
Of course, I've heard all these tunes zillions of times, but never played many of the non-jazz

pop, rock, funk, disco

tunes before...

...and the arrangements of EVERY tune is very specific, because we're always playing along with an enhancement track...as there are only four of us
(trumpet/keyboard, trumpet, female singer - superb, electric bass)...so I'm wearing earbug (or probably my new Sony headphones as earbuds ALWAYS fall out of my ears, and - with electric bass - I don't have to play in tune...I just have to PLAY).

[BopEuph]

The lucky thing is, 95% of these basslines are simple, and you can follow along with lead sheets and making mental notes when to jump back to verse/bridge when reading down. The tricky one is Sir Duke, though it's just a fast pentatonic riff (in B originally, but I usually end up playing it in Bb).

Earbuds fall out of my ears, too. I suppose one of these days I'll get customs, but my $50 Chinese Amazon brand has been doing very good...though it still works its way out, albeit slowly; so I just shove them back in farther when I'm not playing. The look on these types of gigs is just as important as how well you play (depending on bandleader and client), and I always feel goofy wearing cans on a gig, even if that's what was provided. Though I've only seen provided cans on cruise gigs in my 25 years of gigging, which I'm sure has moved to requiring your own earbuds by now.

[bloke]

debriefing

First of all...Sir Duke isn't really difficult...I suppose it's because (though I never played it with any combo - back when I was playing bass) I worked out the riff (when waiting for a gig to start - unplugged, obviously). I was rusty at it, but it came back (B-major...but keys don't make a damn bit of difference on stringed instruments - whereby all the strings are tuned apart at the same interval...as long as one stays away from first position). The easiest part of it (assuming one doesn't screw up the shifts) is the highest part - up around the 13th fret...The frets are close together, the notes are slower and the fingerings are very easy.

The one that's "hard" for me is "I want you back" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2bVIBwpCTA because it's relentless...The bass player (in a small combo) has to cover that trombone lick - over-and-over-and-over-and-over-and-over ad infinitum. There's a quick shift involved, and (of course) that shift has to occur every...single...time. There's also the issue of "concentration"... (it's MUCH longer than it was on this Ed Sullivan Show appearance). Also (and I wish it wasn't), I believe we're playing it a little faster than the record.

Of the "pop" stuff, this Cyrus tune (along with the one Swift tune we did) were the easiest...There's no harmonic substance, and both rely (100%) on the vocalist...and our vocalist is quite capable. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M11SvDtPBhA

Packing up my stuff (and thinking about all the little things I screwed up), some of these bass charts roadmaps are wild (and I don't believe they were written out by the bandleader to be read, but - rather - to be "learned"...and (based on how I have to budget my time) I'm just going to have to look them over a day before each of these jobs (as the set lists and rep change for every job), and do my best (with my 70-year-old brain) to remember where (back on page 1 of 3) the "chorus #1" is (ex: Where it says "play chorus #1 two more times, go to the bridge, play half the bridge, and then jump down to the outro and play this rhythm - written in pencil, rhythm only - no notes - as the last bar" - etc.)

He DID help me out a BUNCH before last night's gig and - several of the tunes (whereby it was just typed lyrics and chord changes approximately over the words) - he spent some time before the gig and penciled in most of the bar lines for me.

I do best on the tunes whereby
- the bass parts are written out (100%) in notes in the bass clef
and
- the bass parts which are simply a piece of paper with the name of the tune and the key

One thing we did was (Chicago) Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?. It's one whereby (bass chart) every single note to be played is written out (and even in the string bass octave). Pretty much (though I'd not played it before, and had only HEARD it a zillion times) I read that one flawlessly, including the 5/8 time section (which - truth be told - is probably the least "busy" section for the bass.)

ALL of these tunes have "enhancement tracks" with them (amazing guy...He created ALL of them himself ). I've been struggling with earbuds...but (I believe I'll need some customized $$$ earbuds, because ALL earbuds fall out of my ears) I brought the (remember me bragging about picking these up cheap?) the new-to-me Sony 7506 headphones to use instead. These are "over-ear", which (again) makes me (again) wish that I had some replacement hangers (which are both broken) for my 7502 Sony headphones (which are the open-air type). Those replacement hangers are no longer made...and I keep trying to find a "parts only" 7502 on eBay.

He also DID pass off a really nice compliment.
(He plays trumpet, keyboard, and sings some - mostly: left to the female vocalist - on these gigs, but he also plays bass.)
While we were packing up, he said something to the effect...
"As a bass player, a lot of the things you play (ie. when we're not playing pop/disco/rock/etc., and it's up to me to supply my own bass lines) really make me grin."
I suspect (??) he's referring to the fact that (with the combo being so small) that - WHEN I CAN - I'll work in missing harmony lines (that people expect to hear - associated with the melodies), YET I'll strive to work them in IN THE FORM OF bass lines. I also strive to add some variety in my bass lines, yet WITHOUT screwing up the harmonic structure and/or implied inversions (etc...as maybe you've read by posts about - back in the early 1980's, in a series of gigs - being sternly "schooled" by Sidney Chilton, jazz pianist - father of Alex Chilton of the band, The Boxtops - re: not just playing any ol' damn walking bass line "just because its in the chord change".) Finally (just as there are MANY really nice "substitute chords") there are SOME (not as many) substitute bass notes which sound really nice (when used appropriately) and add a bit of sophistication to the harmonic structure...and (whoduh thunk it? ) I know of a few of these.

Anyway...
I'm playing electric bass again.
(I know longer own an upright - neither the 5-string Kay that I sold, nor the Korean "stick bass" that I had in the past, and have NO plans to re-acquire similar axes.)
The 12" Polytone MiniBrute bass amp - which I specifically bought to follow me around all over the west coast of the US, as well as all over western Europe (bought new in 1982 - Dixieland Revival Era II, and which @tadawson helped me self-rehab) worked like a champ (was totally useless when I first pulled it out), and (though only a 12-inch speaker - though with a HUGE magnet - driven by only 80 watts) offered PLENTY of sound (only turned up to 7-1/2 or so...and that's with a good big of treble dampening (which reduces EFFECTIVE volume, as do my flat-wound strings).

I need to keep up the tuba playing...I quit an orchestra (simply didn't sign nor return this year's contract...), but others are calling. I have one of those (truly) fun John Williams movie-tunes concerts booked soon. Of course, there's Easter, some dixie jobs, et al.

[humBell]

Have fun! (er... hope you hade fun? or rather have fun with the next one!)

I got a 5 string bass from a tubaforum person in the dawn of my tubeneting and have pulled it out for pit parts in recent years. 5th string (low b) is a gratuitous pleasure. i hade decided if i ever looked for a new upright, i'd try to find one. Not withstanding a new upright fell in my lap after a fashion without that 5th string.

I never made any effort at rigorous fingering breakdown, and loosely blame frets for that. And the odd change of scale, and arm angle, make translating hand position from upright to guitar really weird, to say the least.

[bloke]

Mine is a 4-string "Jazz" Fender bass (strings closer together than "Precision" Fender and many other makes' styles and geometry).
When I play wide-spaced strings electric basses, I immediately notice the extra work involved (more left-hand finger motion).

I actually had a conversion kit (years-and-years ago) which cleverly converted a (genuine USA-made Fender) Precision bass that I had bought from 4-string to 5-string WITHOUT drilling ANY new holes and WITHOUT any other type of defacement. (I later returned it to stock and sold it.)

The thing that I never liked about 5-string was reaching PAST that rarely-used string to play on the strings which I DO use all the time.
Further (as most all of my electric bass playing was in small combos...no jazz "big bands" nor "heavy metal"' nor "black gospel"), whenever I explored the very low range of the 5th string, it nearly always (much past low E-flat or D - as with the tuba) seemed a (pun intended) "bridge too far" (range-wise) to be appropriate for those small combos.

"or it didn't happen" pics:

This was a heated patio. (gig started c. 60 degrees, and ended up - were it not for the enclosure plastic curtains - c. 46 degrees, but - with the enclosure curtains, de facto ended up about 68 degrees.)

The restaurant and it's bar were jam-packed (inside) and - by the time we started - this patio was jam-packed as well.
I'd estimate the average waiter/waitress foot pace @ 10 mph.

...Someone walked up (during set #2 of 4) and told us that the singer was just fine, but that "air thing" (trumpet) was too loud.

The bass is "stock" (other than those 60's - 70's vintage chromed cover plates removed and stored in the case), and the only set-up work (I don't trust others to adjust the neck NOR the bridge NOR the string guide) was done by me. (OK...I DID replace the bridge height adjustment screws with some same-thread screws with actual heads on them, and I ground points on them - to imitate the originals.) It celebrated its 50th birthday a couple of years ago.




I have a 1990's Peavey bass amp (BW 15" speaker, considerably more wattage, slight 60c hum...a friend is in the process of replacing the capacitor cluster) with casters (heavy), which offers a slightly more "full" sound, and (obviously) more potential volume.

I also have a 1970's TUBE Ampex Portaflex (works well) which needs to be sold to someone who will use it - such as a recording studio.

[BopEuph]

Yeah, Sir Duke isn't hard once you work out the soli lick. The rest of the original bassline is simple with some VERY tasty fills. I missed I Want You Back in that list. That took some sheddin, too, though I use a lot of hammer-ons/slurs to keep the pocket and not get tired. I love playing that bassline, though.

I have a Mini Brute with a 15". It's the amp I've had the longest, and really dig how simple it is and sounds great. I recently got a tiny Eden practice amp that I prefer to drag around, but if the gain/master volume knobs get jostled just right, I have to play with them again to fix the resultant overdrive. I've never seen a combo amp have the option to overdrive your signal.

That conversion kit seems weird, and it's just easier to have a cheap 5-er. I prefer my 4 string basses, but the 5-string is required on some church and Broadway shows. I'm just a little more clumsy on it, but I'm really not a fan of the lack of "punch" on the B-string. But the way an MD explained it, is that because the bass and left hand piano regularly double each other, you need the B string to get almost as low as a piano can, rather than bailing out at the octave. I bought a first generation Sire Marcus Miller bass that was nearly $200 cheaper from Thomann than the US distributor, and their store brand $30 gig bags outperform a $150 Road Runner in every metric.

One of my favorite (of my many) basses is a '57 reissue Precision with a Geddy Lee jazz neck (which is probably the same specs as your vintage jazz bass, but much thinner). I've had extended access to Duck Dunn's '58, and it feels exactly like it. Flat wound strings are so nice for 60s-70s music, and are almost impossible to mix poorly--they can almost never be too loud, and you ever really need to barely touch the EQ with them. The jazz bass can get too punchy and stick out too much if you've got an inexperienced sound guy. But I do have an all-stock Geddy Lee Jazz bass that plays wonderfully; it's just a bit heavy and I don't care to play it on long gigs.

As for charts, if you ever want, I have hundreds of personally-transcribed charts in these genres so that I can turn my brain off on the gig if I so choose. I loathe vocal/chord charts myself. Alternately, iReal Pro has pretty much all of the songs in your list, but they're just chord charts, and you have to download the songs from their community forums due to copyright laws. My favorite thing about iReal is that transposition is super easy if the band wants to play in an odd key, and they're surprisingly legible on your phone if you don't have a tablet.

That gig sounds like a blast! I prefer stage shows over F&B style shows, because stage shows are usually shorter, less hassle, paid way better, and you're usually better treated. Though that gig sounds like the ideal restaurant gig.

By the way, if you ever wanted to mic up your tuba, the Polytone sounds great with it. I usually simply gaff tape an SM56 inside the bell, just below the flare. You'll just also need a good preamp that accepts/converts XLR to TS.

[bloke]

I built a heavy-duty adjustable aluminum rig (adjusts from 14" to 26") which supports a bass drum kick mic. I just duct-tape on a wireless.

I blow the sousaphone through the Peavey with the Black Widow...(if I really need that much sound}...and (again) right now, a friend is replacing the capacitors on that amp.

[MN_TimTuba]

I like that set list, Joe.
My little folk/country/gospel/old rock trio has done several of them, but we lean more heavily into Gordon Lightfoot, CCR, Linda Ronstadt, Willie Nelson,
Roger Miller, Kris Kristopherson, the Everly Brothers, Peter Paul and Mary, etc. Our rhythm guitar player is very good and has a rich alto voice, which makes it easy for me (bass/baritone) to sing high harmony with her when Im not singing lead. I used to take my 12 string, but now just play my Epiphone Rivoli bass. Our keyboard player is new to our style of music, but he's learning to pick up the fills and intros. We just use chord charts with lyrics. Hoping to add a lead guitar and a drummer soon. It's not tuba, but it's music I love to play and sing!
Tim

[bloke]

I like that set list, Joe.
My little folk/country/gospel/old rock trio has done several of them, but we lean more heavily into Gordon Lightfoot, CCR, Linda Ronstadt, Willie Nelson,
Roger Miller, Kris Kristopherson, the Everly Brothers, Peter Paul and Mary, etc. Our rhythm guitar player is very good and has a rich alto voice, which makes it easy for me (bass/baritone) to sing high harmony with her when Im not singing lead. I used to take my 12 string, but now just play my Epiphone Rivoli bass. Our keyboard player is new to our style of music, but he's learning to pick up the fills and intros. We just use chord charts with lyrics. Hoping to add a lead guitar and a drummer soon. It's not tuba, but it's music I love to play and sing!
Tim

I've never been in a regular combo before with just three instrumentalists,
- a sometimes keyboard sometimes trumpet
- a drummer
- a bass player
... and one very good singer
There are lots of tunes that I would choose to play over some of these, but I'm not the bandleader and I'm not the singer. Hell, I'm not even good lookin'. ...so I'm glad to just be playing.
People don't pay anything for live entertainment anymore (I certainly don't), which I'm sure is why he created all these enhancement tracks, as it's such a minimal combo. One time, we had an additional 50/50 keyboard/guitar player who is very good, but the only people that paid enough to bring that fellow in was one of those ballroom dancing clubs... and most months they just dance to recordings.
I'm glad I grew up when I did. That said..
(and it takes too long to explain this, but) I really wish I had been born in 1937.

[BopEuph]

Which Peavey do you have? I'm guessing a TKO.

The T-Max was a dream amp of mine back in college, and now that they're dirt cheap, I don't see the need to buy a 30lb amp head when Class D is just as powerful and can be lighter than your bass now.

[bloke]

Which Peavey do you have? I'm guessing a TKO.

The T-Max was a dream amp of mine back in college, and now that they're dirt cheap, I don't see the need to buy a 30lb amp head when Class D is just as powerful and can be lighter than your bass now.

TNT BW
It's heavy but I already own it and I don't feel like shelling out money on more gear. It's been sitting for decades. I got all the pots clean, so that problem is solved. I found four identical casters on eBay and replaced the broken casters (and the old ones that haven't broken yet) for $10.
It's got a little bit of 60 cycle hum buzz, and I'm bartering trumpet repairs with a friend who is currently replacing all of the capacitors.

I don't imagine I'll need this much power very often at all.

If I need ridiculous power, I have a Woodson PA system (all the same guts and speakers as Kustom and Kasino... Those two brands having been assembled in Kansas and Woodson having been assembled in Missouri) with upwards of 300W and two towers with each have four 12-in speakers in them.
If you turn it up much above 3, it will run you out of the house, then consider that our house has 23 ft high ceilings. When I've been asked to play solos with bands, orchestras, with brass choirs, or even with pianos, I've played the accompaniment through that thing at realistic full volume, so my chops are then capable of balancing with the accompaniment when it comes time to actually do the thing.

Being really vintage, the Woodson has the old mechanical reverb. I haven't cleaned the pots on it, but they're not so bad that I can't work around the dirt corrosion.

Again, I need to sell my early 70s Ampeg Portaflex.

[bloke]

A person here on tubaforum posted this on facebook.

Follow the form (EXCEPT, imagine each of the roadmap points ALSO featuring a couple of sentences of explanatory words), and you'll get an idea of SOME of the charts that I have to read (though they are 4 minutes long, and feature MORE of these sorts of things).

I love this guy, there's not a kinder person anywhere, and he's VERY talented...but some of these charts are pretty wild (and without bar lines...just words, and chord changes...even though some of them (being pop arrangements) require that very specific funky bass lines be played.

many of these tunes:
I'd rather not look at a chart, but - as there are tracks to play along with (and with their own specific intros and tags) I'm stuck with the charts.

[BopEuph]

Those kinds of charts are amazing, especially when you have a less-than-understanding bandleader who handed you a chart like that and says some BS like "a real professional musician can sightread that perfectly." Bonus: the bandleader can't read.

My favorite are in salsa bands. They'll hand you the book, and it's always a thing that the whole book was handwritten by the last player in that spot, as each musician is personally responsible to write out their own parts. So, road maps don't line up, and forget about measure numbers. You're even lucky if whomever wrote the chart noted where the cuerpo/coro/mambo/montuno/etc. are for reading and rehearsal's sake...and if they ARE notated, you hope they're labeled correctly.

Did an initial rehearsal with a garage salsa band many years ago. I was new to Orlando, and a friend called me to play a gig with this band on lead bone. One of the charts we read did not have a mambo written out for the two trombones (the only horns in the band), so I told my buddy to follow my lead and improvised one on the spot. The rhythm section stopped, and lectured me on how that wasn't the mambo of the song, and fired me for "not being able to read." They called me a gringo in conversation between the group of them, and told me to come to some of their gigs as a spectator if I want to be considered again in the future. I told them I'm probably the only guy in the room that's played with noted salseros as I walked out, to which my buddy on bone 2 laughed because he knew I was in the right and that I wouldn't have trouble finding more work, even in salsa.

And once on a cruise ship gig, I had to sightread a big band arrangement of Blue Moon. The written bassline and the chord symbols above were in two completely different keys. I picked one of the two and played the 50/50 game and lost. The bandleader, a sax player, said "well there's nothing wrong with my part, so you must be in the wrong. Either way, a professional musician should be able to look at a chart and figure out the mistakes on it before playing the first note!" This wasn't even a situation where someone penciled in the wrong chords above the bassline. It was a Finale engraved chart--Dave Wolpe arranged the chart and farmed out the copywork, which he told me years later that copyist caused him to NEVER hire out work again.

[bloke]

I'm dealing with this stuff, but I could deal with it more effectively with fewer sudden zigzags and fewer "go back and play half of this, and then jump up to here" types of things.

Of course, the more I play some of these tunes, the more my ear takes over.

I'm not getting all bent out of shape. I'm doing these jobs because it's learning experience. If we stop learning, we stop living...
.... and I really like these people.

On the (for the lack of a better term) "generic" standards, I'm playing more complicated bass lines than (slightly breaking my own rules) I would ever otherwise do... not enough to be a jerk and with the volume turned down a little bit - the purpose being to fill out the harmonic hollowness of the small group, and it's resulting in smiles, rather than glares.
(Perhaps an example: 12/8 tunes like "Blue Moon" might feature a good number of eighth notes and maybe even a couple of pairs of 16th notes - possibly even 16th note triplets - in a pattern that I might establish - to cover more chord tones...but - of course - the ~time~ has to remain solid...sort of a "guitarish" bass pattern...)

volume level:
I did notice that this little 12-inch 44-year-old Polytone amp of mine was capable of being turned up too loud for the venue - and without distorting, which was gratifying, because it means that it has plenty of sound and plenty of power for most any gig that we would play, and that I can stick with this small equipment for nearly every job. (Using it at home, I feel like it's lost a very slight amount of power since it was brand new...but it might just be the combination of the flat round strings, and my change in personal taste of tonal contour knob adjustments, contrasted between when I was in my mid-twenties and now.)

playing with a pick:
I definitely think it would add some of the proper type of color for some of the more country type tunes which are slated. That said, my background is nylon string guitar playing, and I really don't possess very good skills with a pick. (I do okay with single stroke picking, but I'm sucking at back-and-forth - though fast picking is really not required very often with bass playing). I'm going to need to work on that...though no one's pressuring me to use one, and nor has anyone even mentioned it.

TUBA PLAYING AND TUBA PLAYERS
I personally view electric bass playing as a much more practical double than euphonium or bass trombone (and an adequate/usable bass rig can be picked up for about 1/10 - ?? - of the price of a good euphonium or a good bass trombone). One could claim that electric bass playing has little to do with tuba playing, but it actually has everything to do with it, as it's a bass instrument. Both the tuba and the bass guitar require the use of the fingers. Far more often, the bass player is going to have to create their own (so-called) "notes", which defines that it tremendously enhances one's tuba playing skills.
Back before bass guitars had ever become a thing, every working tuba player was expected to be able to play the upright bass, and every working upright bass player was expected to be able to play the tuba. Many of them also played bass saxophone, as well as piano. Circling back to euphonium and bass trombone, any town of any size has several people who are good bass trombonists and who own a bass trombones, and - needless to say - every town of any size features a flock of euphonium players that's about as large as a typical flock of blackbirds. Yes there are a lot of electric bass players too, but (mostly consisting of "people who own bass guitars") not that many who can read, play without charts or with minimal charts (bass clef, string bass octave clef, sometimes treble clef, and - of course - lead sheets), play with good time (drummers LOVE this, and - particularly - drummers who themselves don't keep particularly good time love this), and supply a good feel.

[BopEuph]

TUBA PLAYING AND TUBA PLAYERS
I personally view electric bass playing as a much more practical double than euphonium or bass trombone (and an adequate/usable bass rig can be picked up for about 1/10 - ?? - of the price of a good euphonium or a good bass trombone). One could claim that electric bass playing has little to do with tuba playing, but it actually has everything to do with it, as it's a bass instrument. Both the tuba and the bass guitar require the use of the fingers. Far more often, the bass player is going to have to create their own (so-called) "notes", which defines that it tremendously enhances one's tuba playing skills.
Back before bass guitars had ever become a thing, every working tuba player was expected to be able to play the upright bass, and every working upright bass player was expected to be able to play the tuba. Many of them also played bass saxophone, as well as piano. Circling back to euphonium and bass trombone, any town of any size has several people who are good bass trombonists and who own a bass trombones, and - needless to say - every town of any size features a flock of euphonium players that's about as large as a typical flock of blackbirds. Yes there are a lot of electric bass players too, but (mostly consisting of "people who own bass guitars") not that many who can read, play without charts or with minimal charts (bass clef, string bass octave clef, sometimes treble clef, and - of course - lead sheets), play with good time (drummers LOVE this, and - particularly - drummers who themselves don't keep particularly good time love this), and supply a good feel.

When I first moved to Orlando, I gave one of the top jazz bassists a call to talk about breaking into the scene. I told him I'm a bass/euphonium player who graduated with degrees on both instruments and wanted some advice. He said, "bass and euphonium? Well, then, my advice is to buy a tuba and start working your chops up on it. You'll get way more gigs." Boy, was he right. When my Willson was stolen, I didn't spend the insurance check on another euphonium. I miss it dearly, but a (then) $6500 instrument that I've made $500 in the decade that I owned it vs. a $1000 (now maybe $3500) upright bass that's put a roof over my head made no sense to me.

[humBell]

....

The S sign under the staff threw me...

[bloke]

LOL...
This is page 2 of a typical chart that I'm handed to READ on these gigs:

ACTUALLY, this one is considerably easier to interpret than quite a few of them...though "chorus" and "verse" (back on page 1) aren't all that clearly marked, as to where they start and stop.

[Schlitzz]

You chaps gonna play Country Roads?

[bloke]

The bandleader texted this to me, this morning:

[bloke]

This is a promo hour-long demo recording of this little combo from a year ago (before I was pulled into it).
I'm thinking it may have been viewed on one of those local cable channels (??).
The bandleader was covering bass/trumpet/flugal/keyboard/harmony vocals.
(I've used his bass, its a fairly expensive Japanese Fender, but the neck needs adjusting...so he's working pretty hard when he's playing the bass.)

With me on bass and tuba, he's freed up to play more keyboard and trumpets, the guitar/keyboard guy can play more sax solos, and - with the tuba - he can add in more dixie, and other stuff whereby the tuba fits better than bass.

The bandleader's oldest daughter is the band's vocalist.




("Hub City" is the nickname for Jackson, Tennessee, originating from its history as a railroad center located
between Memphis and Nashville. Key locations often referred to as "The Hub" or "Hub City" include the downtown brewery, a flea market, and a church.)