Creating a walking bass linePodcast #3 - Additional notes

© Copyright Darren Dutson Bromley 2012

Creating a Walking Bass Line.

Learning how to create a walking bass line from a chord sequence is an excellent way of developing knowledge of chord function, fretboard awareness and an alternative accompanying style, but most importantly, it sounds really good and will impress all your mates.

We’ll start with a very common chord sequence of Cma7, Am7, Dm7 and G7.

This is known as a I vi ii V (1-6-2-5) progression. Roman numerals are generally used when referring to chords, uppercase for major and lowercase for minor. The number describes the chords position in the key.

For example in a C major scale we have the following notes:

These notes can be harmonised by adding a note a third above and a note a fifth above.

These are called triads and when built from a major scale always follow the pattern

major - minor - minor - major - major - minor - diminished - (major)

The seventh can also be added:

Again the pattern of chords is consistent to all major scales.

major7 - minor7 - minor7 - major7 - dominant7 - minor7 - minor7b5

The roman numerals refer to where these chords occur in the scale.

Chord iii for example would give Em where as V7 would be G7. Thinking of chords this way gives you a better understanding of the general harmony of the piece and also aids in transposing to different keys.

Taking the root note of each of our chords in the sequence we arrive at a pattern which looks like this.

We can approach each of these notes from either one fret above or one fret below. This is known as a chromatic approach note and gives the line much more movement and direction.

We can now add the chords in. Try to create a feeling of independence between the bass line and the chord to help achieve the illusion of two things happening at once. The chord can be played short or held longer to create different effects.

To make the chords sound smoother and to help the harmony work better we can change the Dm7 to D7#9, this has a stronger resolve onto G7 which can be changed to G13, again for ease of fingering and also because the chord changes sound better. The reason for this will be covered in later episodes.

Our line now looks like this:

Practise this, slowly at first and ideally with a metronome. Strive for an independence between the bass line and the chords. Try and apply this technique to other songs and listen to players such as Joe Pass (the duet albums with singer Ella Fitzgerald are an excellent example of this technique) and British guitarist Martin Taylor (his solo albums show what you can do when you take the technique up a level).

See you next time.