Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Playing Bass Guitar

By Abbie Brown


In 1965 British rock group, The Who released a song called My Generation. Apart from its claim to fame as a rock anthem it also contains the most instantly recognizable bass guitar solo in rock and roll. This iconic solo by John Entwistle is typical of the bass solo modeled on similar solo breaks played on double bass and bass guitar in jazz music. This type of bass guitar solo is in the form of a question and answer sequence often found in blues music. The Who's solo also imitates jazz bass solos in that it is played without other instruments behind it. In jazz such solos are played unaccompanied because other instruments tend to drown out the bass.

Generally there are already many bass solos integrated within rock, funk along with jazz however just in pop songs has the bass guitar solo stood alone being a piece involving tunes. The particular initial pop musician inside England to be able to own and perform a good power bass guitar was Jet Harris. He observed fame along with fortune with The Shadows, Cliff Richard's backing group who had been trying to generate their particular approach throughout pop songs being a singing along with instrumental group. Harris played around the band's first instrumental hits featuring the lead guitar regarding Hank Marvin however decided in order to try to make the idea as being a soloist similar to America's Duane Eddy.

Jet Harris' initial huge reach as a solo guitarist was throughout 1962 with his or her rendition with the 1940 song Besame Mucho. The throbbing paperwork in the six string bass turned any poignant really like song into an instrumental work full regarding menace. Almost certainly inspired by simply their particular former band member's accomplishment, The actual Shadows released yet another six string bass solo named Stingray as a single throughout 1965.

Meanwhile within America in 1963 the young composer and also arranger called Jack Nitzsche developed a lush orchestral single referred to as the Lonely Surfer. Your orchestra ended up being basically the actual backdrop to get a basic melody played around the bass guitar. The actual Lonely Surfer never climbed larger when compared with number thirty-nine about the charts, nevertheless which is pretty great for a bass guitar solo!

These days the bass guitar is an important part of any band. It was actually born in the nineteen thirties but met with very little success until it was adopted by the early rock and roll groups of the nineteen fifties. The bass guitar is of course descended from the double bass which has always been a solo instrument in orchestral music and was often used for solo work in jazz.




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