Somebody calls a jazz standard and you freeze. Maybe you’ve been playing for a year, maybe for 20 years. You don’t need to memorize bass lines to fix that. You need to know the tune, and you need to know where you’re going.
Quick answer
Ears, voice, instrument. Sing the melody first so it’s in your ear. At the piano, play all the notes of each phrase at once to find the chords, and check them with your voice against the recording. Then go to the bass, sing the melody while you play, and write out the first note of each bar.
Here’s how I learn a tune by ear, and how to find where your bass line is going once you know it, so you can walk through it without a chart.
How do you learn a jazz standard by ear?
I’m a little more familiar with the bass than with the piano, but I learn everything on the piano. At the piano you can play all of the notes at once, which you can’t do on bass, or on a saxophone or a trumpet. Every professional musician I’ve ever met plays some piano, because that’s how they learn tunes and train their ears.
These are the steps by which I learn songs, in this order:
- Sing the melody. First I sing it, because I want to make sure it’s in my ear.
- Find the chords at the piano. I play all the notes of each phrase at once, so I can figure out what the chords are.
- Check it against the record. I match the chords with my voice to the recording I’m learning from, so I know I’m learning the tune correctly and I have the correct chords.
- Go to the bass. Once I get to the bass, it’s easy.
Every piece of music I’ve ever learned, I’ve learned this exact way. Sometimes, if I’m transcribing a difficult solo, I’ll go straight to the bass, because I don’t have a lot of chops on piano. But what I do 100% of the time is sing it first. I transcribe with my voice first and use my instrument to reflect what I’m hearing. It’s the same order I use in how to transcribe bass by ear.
Ears, voice, instrument. Not ears, instrument.
Cole Davis
Sing the melody while you play the bass
Once I can sing the melody and I know the chords, I can play the song without even thinking about it. Then comes an exercise I do with all of my students when we learn jazz standards: singing the melody and playing the bass. I encourage every bass player to do this. If you play a little bit of electric bass, please do this too, because it will increase your knowledge of the song tremendously.
When you can play the chords, play the roots and sing the melody, you’re ready to really internalize the tune, play it on a gig and take risks with it. You can even substitute some changes, because you understand how the harmony works with the melody. In my lesson on learning a tune this way, I added a G chord because it makes sense with the key: the G resolves to the A, and it doesn’t get in the way of the melody. Then I tried a substitution that doesn’t work. I know the difference because I understand the melody and how to play the chords.
How do you walk a standard without a chart?
Now walk it. I’m always trying to figure out where I’m going in my bass lines, and sometimes, if a tune is complicated, I’ll actually write out the starting note of each chord.
Here’s how that works on the first four bars of “Have You Met Miss Jones.” I start on the F. On the second bar, the A minor 7 in the chart I use in the video above, I start on the C. Then I play a B-flat on the G minor 7, and then back to the root, C, on the C7. Once that’s decided, the bass line actually starts to reveal itself. If you want to hear what Ray Brown does on that tune, I break down his recording in Ray Brown on Have You Met Miss Jones.
By picking a direction, I’m eliminating the stress of coming up with a bass line in real time. That’s actually the first step. It’s not memorizing a bunch of stuff, because it’s very difficult to memorize bass lines, and it’s not knowing a bunch of theory that will leave you with more questions than answers. I’d go as far as to say that the licks come from the direction, not the other way around.
Fill in the rest from beat one
Once you have the direction, you can work backwards, because beat one is the most important thing. As Bootsy Collins said, everything is on the one. With beat one in place, the rest of the notes sort of fill themselves in.
Think of it as a puzzle. You’ve got four notes you can start on, the 1, 3, 5 and 7. You’re probably going to throw a third in there, and a seventh or a fifth. And as I always say, wrong notes go on beats two and four, and right notes go on beats one and three. There’s a million ways to break the rules, but those are in fact the rules. If you’ve got your 1-3-5-7 and you understand the balance of wrong notes and right notes, you’re good to go.
Wrong notes, right notes and cadences are all handy ways of getting familiar with bass lines. But none of that matters if you don’t have the destination. Establish it first, then fill in the rest, and it’ll make perfect sense.
Try this today with one standard
- Pick a tune you can sing. Sing the melody until you’re sure it’s in your ear.
- Find the chords. Play all the notes of each phrase at once on a piano or keyboard, then check the chords with your voice against the recording.
- Sing and play. Play the roots on bass while you sing the melody.
- Write the first note of each bar. Do the first eight bars, the way I do on “Have You Met Miss Jones.”
- Walk it. Land those notes on beat one and fill in the rest, with right notes on one and three and wrong notes on two and four.
Sing it, find it on the piano, play it on your instrument: that’s the method I teach in Play What You Hear, and you can repeat it on any song.
Pick one standard you love tonight, and sing the melody before you pick up the bass.
Go deeper
Play What You Hear
A six-lesson ear training method for learning songs by ear: sing it, find it on the piano, then play it on your instrument.
FAQ
Do bass players need piano to learn jazz standards?
I learn everything on the piano, because at the piano you can play all of the notes at once, which you can’t do on bass. Every professional musician I’ve ever met plays some piano, because that’s how they learn tunes and train their ears. I play all the notes of each phrase at once to figure out the chords.
Should I sing the melody while I play bass?
Yes. It’s an exercise I do with all of my students when we learn jazz standards, and I encourage every bass player to do it, including electric players. When you can play the chords, play the roots and sing the melody, your knowledge of the tune increases tremendously.
How do you start a walking line on a standard?
Pick your destinations first: write out the first note of each bar. Then work backwards from beat one, with right notes on beats one and three and wrong notes on two and four. Once the destinations are decided, the bass line starts to reveal itself.
Do you have to memorize walking bass lines for standards?
No. You don’t need to memorize lines. It’s very difficult to memorize bass lines, and a bunch of theory can leave you with more questions than answers. The first step is picking a direction for your bass line, which takes away the stress of coming up with a line in real time.
How do you pick the first note of each bar on Have You Met Miss Jones?
In the lesson, I start the first bar on F. On the second bar, the A minor 7 in my chart, I start on C. Then I play a B-flat on the G minor 7, and back to the root, C, on the C7. With those beat ones picked, the rest of the notes sort of fill themselves in.
