If you’ve tried the Jimmy Garrison A Love Supreme bass intro on “Resolution,” you know it’s hard. It’s also a mind-blowing open bass intro, and the right fingering makes it a lot easier on your hand.
A Love Supreme is John Coltrane’s devotional album, made with respect and love to the higher power he credited for most of his work. Coltrane recorded it with his quartet: McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison and Elvin Jones. To me it’s the greatest album ever made. “Resolution” is the second part of the suite, and it opens with Garrison on that open bass intro. Let’s break it down.
The Resolution bass intro is all fourths
The thing that makes this intro so crazy is that it’s all fourths. Of course, the bass is tuned in fourths. That doesn’t make fourths particularly easy to play.
The first four bars are already a lot, and they’re really hard to do. So the first question is which finger you bar with.
Bar with your second finger, not your first
If you’re playing this at home, here’s what I’d encourage you to do: don’t bar with the first finger. Bar with the second finger.
If you bar with the first finger, you have to scrunch everything up, and that causes a lot of pain. If you bar with the second finger, you have support from both sides of your hand. It’s actually easier.
You can hear on the record that Jimmy Garrison is barring with the second finger. Then, when he gets to the C and F in the third bar, you can hear him go to the fourth finger.
Now, if you find it more comfortable to bar with the first finger, go ahead and do that. I don’t care how you play this. I’m just showing you how I do it to make it easier on me. I find it much easier with the second finger, but whatever works for you. Maybe your first finger is much stronger than mine.
The next four bars look like chaos
Then the next four bars are insane. You know the meme about what a new piece of music looks like the first time you see it? That’s what this looks like to me. It’s chaos.
I’m sure he had some ideas before he went into the studio. But just the fact that he’d have the guts, the chutzpah, to record something like this is unbelievable. I’d 100% not have the guts to do something like that.
He’s about to go in the studio with John Coltrane and record what most people consider to be the greatest album ever made, and this is what he plays.
Cole Davis
So how is he actually doing it? As much as I don’t love the Simandl fingerings for jazz, this is an exception. He’s getting that strength by using the second finger and the fourth finger on the half steps. If you tried to do this with your third finger, your hand would fall off. There are a few ways you can play this passage, but that’s probably the best one.
If second finger, fourth finger on a half step still feels foreign in your hand, have a look at The New Simandl.
The third line is as intense as any rock bass line
The third line is intense stuff. I had to practice it for something like 30 minutes before I got it down.
Listen to the skips. That’s where you can tell he’s using his second finger, because you get more power and more support from that finger. I actually use my third finger in part of this line. You can do that too. Whatever works.
This line is as intense, if not more intense, than any rock bass line. And I love rock music. But this is another level. I feel like the four of them were on a spiritual plane for the whole recording session.
Then the last line is just phenomenal. It’s very difficult. I usually like to simplify things, but this is hard. Sometimes the first finger is just right there and you use it, but you do get more power from the second finger. By the end of it, I’m ready to go put my hands in pickle brine. It’s not easy to play this thing with any level of confidence.
No one compares to the great Jimmy Garrison, in terms of playing double stops and in terms of playing with power. When you look at a bass line like this and hear how beautifully and powerfully it’s played, there’s really nothing like it.
Use Garrison’s fourths in your own solos
If you ever want that kind of power, fourths are a great way to get it. Fourths and fifths. We don’t use fourths a lot in our solos. Rock bass players do it all the time. It doesn’t have to be an open solo, either. Put fourths into an improvised solo over the tune you’re playing and they can really make an impact.
Here’s a way to start today:
- Bar with the second finger. Lay your second finger across two strings at the same spot so you’re playing a fourth, and feel the support from both sides of your hand. Then try the same thing with your first finger and notice the scrunch.
- Add the half step. Practice second finger to fourth finger on a half step, the Simandl move Garrison leans on.
- Take it to an F blues. Play a solo over an F blues and put some fourths in there. Don’t save them for an open solo. Drop them into the middle of your improvised lines and listen to the impact.
Some things are beyond words, and some things can’t be reduced to the page. I’ve reduced this one to the page anyway, because it’s a beautiful open intro that isn’t really discussed enough. The transcription lesson is Jimmy Garrison on A Love Supreme, and you’ll find more lines like it on the transcriptions page.
Then put the record back on. I hope you’ll hear the bass playing on A Love Supreme with new ears.
