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On October 11, 1939, Coleman Hawkins took his band into a New York studio to make records for RCA’s Bluebird label.
He’d spent most of the past five years playing in Europe. While he was gone, the attention back home had shifted to other tenor players, like Lester Young, Ben Webster and Chu Berry.
One of the tunes was “Body and Soul.” A ballad everybody already knew, and one he’d been playing in a New York club. It was recorded almost as an afterthought.
Then he barely played it.
A hit record with almost no melody
You get a few bars of the melody at the top, and after that he’s gone. Two choruses of improvising, straight through the chords, and he never goes back to remind you how the song goes. By any sensible record-company math it should’ve sunk without a trace: a jazz ballad with the tune missing, recorded on a spur-of-the-moment decision.
It became a hit. Hawkins put it like this: “It’s the first and only record I ever heard of that all the squares dig as well as the jazz people.”
It’s still one of the landmark jazz records, and players have been taking it apart for more than 80 years.
Here’s what makes it work. You never get lost listening to it. Instead of running scales at you, Hawkins keeps leaning on the notes that make each chord sound like that chord, so even with the melody gone, your ear always knows where it is in the song. The harmony does the singing.
What happens when the walking stops
That record is worth thinking about if you play electric and freeze on solos.
Most of us learned to find our place the other way, with time. Root on one, walk to the next chord, lock in with the drummer, and you always know where you are because the quarter notes keep telling you. That’s a great way to play a bass line, and it’s exactly what the band needs from you for eleven choruses.
Then the horn player points at you, the drummer opens up, the quarter notes go away, and your map goes with them. (I get into that in how to solo on electric bass.)
A one-note drill on an F blues
Something to try tonight.
Put on a blues in F. Forget the root. In every bar, aim for the third of the chord: A on the F7, D on the B-flat 7, E on the C7. Play almost nothing else. Land on that one note, leave a lot of room around it, and record yourself.
It’ll feel too simple. You’ll also hear the changes go by, the same way you hear “Body and Soul” on a record with hardly any “Body and Soul” in it.
If you’re happy holding it down and never taking a chorus, that’s fine. You’ll still be the one everybody calls. If you want the chorus too, start with the third.
Go deeper
Jazz Soloing on Electric Bass: From the Beginning
A 5-lesson method that starts with your bass line and chisels it into a solo.
