Quick Tip for Playing Fast - Christian McBride | 2 Minute Jazz

In this video, Christian McBride talks about the real secret to playing fast bass lines. #2minutejazz #jazz #bass #tutorial #onlinelesson #openstudio #happypracticing #christian #mcbride

Six-time GRAMMY®-winning jazz bassist Christian McBride can be likened to a force of nature, fusing the fire and fury of a virtuoso with the depth and grounding of a seasoned journeyman. With a career now blazing into its third decade, the Philadelphia native has become one of the most requested, most recorded, and most respected figures in the music world today.

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(fast bass jazz music)


(scats)

Now, I'm not sure that's the kind of fast a lot of bass players ask me about. When they ask me about playing fast, they ask me about playing lines.

(fast bass jazz music)

Well, I mean, that's cool.

But, you know, it's the idea that's more important that's, than being able to actually play fast. If you're actually hearing
an idea that is fast, that's more important, that's just simply being able to do this.

A lot of bass players can do that, by the way. Just take your fingers and go like that, just:

(fast bass jazz music)

That's fast.

But when you actually have some ideas, when you can go--

(fast bass jazz music)

Comes from transcribing horn lines. Actually hearing horn
lines that interest you. Horn lines that say, "I gotta go and practice that."

The technique is there, but you gotta get the idea first. So don't worry about the speed, worry about the idea.

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[tombeyer]

So dope. C. McBride's playing on upright gave all upright players a new hope to what is possible. All the while the bottom remains intact and un-compromised.

[ayoungethan]

"Don't worry about the speeds, worry about the idea" then build your technique around the idea. Got it, thank you Mr. McBride

[Starritt_Piano]

That’s why the European classical composers are so helpful for developing ideas as well as listening and transcribing other Jazz musicians you like, I think Classical and Jazz traditions all compliment each other. For example, opera really gives me the ideas to phrase a lime in a particular way, or listen clearly to how each idea is constructed in terms of the shape of it.

[davidkodym]

I was searching for a video of finger technique to learn to play faster, to be actually able to execute more ideas, and I got this"Just take your fingers and go like that". Wow! it is much more simple then I would have ever thought:-)
.... it is 5 min later...I tried it, and it seems really simple as that. My slowness was pretty much in the thinking that I do something "more" then just "going like that" with my fingers. The brain is learning by itself to move the fingers as needed now, no manual or a lesson needed. Many mistakes happen. I is just the beginning, but it is like a crystalization, and with a little trust and lot of practice the fingers will act automaticaly without a thought and just execute the idea. It will be like driving a car, when you know it.

[subcontrabass]

walking at 300bpm just with the index finger.... lol

[bassoskat]

Such great advice, musical ideas of lasting value, not just playing fast.

Honestly...very true. After you had grab very good the idea.. you can play it fast..wow thanks 👆🏾🎶🎵

[cnrbsmth]

This man makes the upright look like a viola

[Keys_To_Clarity]

That was beautiful... this has been a big problem... was wondering why my fingers can move as fast as I want them when I'm reading music but they trip over themselves when I'm trying a fast line in a solo...

I guess I'm just running in blind... thank you...

[mikedavino]

You and Peter Martin great 2 minute jazz. Short and sweet

[robbesrh]

Absolutely so. Performing music is not a circus side show where you‘wow’ people for a short duration of time and then they move on to another exhibit and forget all about you. People who seek out live performances of music do so because they have experienced something very special and personal at live performances and they are hoping to experience that magic again. It’s an ancient ritual and the musicians are the priests who invoke the spirits of the muses. There are definitely some really exhilarating songs that have a fast tempo; Giant Steps comes to mind. _And_, there are also many medium tempo songs that will charm the shirt right off your back with the vivid colors they paint, and the gracefully articulated melodic lines that unfold like the cadences of a clever and inspired poem. Whatever you play, whether it be like a flash of lightening, or like the slow deliberate path of the moon across the night sky, it must be executed with mastery and ease; and it has to touch your audience just right. Speed will come with time and experience. Forcing it kills everything. In and of itself it amounts to very little.

At UCLA Kenny Burrell used to organize a yearly tribute to Duke Ellington. One year, Stevie Wonder calls that afternoon to say he wants to perform his song, Sir Duke, with his band at the event that evening. So I went to Royce Hall to observe whatever I might get a chance to see, like Stevie warming up his chops on the piano. But I didn’t see Stevie cause he wasn’t there for the afternoon set up. Turns out Stevie takes the stage cold. He’s so much a musician that every note from beginning to end is perfect — no warm up, no rehearsal. Just comes out on stage cold for a single number, and he sounds exactly how he sounds in the studio recordings of Songs in the Key of Life. Yeah, he’s really all that. But what I did see was his guitarist sitting back stage with a new girlfriend (my guess) noodling on his instrument like a boss. I mean, he had all these jazzy funk chops he was playing up and down the fret board. You almost want to ask him, “hey, how did you learn to play all those notes”. It was fairly impressive. You could honestly say he played with himself extraordinarily well.

So that was 5 in the afternoon. Stevie and his band probably hit the stage about 9:30 that night as the event is sorta coming to an end. So you’d think Mr. Chops is gonna be strumming up a storm and making Sir Duke really pop. But no. He might as well have not even been up there. When it came to game time, he apparently had nothing to add to the groove or texture. He looked kind of lost or nervous, and was surprisingly quiet for all his impressive antics backstage a few hours earlier. All those fast runs and noodling he could display with verve and panache backstage before the concert — when it’s not called for, and doesn’t count — added up to nothing when the hour of execution was at hand. While Stevie is singing, “They can feel it all o-o-ver...”, this poor guy couldn’t conjure up a canker sore.

[vincentm]

I was able to play fast as lightning on electric and it sounded great playing a pentatonic minor scale, but it was limited.

[wooddawg]

A lot of fast players play like that is they need to, but I guess it depends on what type of music your playing. Most musicians can’t read as good as you because of your training yet the bass instrument or any other they play is done well. Ijs

[onseanzion]

this guy is funny. he is my secret mind that I never reveal

[willb]

Anyone else: Try "Bass Pilgrim" - Renauld Garcia-Fons. here on YouTube. Some interesting finger technique and !MY! very fast kick at the end, full neck 5 strings.

[riqu]

waht is a horn line ? trumpet frases ? ty

[lurchamok]

ok but what i expected was  e.g.. relax between each note, or don't press harder as you get faster, or  built up some muscles   .... or whatsoever

[herculesmwp]

This was not a video for tips on how to play fast.