2 Killer Speed & Shifting Exercises For Bass Players (L#149)

Ok, I admit it... I stole this exercise from one of my favourite all time guitar players.

I was lucky enough to study with Mike years ago when I was really just starting out with improvising, and although over a 4 year period I only sat down with him a hand full of times - those lessons were by far the most important lessons I ever had. Ever.

And, yeah - you might think, "but he's a guitar player... and you're a bass player, right?!"...

Here's the deal. Improvisation is improvisation no matter what instrument it's on. If you really want to study improvisation, by only listening to or studying with bass players you're missing out on a huge chunk of the party ;) ...when it comes to improvisation I really recommend studying with as many different instrumentalists as you can - my favourites have been guitar players, piano players, trumpet players and trombone players.

Right, that's enough "Mike love" for now... let's look at this exercise!

If you're playing up and down the neck, whether it's during a bass groove, fill, or solo line, you need to get super focused on exactly how you're shifting through the different positions on the neck. If you don't, you're fingers will literally start tripping over themselves, you'll end up using odd fingering combinations, and the overall result will be messy sounding lines that have no consistency - and for you, it will be a case of "sometimes I can pull it off... and other times it just sounds and feels terrible"...

Well, the 2 exercises I'm going to show you in this lesson will help you completely eradicate this common problem from your bass playing.

All I'll say for now is... it's ALL in the shifting!

When you're done, check out these awesome bass finger exercises to help you develop your fretting hand.

As always, see you in the shed...

Scott :)