There is much confusion and frustration for most people when they try to learn bass.

Should you hire a private teacher? Perhaps you should take online bass lessons?

No matter which option you choose you must take some kind of lessons to make progress on bass. It’s just a fact everyone learns from someone else. Unless you want to try and reinvent the wheel and lock yourself away the first day you buy your bass guitar no one on the planet is really self taught.

We all learn from teachers, books, videos, watching other players and finding online bass guitar lessons to help us.

The number one problem I see over and over again is players who think they can become great bass players by being “self taught” (and secretly they just watch free videos on youtube).

You need a mentor, a guide. Someone to who can already do what you are trying to learn.

The major issue with not having someone to teach you is you will lack focus. You have no idea where to begin, what to learn next or what order to learn things in.

You also have no idea when you’re doing it wrong.

Online bass lessons or hiring a private teach are the only choice in my option if you honestly want to learn to play the bass guitar you invested your money in.

Sure you can pick up a few things here and there but lessons are what separates the pros from the players who just “noodle”.

Now of course I am bias because I teach online bass lessons. I stand behind my feelings of needing lessons and I would love for you to take lessons with me.

Note: You can go here to check out some of my free online bass lessons.

If you can afford a private teacher and have $200+ a month for tuition and the time to travel to your lessons then I highly recommend it.

I offer a more affordable option for people who still want to learn but perhaps don’t have hundreds on dollars every month.

The other beautiful thing about online bass lessons is that you can take them at your leisure. Anytime you want you can login and watch them. You can also re-watch them over and over until you really get it. It’s a great way to learn to play the bass.

So go here and check out my online bass lessons for free.

You’ll be glad you did.

- Tom

Tags: best online guitar lessons, free online bass lessons, Online Bass Guitar Lessons, Online Bass Lessons

2) Play with your bass in tune! – Not tuning your bass is going to train your ear incorrectly and also you’re going to sound pretty bad.

3) Learn the bass guitar notes of the fretboard – Knowing where the various notes are is vital as a musician. Not knowing the notes on your instrument is like trying to type on a computer keyboard with all blank keys and no idea which letter is which

4) Have fun! – Forget just reading books and studying theory when you’re just a beginner on bass guitar. Learn some fun songs and bass lines and enjoy what you are doing.

5) Expand your ear – Try to listen to as many genres of music as you can. With sites like YouTube you have no excuse for not trying out new types of music because it’s free!

If you enjoyed this post or have any tips to add please leave your message in the comments section at the bottom of the page.

- Tom

Tags: Bass Guitar Tips, Beginner Bass Guitar, Beginner Bass Guitar Tips

I have always taught people the basic bass scales as I feel they do give a good foundation to use for bass line building and playing. I know some musician choose not to learn theory at all and others spend more time learning theory than playing music.

I feel the best approach is balance. Knowing your bass scales is never a bad thing but you need to know how to apply them to your bass. It’s no good knowing a million different scales and then never using them or spending so much of your life with your head in a text book that you forget to actually play music.

A few good scales to learn are the major scale, the minor scale and the blue scale. These will help give you a good base on which to expand and build on. For some people the need to take scales any further is not needed. For others the thought of not knowing every scale on the sun is blasphemy.

At the end of the day I think the best advice I can offer you is look at what you want to achieve on bass. Once you have a clear goal and focus of where you are heading work backwards and see if knowing lots of scales is one of the steps needed to get you to where you want to be.

What do you think about learning bass guitar scales? Leave me a comment below I’d love to hear you opinion.

- Tom

Tags: basic bass scales, learn bass guitar scales, learn bass scales, learn scales on bass guitar, learning bass guitar scales

By following these few fundamental tips you should quickly see a great improvement in how good you sound. Rather than not having a clue which notes to play you will have a clear idea of what to do.

So go here now and check out these tips on how to improve how well you can play a bass solo. It will really help you out,

Tags: bass guitar solo, Bass Solo, solo bass guitar

Step bass playing is a mixture of slap with different percussive techniques. I found this video on PlayBassNow.com and was blown away. This takes slap to a whole new level. It reminds me a lot of what many acoustic guitarists do with the percussive hand slaps over the fretboard.

The term “Step Bass” or “Step Technique” was invented by a French player by the name of Jean-Luc Gastaldello.

The video below is a demonstration of the step bass technique by Sébastien Husson.

Enjoy!

Tags: Jean-Luc Gastaldello, Sébastien Husson, Step Bass, Step Bass Guitar, Step Bass Guitar Technique

When I was a beginner I struggled to get started on bass. I found it really difficult and some days felt like giving up. Luckily I didn’t but when something seems so hard it stops being fun. So I decided to stop struggling and to try something new.

What I had been doing so far obviously was not working. I had been taking beginner bass guitar lessons with my friends Google and Youtube. This is where I had been going wrong because I had no focus. I jumped from lesson to lesson with no connection between them and no clue what order I should be learning everything in.

If you’re currently a “Google Bass Guitarist” then it’s not your fault if you too are having a tough time learning bass like I was. With so much information out there trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together yourself is an up hill battle.

So what I did is I started investing in my bass playing. I bought some books, DVDs and took some online bass guitar lessons. You know what happened? With 6 months I was in my first band on stage playing in front of an audience, which included my friends and family.

It was great finally getting up there and playing the music I love. The smiling faces of my family and friends who were finally proud of me and what I had accomplished. It was a great experience I’ll never forget.

I’m so glad I did what it took to make my dream come true. Years later I now teach bass guitar lessons online. I help people who were stuck like me and give them the skills they need quickly.

You can find out more about my video bass guitar lessons here

- Tom

Tags: bass guitar lessons, beginner bass guitar lessons, electric bass guitar lessons, Online Bass Guitar Lessons, video bass guitar lessons

So when should you use them?

Well if you’re playing a certain song you obviously use them when
the song tells you to, either in the Tab or Sheet music.

If however you want to create your own bass lines or spice up an
existing song you can add chords wherever you like.

In most pop, rock and blues music chords on bass are not played
constantly. They are often mixed in with bass line to help
strengthen the music being played. Sometimes you will find you
play a chord, followed by a bass lick.

You can also end a song on a chord. This works well for almost
any song. As long as you know what the ending chord is you can
play it on the last beat. Sometimes with double stops (2 note
chords) you can slide into them and this can have a nice sounding
effect.

You could also play an entire piece with just bass chords, all
though this is not typically common.

Like all music, it’s a creative thing and up to you to experiment
incorporating chords into your playing. There are no hard and fast
rules of when to play a bass chord if you’re creating your own bass
line.

So have fun with them, mix them in songs when you’re practising
and then use them when you play. By knowing bass guitar chords you
can stand out as a bass player as you have an extra tool to use in
your playing.

The 7 Common Bass Guitar Chords

Lets now jump straight into looking at the 7 most common bass
chords and how to play them on your bass guitar. These are what I
like to call the ‘core’ chords as these 7 are used in more songs and
more often then any others. That’s why knowing these gives you
the keys and unlocks the majority of chords you’ll come across in
music.

Here they are: (Print these out if you can)

A5 (fifth) chord
g—9—–
d—7—–
a———
e———

A4 (fourth) chord
g—7—–
d—7—–
a———-
e———-

A3 (third) chord
g—6——
d—7——
a———-
e———-

Ok now we move onto the 3 note chords.

A (Major)
g–9—–
d-11—–
a-12—–
e——–

Am
g–9—–
d-10—–
a-12—–
e——–

A7
g—12—–
d—11—–
a—12—–
e———-

Am7
g—13—–
d—11——
a—12——
e———-

Tags: bass chord, bass chords, Bass Guitar Chord, Bass Guitar Chord Chart, Bass Guitar Chords, free bass chords, free bass guitar chords, learn bass chords

Some people believe that scales for bass guitar are not necessary and boring. They can however greatly improve your development and can be fun if you go about learning them the right way.

With so many different bass guitar scales it can be tricky to know where to begin. Each of them plays its own role but some are much more frequently used than others. The two most common scales for bass guitar are the major scale and the minor scale.

The simple way to tell these apart is to remember that the major scale is the happy sounding scale, the minor scale has an evil sort of sad sound to it. Most songs have a mixture of both in them so it’s important to learn both of these scales on your bass.

Once you have down these two basic bass scales you can then begin to expand out and discover how to play other types. The blues scales is another commonly used scale in rock, pop and blues music. The difference between the blues bass guitar scale and the major scale is the added flat 5. To play the this extra note just take the 5th note of the normal major scale and flatten it by playing a fret lower on your bass.

I’ll be updating this bass guitar scales guide soon with more information! Come back soon.

Tags: Bass Guitar Scales, bass scales, blues bass guitar scale

Bass courses online also have the added benefit of convince. You can watch them in your own time rather than having to stick to a set time for a lesson with a bass teacher. Online lessons are there for you want you want them. You can watch them anytime, day or night.

Another huge advantage to taking an online bass course is that you can re-watch the material until your have learnt it thoroughly. In a private lesson once your time is up that’s it until the following week. Being able to pause and rewind video lessons means that you can repeat the training and progress much faster.

You can learn pretty much any bass topic online. Chords, songs and bass guitar scales are just some of the various subjects that you can learn through taking a course on the Internet.

To take an online bass guitar course you can search for them on a search engine, like Google. There are quite a few to choose from. Some are free and other paid. The paid ones tend to be more structured and well laid-out. The support is also better if you’re taking online lessons as you can easily contact your teacher when you need to.

So why not take an online bass course today? You might be surprised at how quickly you can learn bass and join a band. It’s really quite simple and anyone can do it once you have the knowledge you need.

Tags: Bass courses online, bass guitar course, online bass guitar course

The offer in this video has ended.

Click here for my online bass lessons

I hope you all have a great Halloween and enjoy this Halloween bass lesson. Please leave your comments below and if you’d like to take online bass lessons, click the link below the video.

Tags: Halloween bass tab, Happy Halloween