Customer Reviews

The Bass Player Book: Equipment, Technique, Styles & Artists

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Karl Coryat's THE BASS PLAYER BOOK is a collection of some of the most helpful articles from Bass Player magazine's first ten years. It is well organized and informative. It contains materials that should prove helpful for beginners, intermediate level players, and 4 string veterans.

Part One contains 15 chapters on Playing the Bass. It covers everything from what to do when you string up your very first bass, to basic theory, to requirements of the working bassist.

Part Two covers equipment in 11 chapters. Here you find informative chapters on how to buy a bass (electric and acoustic), installing strings, setup, amps and effects, uprights, and recording among others.

Part Three includes chapters on 8 of the greatest bass innovators from james Jamerson (of Motown fame) to Jaco, Flea, and Michael Manring. [One shortcoming to be noted - you CANNOT have a section on bass innovators and leave out Victor Wooten of Bela Fleck and the Flecktones].

Finally there is a chapter discussing 30 albums every bassist MUST own. Although there some on the list with which any of us would disagree, and others which we would say should have been included, the choice isn't bad. A wide variety of music is represented from reggae to jazz, from country to funk, from blues to latino, from rock to fusion. And Victor's album A SHOW OF HANDS is included here.

For an intermediate level player like myself, there was plenty of helpful and inspiring chapters. I know there are chapters that would have been helpful when I first started, and I can imagine that there is plenty here to please even the virtuosos among us.

This book will be a wonderful tool for the bassist who is just beginning to learn his/her instrument or the more experienced player who would like to explore their options. The theoretical and instructional section is as comprehensive as is possible for those without the benefit of an instructor as well as being easy to understand. The section covering equipment will serve well as a guide to those of us with just enough information to make ourselves look very foolish. The section on notable bassists and the recommended listening list stands as a veritable "who's who" of my own personal heros. (Where's Patitucci?!) I will highly recommend this book.

As a beginning bass player I got a lot out of this book. It's fun, well written, lots of pictures. I found the intro to theory very readable. It was all new to me and I liked the way it was presented. In fact, the sections sort of repeat themselves in some places, but that's good, it reinforces some points.

A real strong point is the overview of bass styles and the written examples of typical bass lines in rock, jazz and genre. That was fun and interesting and as I learn I go back to those sections and learn more. There are real nuggets of playing wisdom hidden in those chapters.

The chapters on the various stars of the instrument were fun. (Funny thing here is that, after stressing good playing position in the opening chapters, most of the artists pictured are usually providing counter examples) The discography of must-have CDs I could do without, better would be a section at the end of each chapter on the artists recommending their specific works.

But this should not be the book you use for practice or the only one you use to learn to play. There are lots of other books that do that better. This is a good addition to your library and supplement to the practice books. It's a reference book, fun and informational, with some good playing tips.

Minor weak points: the written examples in the book are too small to read easily. Using this book for serious practice is a strain. The chapters that cover the various styles and give examples are very helpful, but rock get's the lion's share (OK there's more rock in the world than any other kind of music and most bass players are in that space) but the sections on jazz and country could be expanded just a bit. A CD sampler would have been cool, but it probaby would have raised the price another $10

The Bass Player Book is excellent for bass players that want to attain a pretty good picture of the most important considerations for the bass - such as technique, practice routines, purchasing considerations such as amps, and instrument maintenance and a healthy dose of music theory. Another quality that makes this book very good is that there are many contributing authors, hence you will not be stuck with one perspective.

Articles written by and about various well-known bassists also motivates the curiosity of beginning bassists to take the effort in understanding the often minor idiosyncrasies that give certain players their sound and feel.

I agree with other reviewers that an accompanying CD would have made this book even more useful, but it nonetheless satisfies its purpose as a very good primer for beginners and refresher for intermediate players.

You probably won't learn all you need to about bass from just this book -but it's a pretty good overview of technique, music, gear, and performers.

Definitely a decent addition to your bass books library.

I found very little of value in this book..........how the author could write a piece on "Flea" (who?) and overlook Jack Bruce (perhaps the most unique and influential electric bassist of the last 40 years)
is beyond all comprehension. To me. And that's just for starters.
Well, at least they did do Jamerson and McCartney.

This book teaches you the basics of music theory,setting up your bass, electronic basics, and different styles. It is well done and very useful.