Bass Player: Dave Holland Another transcription from the 1985 Dave Holland Quintet album, ‘Seeds Of Time’. This tune is a simple duet between Holland and percussionist Marvin ‘Smitty’ Smith. Smith is playing a weird combination of woodblocks and bell like percussion (cow bells/agogos?). The main bass part is a one bar riff of rapidly executed…

Bass Player: Dave Holland The 1980s was a rich period for bass player Dave Hoiland who produced a series of incredibly fresh sounding albums for the ECM record label durng this period. Starting with the ‘Jumpin’ In’ and followed by ‘Seeds Of Time’ and ‘The Razor’s Edge’, these three quintet albums featured Holland alongside saxophonist…

Bass Player: Larry Klein Bass players gravitate towards Joni Mitchell primarily because of the contributions that Jaco Pastorius made to, amongst others, the albums Hejira, Mingus and Shadows and Light. Those who continued to follow Mitchell beyond the ‘Jaco’ years will come across Larry Klein, a bass player, producer and songwriter with a CV that…

Bass Player: Dave Holland Another tune from the 1988 ECM album that Holland did with drummer Jack DeJohnette and saxophonist Steve Coleman, ‘Triplicate’. The transcription is the complete Dave Holland bass part for the tune ‘African Lullaby’. It is a simple piece in which the three musicians play parts that interweave like a fugue but…

Bass Player: Dave Holland In the late 1980s, Dave Holland recorded a trio album with his regular sazophonist, Steve Coleman, and drummer Jack DeJohnnette with whom he has played in dozens of different settings including Miles Davis. The album, ‘Triplicate’ features compositions by all three players and a couple of Jazz standards from Charlie Parker…

Bass Player: Gary Willis From the 1998 album ‘Bent’ led by bass player Gary Willis, this is head, chords and bass solo from the tune ‘It’s Only Music’. Willis’s phrasing on this tune is a masterclass in nuance and subtlety and it is highly recommended that this chart is looked at alongside the recording. Willis…

Bass Player: Jeff Berlin The full transcripotion of this tune was posted late in November 2020 and, at that time, the supplementary trancription was promised that would provide the details of the overdubbed solo that occurs between 3:24 and 4:10. This was a tough transcription. Jeff’s sliding blues phrases and bends are difficult to capture…

Bass Player: Geddy Lee Transcribing this tune gives you are real sense of Lee’s arranging skills and the work involved in balancing keyboards, vocals and bass not only as a performance challenge but as an exercise in orchestration. Look at the gaps in the bass part where Lee is wearing a different hat and how…

Bass Player: Geddy Lee There are not that many albums where the whole recording has an influence on the bass players who listen to a band but the 1981 Rush album ‘Moving Pictures’ remains one of those iconic recordings where every track is perfect. As a result, alongside Coz Powell’s ‘Over The Top’, Jeff Wayne’s…

Bass Player: Geddy Lee Another track from the 1981 Rush album, ‘Moving Pictures’. This album is felt, by many, to be apex of the band’s career and that they never bettered it (fortunately for Lee, Lifeson and Peart, there are plenty that disagree). The track ‘Tom Sawyer’ was arguably the stand out single from the…