Bass Player: Dick Nolan When It Bites hit in 1986, they caused something of a stir with their Prog/Rock/Pop hybrid and the album ‘The Big Lad In The Windmill’ features strong compositions and strong playing from all four band members including guitarist Francis Dunnery, with his Allan Holdsworthesque lines and expressive vocals, and keyboard monster,…

Bass Player: Dave Holland From the 1987 ECM album, ‘The Razor’s Edge’, the transcription is the eight bar sequence that underpins much of the tune. The piece is essentially in 3:4 but the last of weach 8 bar sequence is one bar of 4:4. The imprtant thing to executing this chart, from a reading perspective,…

Bass Player: Scott Sutherland This one came in as a request off Talkbass and features Scott Sutherland’s 12:8 shuffle groove on Tommy Castro’s ‘Backup Plan’ from his 2009 album ‘Hard Believer’.

Bass Player: Jeff Berlin Another tune from the 1979 Bruford album ‘One Of A Kind’. This is Bruford’s ‘Alice In Wonderland’ reference… Alice did not feel encouraged to ask any more questions about it, so she turned to the Mock Turtle, and said ‘What else had you to learn?” I posted this originally in 2020…

Bass Player: Jeff Berlin From his 1997 CD ‘Taking Notes’, this is a slightly more measured composition with the really interesting note choices we have come to expect from Jeff but at a tempo that allows us mere mortals to find a way in. There is a lot to sixteenth note reading in this piece…

Bass Player: Neil Murray This transcription came as a request from the hallowed forums of Basschat.co.uk. Bilbo has a background in heavy metal, having played with NWOBHM band ‘No Quarter’ whilst in his teens and he has enjoyed Neil Murray’s work with Whitesnake, Gary Moore and a few other rockers as well as his Jazz…

Bass Player: Mike Rutherford A beautiful Tony Banks composition, ‘Evidence Of Autumn’ was originally released as the B-side to the single ‘Misunderstanding’. Some really interesting chord voicings in the introduction and the bass part is not particularly difficult but it is always interesting to hear how Rutherford orchestrates his bass parts and incorporates them within…

Bass Player: Bobby Sheehan Blues Traveler are a Rock band with a unique selling point in the form of singer/harmonica player/lyricist John Popper. As is often the case, however, stella frontmen can mask the strengths of the rest of the band and Bobby Sheehan suffered a little from that. His lines are certainly a little…

Bass Player: Jonas Hellborg An intriguing, if obscure, album, Jonas Hellborg’s ‘The Word’ features the Swedish bass player alongside drummer Tony Williams and the Soldier String Quartet. The transcription is of the opening track ‘Akasha’ which is only 54 seconds long. The pulse is very slow and has been interpreted as you see it here…

Bass Player (and composer): Jeff Berlin Jeff Berlin’s composition ‘Joe Frazier’ first appeared on the 1980 Bruford album ‘Gradually Going Tornado’. The main theme of the tune is a bass/piano unison head which places demands on the bass player that, in those days at least, were way out of the reach of the average bass…