You can do this up and down the strings, and / or you can do it ACROSS the strings as long as the counting is CONTINUOUS. It goes: Ton, ton, semi-ton, and then ton, ton, ton, semi-ton ( T + T + S / and / T + T + T + S ). Again: A "TONE" is two frets, and a "SEMI-TONE" is one fret. If you just count frets it is this: 2, 2, 1 and then 2, 2, 2, 1. Then for each step, 2, 2, 2 as you go up or come back down, there is a NAME for each step--kind of like the names of the notes of the major scale (this part I could be wrong). I'm BEGINNING to wrap my head around this, and, I need an aspirin.
Great lesson! Been playing for 15yrs and never learned any theory (always been more of a song learner). Just started dabbling in theory and this is one of the best lessons I've seen so far. It really gave me a "WOW" moment for once and made the major scale actually stick in my head! I can now look at the neck and find, for example, a Dmaj7! That kind of thing used to always confuse the hell out of me. Definitely going to be watching the rest of your lessons. Thanx again!
I'm a professional bassist from Las Vegas, love the video's l Only had 2 bass lessons in my life and play by ear. I can play Any song and style and have written, recorded and performed many songs and performed with many great people playing original music and I find your videos fun and to the point. Keep em coming and thank you!
Clear and detailed without being verbose and great interaction with the bass during instruction. Sometimes videos go on forever and you don't get to see the points illustrated until the end. I've just found this series and I am looking forward to exploring all that is offered on this channel. -- Great, great job and thank you for taking the time to share your knowledge in such a well thought out way. --SH
I am so angry with my bass teacher!! I just started with him and he started teaching me stuff that were way ahead of just the basics of scales, degrees and intervals. To understand what the hell he was talking about I had to watch a few of your vids. I just paid for a months lesson and after the last one, I may give him a piece of my mind and flatly tell him I’m no longer taking anymore lessons.
Thanks for this - your explanations are so clear. I've been playing off and on for 30 years and the thought of theory scared the shite out of me. Wish I'd had a teacher like you back then when I started. I think I would have developed better and would have taken it all a bit more seriously. Still I'm going to learn it all at the age of nearly 50!! Cheers - you're an inspiration!!
Thank you so much for this, I've been playing bass for years and somehow always avoided music theory, because I didn't "get it", it just appeared dry and uninteresting to me. Now that I finally want to learn more about theory this helps a lot, I really appreciate how clearly you explain this. I also love your accent by the way :)
For you to do these lessons for for and you use this wonderful RUclips channel is amazing. When I get better at bass and learn all this I'll do the same and pass it on. Bands need good bass players and all of us should help each other out. great lesson.
I swear your the best teacher on RUclips. I don't know what I'd do without you. You make everything so digestibal and really help us try to apply what you're saying. I probably would've gave up without this channel.
These lessons are great. Clear and concise. That doesn’t mean it’s easy, of course! This is tough material, but the best explanation I’ve found, so far.
This video has helped me so much! Thank you. Changed my understanding of bass. So many videos just teach you the scale, or the pattern but this really explains all of the essential parts to really understand what's going on.
Wow! wow!! wow!!! this is awesome, is exactly what i have been looking for on youtube for a couple of months. Thanks for posting these wonderful videos. God bless ya.
Great video - looking forward to working through the series. Simple and straightforward. Love the metaphor of learning something when "you know it's just a succession of building blocks that you've already learnt as opposed to a long string of unrelated notes... turning into memory feat like learning Pi to 200 decimals." Perfectly explained and hugely reassuring.
Im not very good at english but this you have a perfectly pedagogic way of speaking. The way speak of it as if it was like the easiest of things actually makes it easier! Big up bro
Hi there. When I take the Perfect 4th as a moveable pattern I'm using the first finger barred across. Just shift the pressure from one string to another. It would be OK to use any fingering that works for you at any particular time. The fingering is less important than the actual fretboard pattern. You could also use the first finger for the tonic and the second finger for the perfect 4th.
Heavy. Ton, ton, semi-ton, and then ton, ton, ton, semi-ton ( T + T + S / and / T + T + T + S ). This does me think more three dimensionally. Once I watch it twenty times, it will help. Thank you.
Thank you so much for clearing up the difference between a harmonic and a melodic interval for me, now i hear you say it, it just sounds so simple. Keep up the good work man!
Fantastic but simplistic break down of numerical patterns in half and whole steps to allow a player go all over the fretboard and actually improvise and also in KEY! Thanks so much. This is invaluable to make any bass player a bigger part in the creative writing part of a bands song. This also helps prove that bass isn't just a rhythm instrument but a MELODY instrument and therefore the "BASS" melody of the entire song. In America, they have more of a "lets just add the bass after the rhythm and lead guitar writes it. In British bands, you can always hear the driving main melody coming from the bass as in most cases, the MAIN instrument and foundation of the song. The is why the majority of the BEST NON-SLAP bass players are British!
14:12 for the 100% clear lesson. Now up to me to practice and recognize these patterns. Like the man in the stall said to the man outside waiting "GIVE ME TIME"!! Your a great teacher only channel I learn from
I'm trying to learn music theory and have been doing this alone, but now your helping me, i hope, i am just a bit confused at the moment so, as best as i can, form my question i broke it down; 1st note of C Major is C (3rd fret A string) = Root, 2nd note of C Major is D (5th fret,A string) = Tone, 3rd note of C Major is E (2nd fret, D string) = Tone, 4th note of C Major is F (3rd fret,D string) = Semi-Tone, 5th note of C Major is G (5th fret, D string) = Tone, 6th note of C Major is A (2nd fret, G string) = Tone, 7th note of C Major is B (4th fret, G string) = Tone Confusion is now set in and i need clarification at this point!! Now that i went through all that i'll ask my question. The last note of C Major is once again a C (5th fret G string) technically it would be a Semi-Tone this to my limited knowledge would be considered the "Octave" also an 8th note for the scale is this note generally omitted due to it being basically the next octave up and the beginning of the next cycle? If so would this be considered a C Major 7th? C D E F G A B C I think what is confusing me is i learned different terms Root, Step, Step, Half, Step, Step, Step, Octave (aka next root)
Hi Mark! Hope you are doing well. Thanks a million for your tremendous work & extensive teaching of knwoledge! I highly appreciate you & this channnel! Always a great joy to watch! :)
Tones can also be called steps. Half step = Semi tone Whole step = Tone Major scale: WWHWWWH Also to remember that there is no E# /Fb, or B#/Cb . That might help with the other scales.
Hey I had to go back to make sure I understood everything... Just to make sure, an interval is sort of like a pattern... Which you said by know those intervals (pattern) it will help us understand some of the bass lines... Thanks again
Yes. They are just labels of musical distance that you can see as patterns on the fretboard. They are the building blocks of all music. Think of them as words or even letters in language. Have a look at one of your favourite riffs and just break it down into the intervals. You should see them laid out in front of you.
Yes I learned this in steps. Whole step, whole step , half step, etc Its easy to see it on a bass fret board because a half step is one fret and a whole step is two frets .
Has anybody mentioned that you're good at this? For what it's worth, I'm just beginning my journey with a bass guitar -- in fact the guitar itself is yet to arrive owing to the roads having been washed away on the very day I ordered it -- but I digress... I have a drawer in my head that contains a decade of playing various woodwinds at a fairly high level, back when dinosaurs roamed the earth but, I'm going to keep that drawer closed for now and focus on learning what was my first choice of instrument back in 1968. (Never realised, owing to my mother simply refusing to allow any electric stringed instruments in her house, along with drums but again I digress...) The aim is to be at least somewhat capable of carrying one recognisable tune by ice-off next spring. Might help stave off annual cabin fever syndrome and possibly roll back any nascent dementia? I'm already learning loads so it appears a couple brain cells managed to survive the 1970's Excelsior!
This question is probably stupid ..but what about basses with more than 4 strings? More specifically 5 and 6 strings.(I own and play a 5 string and plan to buy a 6) does or would this change the scales in anyway or are they still pretty much the same?
5,6,7,8,9 strings all exactly the same. The theory I'm outlining is the same for all instruments too. The fretboard patterns are the same on all basses. The only time they would change is if you had different tunings or on something like a guitar when you have to always remember the B string is tuned a 3rd up, not a 4th.
I do appreciate your teaching. But my biggest challenge is seeing the finger used. I would suggest if you have the time in future edits to introduce some visual que like a tab on the side of the screen or a red dot on the figure. I am very new to Bass and I found the motions here very fast abd hard to follow. But I know some of that must be me for sure. Anyway, thank you!
Thanks for the video lesson, Mark. What is the name for the three tones interval from perfect unison (so it lies between the perfect fourth and fifth)? I was watching some other video where teacher was explaining intervals, giving names to them, and she named all intervals from the unison through the octave, and each of them were a semi-tone distance from the previous one except for one, which was one tone from the previous (perfect fifth from the perfect fourth), and I wonder why it is so.
That's the diminished 5th or augmented 4th (depending on context). It's sometimes called a tritone. There are always several possible names for any interval depending on things like the key.
Thank you, it's good to hear it has some naming, but what I probably was more interested in was why it is skipped in a lesson about intervals (we see that even its name is not self-sufficient as it instead refers to either the 4th or the 5th). Looks like this is some weird interval, as if it was different in some or other characteristic to the others... I'm sorry for the question if it seems silly, but I've just started learning the music theory.
Hi, These lessons are just what ive been after thank you :) can i ask the Jazz bass you are using is an american deluxe? sorry im a bit of a newby and im after a Jazz bass with the inlays
Ok I'm a bit confused . .when u started giving examples of interval exercises u started with M3rd but you didn't include it when you when through all them so I got M2nd, Per.4,Per.5,M6,M7 starring from the C is this right or do I need to put M3 in there might be stupid but I don't know so pls help trying to learn the right way
you're a hero...
You've no idea how many bass players you've helped to play better with your video lessons,
Just wanna thank you, and may god bless you ❤
How can there be any dislikes on this video - it's a clear concise lesson. What is wrong with people?
Have you ever worked with the public? You will never make everybody happy no matter what you do. I did like it!
Not that easy to understand since he goes by pretty quickly. I wouldn't dislike it though
That's why there is a pause function on videos. Listen, contemplate, practice, resume with the play button.
You can do this up and down the strings, and / or you can do it ACROSS the strings as long as the counting is CONTINUOUS.
It goes: Ton, ton, semi-ton, and then ton, ton, ton, semi-ton ( T + T + S / and / T + T + T + S ).
Again:
A "TONE" is two frets, and a "SEMI-TONE" is one fret.
If you just count frets it is this: 2, 2, 1 and then 2, 2, 2, 1.
Then for each step, 2, 2, 2 as you go up or come back down, there is a NAME for each step--kind of like the names of the notes of the major scale (this part I could be wrong).
I'm BEGINNING to wrap my head around this, and, I need an aspirin.
its called an opinion. its wrong when you don't understand there are different opinions that yours
Great lesson! Been playing for 15yrs and never learned any theory (always been more of a song learner). Just started dabbling in theory and this is one of the best lessons I've seen so far. It really gave me a "WOW" moment for once and made the major scale actually stick in my head! I can now look at the neck and find, for example, a Dmaj7! That kind of thing used to always confuse the hell out of me. Definitely going to be watching the rest of your lessons. Thanx again!
Cheers Geoff. It's first in a series of them. Stay tuned.
I'm a professional bassist from Las Vegas, love the video's l
Only had 2 bass lessons in my life and play by ear. I can play Any song and style and have written, recorded and performed many songs and performed with many great people playing original music and I find your videos fun and to the point. Keep em coming and thank you!
Clear and detailed without being verbose and great interaction with the bass during instruction. Sometimes videos go on forever and you don't get to see the points illustrated until the end. I've just found this series and I am looking forward to exploring all that is offered on this channel. -- Great, great job and thank you for taking the time to share your knowledge in such a well thought out way. --SH
I am so angry with my bass teacher!! I just started with him and he started teaching me stuff that were way ahead of just the basics of scales, degrees and intervals. To understand what the hell he was talking about I had to watch a few of your vids. I just paid for a months lesson and after the last one, I may give him a piece of my mind and flatly tell him I’m no longer taking anymore lessons.
I paid for lessons same thing happened to me
I left quietly
I went on to teaching myself and I am happier 💜
Been playing bass like 10 years, never had a teacher. Never actually learned about what makes music work. Your a great man.
Thanks for this - your explanations are so clear. I've been playing off and on for 30 years and the thought of theory scared the shite out of me. Wish I'd had a teacher like you back then when I started. I think I would have developed better and would have taken it all a bit more seriously. Still I'm going to learn it all at the age of nearly 50!! Cheers - you're an inspiration!!
Thank you so much for this, I've been playing bass for years and somehow always avoided music theory, because I didn't "get it", it just appeared dry and uninteresting to me. Now that I finally want to learn more about theory this helps a lot, I really appreciate how clearly you explain this. I also love your accent by the way :)
For you to do these lessons for for and you use this wonderful RUclips channel is amazing. When I get better at bass and learn all this I'll do the same and pass it on. Bands need good bass players and all of us should help each other out. great lesson.
Love this comment. I agree we should learn not only for ourselves but to connect with other musicians and create together! So enriching.
Can u upload a vid playing bass now? Its been 6 years
I swear your the best teacher on RUclips. I don't know what I'd do without you. You make everything so digestibal and really help us try to apply what you're saying. I probably would've gave up without this channel.
Very easy to understand teacher. These vids are a great help to me. Thanks Mar! :)
Best lesson ever! None of my beginning music books or music teachers ever taught me this let alone this well.
These lessons are great. Clear and concise. That doesn’t mean it’s easy, of course! This is tough material, but the best explanation I’ve found, so far.
This video has helped me so much! Thank you.
Changed my understanding of bass.
So many videos just teach you the scale, or the pattern but this really explains all of the essential parts to really understand what's going on.
Wow! wow!! wow!!! this is awesome, is exactly what i have been looking for on youtube for a couple of months. Thanks for posting these wonderful videos. God bless ya.
Great video - looking forward to working through the series. Simple and straightforward. Love the metaphor of learning something when "you know it's just a succession of building blocks that you've already learnt as opposed to a long string of unrelated notes... turning into memory feat like learning Pi to 200 decimals."
Perfectly explained and hugely reassuring.
Im not very good at english but this you have a perfectly pedagogic way of speaking. The way speak of it as if it was like the easiest of things actually makes it easier! Big up bro
Hi there. When I take the Perfect 4th as a moveable pattern I'm using the first finger barred across. Just shift the pressure from one string to another. It would be OK to use any fingering that works for you at any particular time. The fingering is less important than the actual fretboard pattern. You could also use the first finger for the tonic and the second finger for the perfect 4th.
His Jazz bass with the pearl block inlays is sooo funky. I love it.
Heavy. Ton, ton, semi-ton, and then ton, ton, ton, semi-ton ( T + T + S / and / T + T + T + S ).
This does me think more three dimensionally. Once I watch it twenty times, it will help. Thank you.
Where does it hurt giving this guy a Subscription? I have watched your current video and checked your early videos. God is good man, biggup yourself
I started on the flute, and it's really fun learning how to apply the same concepts I learned on my flute to bass guitar!
Thank you so much for clearing up the difference between a harmonic and a melodic interval for me, now i hear you say it, it just sounds so simple. Keep up the good work man!
Brand new bass player here (4 months). I really appreciate these lessons! Thank you!
Fantastic but simplistic break down of numerical patterns in half and whole steps to allow a player go all over the fretboard and actually improvise and also in KEY! Thanks so much. This is invaluable to make any bass player a bigger part in the creative writing part of a bands song. This also helps prove that bass isn't just a rhythm instrument but a MELODY instrument and therefore the "BASS" melody of the entire song. In America, they have more of a "lets just add the bass after the rhythm and lead guitar writes it. In British bands, you can always hear the driving main melody coming from the bass as in most cases, the MAIN instrument and foundation of the song. The is why the majority of the BEST NON-SLAP bass players are British!
Great lesson, thank you! It is the explanation why you are doing it and the long-term benefits helps so much!
@TalkingBass Thank you Mark for an awesome lesson...really appreciate your wonderful tuition - David
14:12 for the 100% clear lesson. Now up to me to practice and recognize these patterns. Like the man in the stall said to the man outside waiting "GIVE ME TIME"!! Your a great teacher only channel I learn from
Still one of the best educators on RUclips
This is extremely helpful and very concise
Hi Mark, Thank you so much. This has glued together bits and pieces that were rattling around in my head! Cheers!!!
This lesson was amazing! You have taught this 'ol dog things that I had never learned before (and that I really needed to know). Thank you!
Excellent explanations - music theory has always been so intimidating with terms and concepts in advance of application. Thank you.
Learned more from this one video than any other bass video I've seen. Thank you
I'm trying to learn music theory and have been doing this alone, but now your helping me, i hope, i am just a bit confused at the moment so, as best as i can, form my question i broke it down;
1st note of C Major is C (3rd fret A string) = Root, 2nd note of C Major is D (5th fret,A string) = Tone, 3rd note of C Major is E (2nd fret, D string) = Tone, 4th note of C Major is F (3rd fret,D string) = Semi-Tone, 5th note of C Major is G (5th fret, D string) = Tone, 6th note of C Major is A (2nd fret, G string) = Tone, 7th note of C Major is B (4th fret, G string) = Tone
Confusion is now set in and i need clarification at this point!!
Now that i went through all that i'll ask my question. The last note of C Major is once again a C (5th fret G string) technically it would be a Semi-Tone this to my limited knowledge would be considered the "Octave" also an 8th note for the scale is this note generally omitted due to it being basically the next octave up and the beginning of the next cycle? If so would this be considered a C Major 7th?
C D E F G A B C
I think what is confusing me is i learned different terms Root, Step, Step, Half, Step, Step, Step, Octave (aka next root)
+John Ogden OMG you did answer my question once i went back and re-watched with more focus the second time.
@TalkingBass Thank you so much for this lesson it has and is helping me to understand intervals. I very grateful.
I'm a guitar player not bass and I'm hooked on your lessons. Great stuff
best lesson I've ever had in
This is the best video for beginners like me. Thank you!
Oh, the tone of the bass 😍 Badass. Thanks for the lessons.
I just found this video...I am so so grateful.
For informative and easy to understand just opened my bass and guitar eyes
Hi Mark! Hope you are doing well.
Thanks a million for your tremendous work & extensive teaching of knwoledge!
I highly appreciate you & this channnel!
Always a great joy to watch! :)
Hey, thanks for the uploads, each and every videos are useful here!
Very helpful and clear, then I'll try to follow your instructions... Thanks
Very helpful.
Much thanks. Emulating Mark King may be nearer in my future then I thought.
You're an amazing teacher! Thank you!!
Fantastic lesson as always very very useful thanks a lot
I love your crisp tone. What do you play through? Any pedals? Sorry if this has been asked before.
awesome lesson
Great content!!! And free!! So awesome
Thank you very much for a such amazing lesson!
I learned good sir. That is an instant like and subscribe
Great lesson Mark! Really good explanation.
Tones can also be called steps.
Half step = Semi tone
Whole step = Tone
Major scale:
WWHWWWH
Also to remember that there is no E# /Fb, or B#/Cb . That might help with the other scales.
Nice work my friend... thanks, my students like it and thank you ;) Rock on my friend
very good work.
Hey I had to go back to make sure I understood everything... Just to make sure, an interval is sort of like a pattern... Which you said by know those intervals (pattern) it will help us understand some of the bass lines...
Thanks again
Yes. They are just labels of musical distance that you can see as patterns on the fretboard. They are the building blocks of all music. Think of them as words or even letters in language. Have a look at one of your favourite riffs and just break it down into the intervals. You should see them laid out in front of you.
+cedyd Depending on where you live, you will hear it referred to as, "whole, whole, half. whole, whole, whole, half." Which can be helpful too.
Yes I learned this in steps. Whole step, whole step , half step, etc Its easy to see it on a bass fret board because a half step is one fret and a whole step is two frets .
This great video made my day~thanks
Has anybody mentioned that you're good at this? For what it's worth, I'm just beginning my journey with a bass guitar -- in fact the guitar itself is yet to arrive owing to the roads having been washed away on the very day I ordered it -- but I digress... I have a drawer in my head that contains a decade of playing various woodwinds at a fairly high level, back when dinosaurs roamed the earth but, I'm going to keep that drawer closed for now and focus on learning what was my first choice of instrument back in 1968. (Never realised, owing to my mother simply refusing to allow any electric stringed instruments in her house, along with drums but again I digress...)
The aim is to be at least somewhat capable of carrying one recognisable tune by ice-off next spring. Might help stave off annual cabin fever syndrome and possibly roll back any nascent dementia? I'm already learning loads so it appears a couple brain cells managed to survive the 1970's
Excelsior!
Cheers man, these lessons have been so helpful :)
Hey trying to do my own channel, your tone is so perfect in every video, what sort of interface/mic setup are using?
This question is probably stupid ..but what about basses with more than 4 strings? More specifically 5 and 6 strings.(I own and play a 5 string and plan to buy a 6) does or would this change the scales in anyway or are they still pretty much the same?
5,6,7,8,9 strings all exactly the same. The theory I'm outlining is the same for all instruments too. The fretboard patterns are the same on all basses. The only time they would change is if you had different tunings or on something like a guitar when you have to always remember the B string is tuned a 3rd up, not a 4th.
Wow great stuff..... Have learned theory
Amazing! Thank you! 🎸
great lesson
Awesome lesson!!
you are phenomenal thank you
I do appreciate your teaching. But my biggest challenge is seeing the finger used. I would suggest if you have the time in future edits to introduce some visual que like a tab on the side of the screen or a red dot on the figure. I am very new to Bass and I found the motions here very fast abd hard to follow. But I know some of that must be me for sure. Anyway, thank you!
Thank you so much youre a hero sir🤍
Thanks for the video lesson, Mark.
What is the name for the three tones interval from perfect unison (so it lies between the perfect fourth and fifth)? I was watching some other video where teacher was explaining intervals, giving names to them, and she named all intervals from the unison through the octave, and each of them were a semi-tone distance from the previous one except for one, which was one tone from the previous (perfect fifth from the perfect fourth), and I wonder why it is so.
That's the diminished 5th or augmented 4th (depending on context). It's sometimes called a tritone. There are always several possible names for any interval depending on things like the key.
Thank you, it's good to hear it has some naming, but what I probably was more interested in was why it is skipped in a lesson about intervals (we see that even its name is not self-sufficient as it instead refers to either the 4th or the 5th). Looks like this is some weird interval, as if it was different in some or other characteristic to the others...
I'm sorry for the question if it seems silly, but I've just started learning the music theory.
Hey, the part 2 of your Intervals lesson helped me a lot (L#6). Thanks again.
If you would like to understand the tritone, read "Interference " by Richard Merrick.
Hi, These lessons are just what ive been after thank you :) can i ask the Jazz bass you are using is an american deluxe?
sorry im a bit of a newby and im after a Jazz bass with the inlays
Well done man!
Ok I'm a bit confused . .when u started giving examples of interval exercises u started with M3rd but you didn't include it when you when through all them so I got M2nd, Per.4,Per.5,M6,M7 starring from the C is this right or do I need to put M3 in there might be stupid but I don't know so pls help trying to learn the right way
Thanks for sharing Sir✌
Thank you for this.
Thank you for posting this
I am diggin’ it !!!
Thank you!!
Fantastic video: however damn that bass needs a set up haha. That fret buzz 😵💫
I don't even play bass (guitar, sorry :$), but 2 minutes in and everything is spot on helpful. Thanks!
Do you have a playlist for all of these?
Thank you
Precise, please can you send the PDF, Thank You
very helpful thank you
Any tips for those of us who play unlined fretless basses?
Every time mark says BASSically, I hehe
great teacher
gOod lesson. I understood it.
Hello sir you are great
All makes sense
Also my fingers can't seem to spread out far enough like that. Major uncomfortable and hard to work with :/
nice bass
Thanks
Who dislikes this?? I've nearly watched every single video of yours by now and didn't find a single one useless or unlikeble
Do you have a video on all the intervals?
You're the best!
very Helpful. is there a way i cansupport you? greetings from the philippines
Buy his courses or donate on Mark's site. Link is in the description