Practice track for Bassists – Avalon

This is a practice track for Bass players learning walking bass lines. There is a clear strong drum beat in more or less a rock style to help with keeping the beat steady, but with a Jazz Manouche style rhythm guitar track.

Here are the chords

Avalon Chors Sheet
Chord Sheet for Avalon by Vincent Rose

Here is the practice track without a bass line, so that you can play along on bass!

Here is my bass line if you want some ideas. The first run through I play root notes and fifths on beats one and three of the bar. The second and third runs through I use a walking bass line based on the modes and scales noted in the chord sheet. Bb Dorian may be substituted for Bb melodic minor, depending on taste. I like the melodic minor though because the A natural keeps the sound closer to the home key of F, which also has an A natural. Notice how the feel changes when the bass goes from root fifths to walking!

Enjoy!

An Evening of Jazz Manouche

I will be playing double bass for the East West Hot Club this week, on Thursday Night 18th October. The occasion is the Evening of Jazz Manouche, a warm up for the annual OzManouche Gypsy Jazz festival, held here in Brisbane. There are some great local Gypsy Jazz bands on the programme for Thursday night, including fantastic local guitarists Ewan Mackenzie and Cameron Ford. The East West Hot Club features the very talented Sean Quinlan and Henry Wang on guitars, with myself on double bass. It will be a great night!

The location is the Black Bear Lodge in the Valley, more details from the link below!

http://www.blackbearlodge.com.au/?p=2025

For more info on the OzManouche festival, see the following link!

http://www.ozmanouche.com/

Cheers, Rob.

Practice Track: Waves of the Danube

This is a practice track for beginning to intermediate guitarists and bass players! The Waves of the Danube was also recorded as “Anniversary Song” and appears under that name in the recordings of jazz guitarist Django Reinhardt. This track is at a very slow 90 bpm, so beginning and intermediate players can work the changes with plenty of time to get their arpeggios working! In Gypsy Jazz circles, it is played much more quickly, but you have to practice slow in order to play quick! Enjoy!

Waves of the Danube