Jazz Bass

Jazz Bass

Bass Music Theory Is Essential For Beginner To Advanced Jazz

Bass music theory is what you must know to improvise with jazz chords and scales. As one of the key building blocks of learning the bass and music, music theory is a subject that you will need to delve into serious at some point in order to become the type of player that can solo and improvise of all kinds of chords changes with jazz and any other style of music as well.

For example, since generally more than three tones are used to construct jazz chords due to the extra chordal notes which are inherent to the nature of the jazz style, you will need know that scales come in many names and alterations. This means that there is a great deal of music theory to be understood in regards to improvising with them. Beginners will never have a clue as to what to do at all unless they can just rely on their "ear" for playing, because there is going to be a lot of music theory to learn and they might as well get down to the business of learning right away instead of waiting for some easy way. However, more importantly it is the intermediate and advance player who must get beyond the limited knowledge of theory, the traditional concepts and the memorized applications that have no underlying logical explanation to them.  

One can simply memorize and use certain concepts for soloing and improvising and there is nothing wrong with that except for the fact that it is very limiting for the bass player because they can't go beyond a certain level of creative expression or even understand some of the great players thinking because they don't have a truly innovative and clarifying explanation of underlying principals of the theory being used. As a player, you want to be able to play lead bass over as many different musical styles and chord progressions within a style as possible without being limited by your missing and or traditional explanations of music theory that have not given you the satisfaction of understanding or ability to express yourself as much as you desire to do so.  

Learning your bass music theory for jazz will apply to all other musical styles as well.  Many times for example, classical bass players can read music great and have excellent technique playing classical pieces on their instrument, but they often lack the great world music theory which holds many of them back from being free to improvise.  Or some jazz bass players have great ears and have learned many licks and progressions and solos, but they feel very inadequate in understanding what they are playing or in being able to perform with a confidence that they know what they heck they are doing.  Bass players will eventually recognize how rewarding and fulfilling not only learning music theory can be, but also when they get the right system of teaching innovative and modern theory, they will be able to actually use it in more ways and styles of music than they can imagine.

do squier jazz basses have the same specs as a real fender jazz bass?

do squier jazz basses have the same specs as a reall fender jazz bass. I am wondering because I want to install 60s custom shop fender pick-ups in my classic vibe squier. Will this work without me cutting some wood?

it should