Ska Progress

The ska bass stuff has been pretty challenging. I was sort of discouraged for awhile. But like everything else...it really just takes dedication.

There are 8 songs on the list to learn. It is a lot for only 3 weeks of time. I have to figure out the part and then learn to play it. I'm pretty clear on the part for maybe 4 of them (though still mastering), have a start on two more, and a couple I haven't really touched. This stuff is fast...and very scale based. If I knew my scales better and had lots of scale practice under my belt...it would be easy. But I'm kind of starting from scratch.

The Transcribe software has been amazing. It has greatly helped with figuring out the parts, but also been a great way to master then with the speed slow down. I like it better than the Amazing Slow Downer interface because you get the wave form...so you can precisely pin point where you're at...and you can loop. Maybe the paid version of Slow Downer does that too, I don't know. But it helps.

Much to my surprise...if I work hard for 30 minutes or so each day...the parts start to fall under my fingers. Faster and faster each day. It is work for sure, but work that is attainable. Terrifying work...but a little amazing too.

A side bonus to the software is being able to go back and check my Pixies tab. Songs like Letter to Memphis or Mr Grieves that I long ago gave up learning the real part and wrote my own...I can now check and revise. In the case of Letter...I like my part better...but I might change Grieves. There are a couple of others too that I should check...like Lovely Day. Anyway...it is pretty awesome to be able to play just KiD's bass part and be certain what I'm hearing. Maybe in the pre-mp3 days everyone had such a clear shot at the low end. We live in an age of wonder, but we've lost some things too for sure.

I doubt that I'll ever REALLY feel confident about anything musical...but if I play this ska stuff for a year or more I will be in a totally different place in terms of speed and understanding scales and intervals. I hope that happens. I don't remember where my head was on day one with the Pixies. I remember Nimrod's Son coming to me out of thin air and thinking "yeah I can probably do this"...but I'm sure that I never could have imagined having 65 songs figured out, mastered, and memorized...with another 24 tabbed out and just waiting to be memorized. Looking back now it seems like it was easy and I discount it all. But there were so many, many hours spent. And now over two and a half years have passed. I've gone from "kinda maybe wanting to pick up the bass again" to feeling confident that I can reproduce note for note all of the parts of one of the most iconic female bass players in history. I probably shouldn't discount that so quickly. In three years I could feel totally confident playing any ska song you could throw at me...and then what? The mind boggles.