Noodling

I've never been a noodler. I like to have a guidepost. I rarely screw around on my instrument. It occurs to me that a little noodling is a good thing though...so I've started doing it on bass in the last couple of weeks. I sit down, pick a note, and then try to figure out what's around there that sounds good too. I started with major and minor "box" patterns, but now I'm venturing out...to see what is outside the box but in the key...and what's outside all logic but sounds ok anyway.

Figuring out the relative placement of notes on the fingerboard seems like such a simple thing. But every time I sit down to noodle I figure out something that I hadn't realized. Oh! I can play that note HERE too. Huh.

I don't know how all of these pieces fit together. How does a lifetime of daily baby steps congeal into skill or technique or knoweldge? It just does. And it is easy to get stuck where you are and never make baby steps towards anything. And then when you make them you think...shit, why didn't I figure that out years ago.  And you also think...huh...not sure if this is useful or not. But the little tidbits...they stick together. And then one day someone asks you "how did you learn to do that" and you think "hell if I know...it just happened".

Those teenaged boys wanking their axes in their bedrooms...that's a whole lot of time and energy I wish I had. I missed the boat. But I'm trying to make up for lost time.