Bass Lessons 12/27/2012

I've given up on the post naming convention of "lesson one...lesson two" because I'm lost as to where I am now. So on to using dates instead.

Last night I had her slowly take me through the major scale in thirds exercise in both one position and also the two octave across all four strings in multiple position thing. I think I get it more now. I really need to work on this. It was funny to ask her to slow it down...because it messed her up. She's so used to doing it fast it was hard for her to slow down and deconstruct it.

She emphasized that the exercise is about keeping your fingers close to the fingerboard to improve efficiency. My fingers do not want to hear that. Especially my middle finger, which seems hell bent on flying up and flipping off the audience constantly. Seriously. It is like it is on a spring.

We spent a little time talking about the blues...and about blues scales and about what the bass plays.  We also talked a little bit about pentatonic scales. I followed about half of what she said. I've pretty much forgotten it all now. I'm really not sure that any of it matters.

I keep thinking that if I just try...that I will understand music theory. But I just don't. I mean I get super simple stuff...but even that I have trouble remembering (like the intervals of the major and minor scales...or what the key signature for various keys are). But the more complex stuff totally goes over my head. It reminds me a bit of electronics...no matter how hard I tried or how much people tried to explain it to me I just couldn't understand. My brain is apparently built for certain things only.

Again I'm left not knowing where to head with lessons next time. Perhaps something will occur to me by then.