Walking the bass between chords

[Clifford G]

Would love to see a lesson on the how and whys of walking bass to move from one chord to another- especially in fingerpicking. Thoughts?

[Dieter]

Hello Clifford,
here a Video-lesson about Walking-Bass for Finger-picking at the Guitar. Unfortunately it is only in German language. But from about minute 6:00 on there are 5 lessons you can look at. I hope, I could help you a bit.

Dieter

Walking Bass at Guitar

[Dieter]

Hello Clifford,
here also the tabs to that 5 lessons.

Dieter

[sunjamr]

I never really thought about it, but I do it all the time. Mainly it’s just going from your lowest root note up or down to the root note of the next chord.

Sunjamr Steve

[JoLa]

That’s a good question or an idea, Clifford.
I always thought that by playing the bass note we hint on or establish the next chord. EP277 is a good example of that.
I also learned that in Travis picking, when we alternate between the 6th and 5th string, we always start with the 5th string right before the A/Am chord (A note), start on a 4th string before a D/Dm chord (D note) etc, which again, establishes the next chord.
You may want to check out the LEG031 Chet Atkins lesson, if you haven’t yet, where Brian explains a lot about that.

🎸JoLa

[jim b]

I agree, been doing some research on walking up and down from one chord to another. would be nice to know the logic behind it instead of just memorizing a bunch of frets.

[Bob S]

Clifford,

I never like to talk rules when it comes to music, but there are some general rules with walking bass lines.

First the bass is mostly quarter notes. First beat of the measure is the root of the chord. Fourth beat of the measure is a half step above or below the next chord root (assuming the chord changes in the next bar). Chord stabs are on the and of one or the and following the next chord change. There is no formula to get from beat one to four. Depends on the chords. I would say use your ear. Scale runs or chord tones are good.

When starting, it helps to have chord changes every measure or every half measure. Trying to come up with a line for four measures (in a standard blues) is difficult. I was watching a video on walking bass lines, and the recommendation was to write out your lines. Do a lot of them, and don’t try improvising them without a lot of practice.

Hope that helps.

Bob

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