I’d like to offer several other thoughts for your consideration.

Listening...

The ability to listen is arguably the most valuable asset for musicianship. The adage rings true: it’s not how fast you play that counts, but rather how fast you listen. I encourage you to explore 3 particular areas of listening as it pertains to developing and refining groove abilities.

...TO THE GREAT GROOVERS

This can’t be overstated. There’s simply no substitute for spending time immersing yourself in great music from players who can really groove. As I expressed in the first lesson of The Art of Groove, Level 1, there are certainly aspects of grooving that can be examined empirically (many of which we have and will continue to explore throughout this series of courses)...but there is also undeniably a sensory/emotional/esoteric aspect of grooving that simply demands saturating oneself in the music. Right off the top of my head, I’d recommend immersing yourself in anything Marcus Miller has ever recorded, James Brown’s greatest hits 2-CD set, and James Jamerson’s work on the old Motown hits. That’s a ridiculously incomplete list, but a good place to start nonetheless. Listen both analytically, as well as just to how the grooves feel and what they communicate on a nonverbal level. Evaluate beat placement and work on emulating the playing of great groovers (not for the purpose of becoming a clone of one of the greats, but rather to use as a springboard for developing your own vocabulary).

...TO THE ENSEMBLE

When grooving in a rhythm section, it’s all about CONTEXT. What are the other members of the band playing, and how does your part fit into the overall picture? If we spend all of our time being bass-centric in our focus, we risk making inappropriate musical choices in the context of the whole. What someone else plays can have a big impact (either positive or negative) upon how well our bass line works at any given moment. Have “big ears” and compensate (with beat placement, phrasing, etc.) as necessary to ensure that the ensemble sounds good.

...TO THE DRUMMER

We’ve spent much of this course examining the crucial relationship and interaction between the bass & drums. Suffice it to say that we should be constantly attentive to the drums, listening for motifs and parts. The synergy that occurs when the bassist and drummer are working well together is one of the most enjoyable aspects of playing music, and is impossible to achieve if listening isn’t occurring.

Phrasing

I touched on it in Lesson 12, but must emphasize the importance of incorporating what I refer to as “the spice”: variations in dynamics, note durations, register, vibrato, slurs/hammers, etc. These phrasing considerations can go a LONG way toward making your grooves more musical and communicative. While immersing yourself in the music of the great groovers, spend some time evaluating their phrasing. You will probably find it to be an enormous part of why their playing is so effective. Anyway, as promised, more to come on this in The Art of Groove, Level 3.

“The Tape Don’t Lie”

...and neither does the MP3 recorder, hard drive or iPhone app!

In a number of exercises throughout this course, I’ve asked you to record yourself and listen back. This feedback can sometimes be painful, but is always valuable and objective. It’s interesting how things can sound and feel a certain way to you while you’re playing, but then sound completely different on playback. I wholeheartedly encourage you to regularly record yourself and use the feedback to continually improve your musicianship.

“Less is (Usually) More”

Economy of notes. In a lot of musical settings, the best way to approach the bass line is by imagining that someone is going to invoice us “per note” at the end of the gig! Yet how often we play “all” the notes, then enthusiastically ask, “You like that? Well, there are more where THOSE came from!”

Sparseness and leaving room for the other instruments works amazingly well in the vast majority of musical contexts.