Frank Paul's "Rapid Fire Bass" for Stick and Inverted-Fifths Instruments

[traktor]

Hello, Tappistry Folk,

After several years, Frank Paul's book on 'Rapid Fire Bass' is back in print.

This is a method book showing how to play driving bass patterns for Stick-Tuned instruments ("Inverted-Fifths"). The book is Frank Paul's orderly method of presenting pulsing bass patterns, which seem to me to be very similar to the impressive bass technique developed by Emmett Chapman, and which you can hear on many of his recordings. "Rapid Fire Bass" is printed with comb binding, has 110 pages, and contains a wide variety of bass exercises, rhythmic patterns, and fingering techniques. All the music is done in standard notation with tablature and fingerings.

"Rapid Fire Bass" is has been re-published by Mobius Megatar (Megatar.Com (http://megatar.com/english/)), and is available through our EBay Megatar Store (http://stores.ebay.com/megatarstore/), where it comes with an included copy of our own "Easy Touch-Style Bassics" (method book on cd).

Some day, we hope to obtain a re-write of this book for bass strings tuned in Fourths, for our 'BassBottom' tuning, and for folks who play 8-string bass, but that's in the future. Our Megatar players and Stick players with bass strings in Fourths can perhaps adapt the technique, though it would take some work. At present, however, all Stick, Warr, and Mobius players who use Chapman's standard 'Inverted-Fifths' bass tuning might find this book of interest.

-- Traktor Topaz

[rjgoos]

Traktor,

Is this book mostly focused towards those who play rock-style music?

Anything there for the more mellow-music-inclined?


Jay

[traktor]

Hello, rj,

It's kind of hard to answer your question. The technique is based on roots and fifths and other scale steps, and when you play them fast you create a driving, powerful bassline, very similar to what you've heard Emmett Chapman play on many recordings.

The book focuses on:
* One-Handed Rudiments
* Contrapuntal Rudiments
* Two-Handed Melodic Bass Technique
* Two-Handed Percussive Technique, and
* Two-Handed Funk Technique

So, as you can imagine, you could immediately apply the technique (at high speed) to funk and fusion and rock, and of course you could apply the same technique (at slower speeds) to ballads, salads, and greens. Oops! I meant to say ballads and other types of music.

When you think about it, most bass is *supportive* both harmonically and rhythmically. And, as a correllary idea, it works out that most bass techniques can go cross-genre. That is, walking bass can be applied of course to jazz, but it also works well (at slower tempos) to most ballads, some latin, and some rock.

But of course, the main purpose of the book is to teach the driving bass rhythms, often modal in nature, which are similar to the bass techniques Chapman developed.

As always, the Mobius Universal Guarantee applies. If you find the book anything less than delightful, return it (in same condition) within seven days for refund of purchase price (less shipping).

Also, it is highly likely that someone here on this list or on other lists will have already studied the book, and can probably give feedback about it.

[Rayzcane]

One thing that a book like this needs is some audio examples on a CD!

Here is one of the examples in the book, chosen at random:

Mixed Motors, #39, Page 22

In the attached midi of this example, each line is played twice, as indicated in the book.

The first line is an Acoustic Bass
The 2nd line is Electric Finger Bass
The 3rd line is Electric Pick Bass
The 4th line is Fretless Bass

Ray Langley