The Bass Players Bassist - The Elusive Pocket

[Music Playing] Hi, my name is Anthony Wayne. I am a bass player, a singer, and arranger, and producer, and currently musical director about the Crown Princess. A crew ship sailing out to the Caribbean. I held from Los Angeles California and I have been playing professionally for well over 25 years. This video is the first in a series of videos that I have developed called the illusive pocket player series. It is mainly the god for bass players and drummers but it can also help arrangers who want to learn how to put pocket on the things. And of course, we discussed what pocket playing actually is because it seems is there a lot of players that have heard with the phrase playing in the pocket. But there are a lot of players that do not know what it actually is. In this series, we will take a look at some real world examples as well as examine some of things that studio players have done in popular recordings. Now, I will be right up front with you and tell you that there are a lot of players that may not agree with what I am going to tell you and teach you in this video series. You maybe one of them but quite simply put that being said you or they are more than likely not pocket players. What is the secret to playing pocket? It is not really a big secret, it is just that some players do not practice it or do not know about it. In a nod shell, there is a marriage between the kick pattern and the bass pattern. Pocket playing is simply learning how to play as a sanction as suppose to playing solo. A kick drum and the base of the bottom the bed, most certainly the bottom of any recording that you might may. So, when there is no marriage and patterns are not similar, sometime the low end becomes very muddy. A monks pocket players, we call this overplaying or busy playing. Although, I can point out, some popular recordings where say this rule was observed and executed and say a 100% fashion. In other words, the base and kick drum are always together. In truth, it is not a 100% marriage. It is more like an 85% or 95% marriage at least to be able to say that you are creating a pocket. Now, pocket playing does not apply to all forms of music. Reggae, Latin styles, it might be the different approach but pocket playing can apply to most forms of music and it duly applies more often to not. You see some players tend to play what is fun to play without consideration of whether or not it contributes to the overall grove of the tune or grove of the section conversely laying down a grove is a repetitive exercise. It is the repetition that creates the grove. Now, do not get me wrong, I am not saying that music should not be fun to play on the contrary. There is a lot of fun to be had playing as a section, playing a tight grove is the section, is stronger than playing solo. Has more impact as we shall see in this series. [Music Playing] Let us take a look at a song I am sure you will recognize. Notice how the length of the notes, the bass notes are short to match the length of the kick drum sound. Yes, there is adlib but only at the end of the phrase.