Palen Music Center Quick Note Monday, January 21, 2008   The PMC Quick Note is a weekly service provided to all area directors.  It is part of our mission to support the lives of band directors across the Midwest.  The weekly Quick Note contains helpful tips and suggestions from area directors, spotlights on area college and university band programs, calendars of upcoming events, advocacy articles promoting music education, links to helpful web resources, and much more.  Comments, suggestions, ideas, and articles are always welcome.   Looking for help on a particular topic? Be sure to check out our Quick Note Catalog of back issues.

---

Beginning Bass Mega-Resource!
For many directors, equipping a jazz band with ample brass and saxes is not a problem. There are usually a handful of drummers who have been begging to play drumset since they started in band, and it is not hard to find a piano player to at least play a written chart. One of the difficulties is to find a bass player who can play at all...especially in junior high groups or in smaller high schools. Very few teachers have the knowledge base to teach bass, even if they have the equipment and an interested student. The good news is that there are wonderful web resources to help.

The site we are going to highlight is www.studybass.com. The tool on their site that is particularly helpful is Scale and Chord Tone Printer. To see the chord tones in a particular key, choose the "chord" tab, then select the root and chord quality. In the example below, we will choose "F" and "dominant 7th".: (Note: You must have Flash already installed on your computer.)

You will then see the following printout of the fretboard:

The beginning student can look at the fretboard, see the notes, and locate where they fall on the bass fretboard. This can be done to show scale patterns as well. The student can then print out the image for further study.

Another really cool thing on the site are the exercises. You can see the pattern, the notes, and even listen to the example:

You can even subscribe to an RSS feed to be notified of new lessons and other information added to the site. For some further reading, check out an article on common mistakes beginning bass players make.

---

Contact Your Local Palen Music Center

Can we assist you with anything?  Please contact your local Palen Music Center school road representative for all of your music education needs.