Bass Lesson: Build Speed, Strength And Accuracy On Bass, Even With Small Or Weak Hands

[Glenn Allen]

Since some of us have to lay down all the parts for our own songs, I thought I'd share my latest video lesson.  hope this helps some of you guitarist-turned bassists.

Quite a  few of my students are over 50, and their hands have taken some abuse over the years or just aren’t as nimble as they were when they were younger.

Some of them aspire to play some dexterity-driven pieces, like Chet Atkin’s “Mister Sandman” and “Maybelle” or even some simpler finger style pieces like The Beatles’ “Dear Prudence” and “Blackbird.”  These songs have a lot of quick chord changes, some of which require some stamina to play barre chords.

Others want to switch from playing guitar to learning the bass, but they lack the hand strength.

This exercise has helped my students with small, chubby, and weak hands build hand strength, speed, and stamina:

[Jim622]

Thank you for the post. I am primarily a guitarist and will definitely make use of this lesson.

[Rudi]

It never even occured to me to use hammer ons & pull off on bass.

I dont even use them much on guitar anymore.

 

I'll give it a whirl.

[The S]

Great stuff! Thanks Glenn!

[Glenn Allen]

It never even occured to me to use hammer ons & pull off on bass.

I dont even use them much on guitar anymore.

 

I'll give it a whirl.

Definitely, look at Jamereo Artis' bass line on Bruno Mars' Locked Out of Heaven.  Lot's of hammer-ons and very tasteful groove that serves the song perfectly.  Kind of reminds me of something Sting would have done during the Police era.