This article is written by Toru Hoshino, a jazz bassist and instructor based in Japan who teaches online lessons to students worldwide. In this article, he shares one simple scale you can fall back on whenever you’re test-playing a bass at a music store.
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What to Play When Test-Driving a Bass at the Store
You want to try out a bass at the store, but you have no idea what to play… and then the person next to you starts ripping through some insane slap lines, and suddenly you lose your nerve. Sound familiar? I think most bassists have been there at least once.
Even if that’s you, playing just this one thing will make you sound like you know exactly what you’re doing. Check out this short video first β the first 10 seconds or so is enough.
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DX5H-7TKQgC/
Feel free to follow my Instagram too, if you’re up for it π
Just go back and forth across the scale shown there, and it’ll sound pretty good almost right away.
About the Scale
Technically speaking, this is an F minor pentatonic scale with a flat 5th added.
It takes the notes FβAββBββBβCβEβ and lays them out across an easy-to-finger area as BβCβEββFβAββBββC.
This scale also works for blues improvisation in F, so it’s worth keeping in your back pocket if you ever want to try soloing. Move your fingers through it and get a feel for that bluesy sound while you’re testing out the bass.
Little tricks like this are great for sounding confident in the moment β but building real soloing vocabulary on top of them is where a teacher’s eye makes the biggest difference.
Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?
This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone β and where having a teacher makes all the difference.
At Line on Bass, I offer an online lesson service where you send me a video of your playing, and I give you specific, detailed feedback β every single day if you want.
Students from around the world are using this to fix exactly these kinds of issues and steadily improve their jazz bass skills.