Author: 1982toru0113@gmail.com

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Seven Walking Bass Techniques You Can Practice Over One Chord Progression

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 breaks down seven different ways to build a walking bass line over the same chord progression.

The progression used throughout this lesson is Em7 → A7 → Dm7 → G7, looped over and over. Trying out different approaches to walking bass on a single repeating progression is a great way to expand your vocabulary — work this into your daily practice and you’ll start hearing a lot more options open up in your own lines.

Performance Video: 7 Variations on a 4-Beat Bass Line (With Tab)

What I Was Focused on in Each Variation

1. Building from Chord Tones (0:32)

The most basic foundation for any walking bass line is chord tones. Start by balancing the root, 3rd, 5th, and 7th of each chord as you build your line — this is the base that every other approach builds on.

A walking bass line built from chord tones over Dm7, G7, Em7, and A7

2. Adding Scales (0:46)

Layering scale tones on top of chord tones smooths out the line’s motion. With more notes available, you get more freedom and a more natural-sounding flow.

A walking bass line that incorporates scale tones for smoother motion

3. Reaching Into a Slightly Higher Register (1:03)

Try working in the 7th–11th fret range. Once you’re comfortable using the mid-register and not just the low end, your range of variations multiplies.

A walking bass line using a higher register on the neck

4. Syncopation (1:16)

Adding syncopation injects rhythmic motion into an otherwise quarter-note-driven line. Weaving in eighth notes or dotted quarters against the 4-beat feel creates a much more expressive rhythmic character.

A syncopated walking bass line

5. Working in Ghost Notes (1:32)

Ghost notes — non-pitched percussive hits — add a percussive nuance to your rhythm. Even a small amount goes a long way toward boosting the groove and feel of the line.

A walking bass line incorporating ghost notes

6. High-Position Approaches (1:48)

One of walking bass’s flashier techniques is approaching a chord from a high position on the neck. It looks effortless when done well, but it isn’t something you can improvise cold — it takes some dedicated prep work before you can use it freely.

A walking bass line using a high-position approach into the next chord

7. Starting the Bar on a Note Other Than the Root (2:02)

You don’t always have to land on the root on beat 1. Starting from a different chord tone — say, the 3rd or the 5th — makes the line flow more smoothly and gives it a more distinctly jazz-like character.

A walking bass line that starts a bar on a chord tone other than the root

A lot of players assume the root has to land on beat 1 — and as a foundation, that’s absolutely correct. But once you’re comfortable with the basics, starting on the 3rd or 5th instead, in service of a smoother line, becomes a real option. I find this works especially well in jazz walking bass compared to rock or funk lines. That said, treat this as something to add once your fundamentals are solid, not something to reach for right away.

Summary

Walking bass opens up once you start combining chord tones, scales, register choices, rhythmic devices, ghost notes, position shifts, and approach notes. Try working these seven techniques into your practice a little at a time, and you’ll steadily build out your own bag of tricks.

A Question I Got Afterward

“What should I do when I can’t think of a walking line in the middle of a session?”

This depends a lot on your current skill level, but the most important thing is usually: don’t try to do anything too advanced right out of the gate.

People often imagine walking bass requires a constant variety of note choices and rhythms — and sure, if you listen to a great player, that’s exactly what you hear. But early on, just being able to use:

  • The root
  • The 5th
  • The octave
  • Chromatic approach notes

is enough to build a line that sounds reasonably convincing. I’d recommend prioritizing getting comfortable with just these first. If you push yourself to play something unusual too soon, your time can fall apart and your rhythm gets shaky.

In an actual session, a steady, in-tune line matters a lot more than a clever one — and it’s what the rest of the band is actually counting on you for. Once you’ve got some breathing room, start layering in 3rds and 7ths, and gradually expand your note choices from there.

Working through all seven of these on your own is a lot to juggle — a teacher can usually tell you exactly which one to focus on next for your playing specifically.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

A Rhythm Drill That Makes Your Time Feel Rock-Solid (The “Pasta” Method)

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 a rhythm drill that makes your walking bass time feel dramatically more solid.

Who This Is For

✅️ You want your 4-beat feel to actually lock in with the drummer
✅️ Your walking bass timing feels unstable
✅️ Playing straight quarter notes still doesn’t sound like jazz
✅️ You want a more natural swing “roll” in your feel
✅️ You don’t feel a satisfying groove when playing with a rhythm section

If any of that sounds familiar, this drill is worth trying. Here’s a 1-minute video first:

The idea is to split each quarter note into a triplet, and place the metronome on the 3rd note of that triplet.

It’s on the harder side if you’re just starting out, but it’s extremely effective for building a stronger sense of swing.

Let’s break it down.

How to Practice: Quarter Notes Against a Triplet’s 3rd Beat

Here’s the breakdown of how to count it.

1. Start by setting your metronome to play straight triplets.

A metronome click set to play straight eighth-note triplets

2. Next, feel the metronome’s click as landing on the 3rd note of each triplet.

The metronome click reinterpreted as landing on the third note of each triplet

3. With the metronome still landing on the 3rd note, play a quarter note on the 1st note of each triplet.

A quarter note played on the first note of each triplet, against the metronome on the third

4. Put together, it looks like this:

The full pattern combining the quarter notes and the metronome's triplet placement

5. Counting “1-2-3, 1-2-3” out loud while you play gets tiring fast, so let’s swap in some easier syllables instead:

Each triplet counted as the syllables PA-su-TA, like the word pasta, with TA circled

Each triplet gets counted as “PA-su-TA” — like the word “pasta.” Pick on the “PA,” and the metronome should land on the “TA.”

Pick on the “PA”

Practice so the metronome lands on the “TA”

That’s the whole drill.

Important

In a real ensemble, the drummer’s accent very often lands right on that “TA” position.

This also trains you to feel a longer note value than a standard off-beat drill would.

For those reasons, this drill is genuinely effective for building a stronger swing feel.

Rhythm feel like this is notoriously hard to self-check — a teacher listening from the outside can usually tell in seconds whether your “TA” is actually landing where it should.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

What Is Bebop? I Explained It to My Wife (And I’ll Explain It to You)

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 explains what bebop actually is — using the same explanation he gave his own wife.

My wife asked me, “So what actually is bebop, anyway?” and I gave her this quick answer:

It sounds old-fashioned. It’s fast, built on eighth notes. It’s mostly played on horns.

That’s maybe half-right, but obviously not a complete answer — so here’s the fuller explanation I gave her afterward, shared with everyone else who’s ever wondered the same thing.

What I Explained to My Wife

Back around 1930, something called “swing jazz” became huge.

It was played by big bands — large ensembles — and it was really popular, crowd-pleasing music, made for people to dance to.

But some musicians got bored of playing “easy-to-follow music meant for dancing,” and started thinking, “let’s get more into the weeds with this.”

After their regular swing-band gigs ended for the night, they’d head to jazz clubs in a neighborhood in New York called Harlem and play there late into the night.

They’d play insanely fast tempos — way too fast to dance to — full of complex improvisation.

That playing style, and the era it came from, is what we now call collectively “bebop.”

The biggest, most charismatic figure within bebop was an alto saxophonist named Charlie Parker — who later became a mentor to Miles Davis, the player who’d go on to be called jazz’s “king.” Worth remembering his name.

That’s roughly what I told her. It’s a pretty rough sketch, but I think it’s basically accurate. (lol)

You can find plenty of this online if you look it up, but knowing a bit of the historical backstory tends to make listening to the music even more interesting.

Finally, here are two well-known recordings — one swing, one bebop:

Swing jazz:

Bebop:

Same broad genre, completely different feel, right? Which one do you like better?

Hearing the difference is one thing — actually getting your own playing to swing like that is another, and that gap is exactly where a teacher’s ear helps most.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

My System for Finding What Jazz to Listen to Next (Without Getting Overwhelmed)

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 his own personal system for figuring out what jazz to listen to next, without getting overwhelmed.

“I want to listen to more jazz, but I don’t know where to start” — I get this question constantly.

Jazz sounds pretty different depending on the era and the region, so it’s no surprise a lot of people aren’t sure where to dive in. I was the exact same way.

When people first recommended Charlie Parker or Miles Davis to me, I remember thinking, “I’m sure this is great, but why is everyone recommending horn players to me? I’m a bassist.”

It was only after listening to a lot more, over time, that I started to figure out what “my own kind of jazz” actually was.

So here’s the system I personally recommend for the “I don’t know what jazz to listen to” problem:

Buy one book of essential jazz albums, and listen to one page a day.

I’ve personally kept this habit going for over 10 years now.

Listen to every album in the book → buy the next essential-albums book → listen to all of those too. I’m still doing this on repeat.

There are still albums in there I don’t fully “get,” but this habit has made it a lot clearer over time what era, what mood, and which artists I actually gravitate toward.

If you’re stuck on “what should my first album even be,” starting this way is a solid option. Here’s the book I’d personally recommend (Japanese-language book, but the artist and album names are still useful as a reference): https://amzn.asia/d/0cazJwN7

But if you’re someone who still doesn’t know where to start even with that —

Eddie Higgins Trio, “You Are Too Beautiful”

is a great pick.

It’s genuinely easy to listen to while still having that real jazz atmosphere, and it was a favorite among the members of my online community, “Bebop Practice Group,” too.

It’s less “difficult and hard to follow” and more “huh, I like this” — a really good entry point. 🙂

Figuring out your own taste in jazz takes a lot of listening on your own — but a teacher who’s already done that listening can point you toward the right starting point a lot faster.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

The Time I Quit a Band (and Bass) Because I Couldn’t Keep Up

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 a more personal story — about the time he quit a band, and almost quit bass entirely, because he couldn’t keep up.

This one’s a little more personal than usual, but anyone who’s taken music seriously hits a wall at some point, so I wanted to share my own story in case it resonates with someone.

When I was 26, I joined a rock band — I’ll call it “M-Rocks” here. The singer was genuinely successful on a major-label level, and I got the call after their previous bassist left.

That previous bassist — I’ll call him “S” — went on to back famous, universally recognized artists and even played at the Budokan. Even back in the M-Rocks days, he had a ton of charisma as a player.

I’d had a decent run in the rock scene myself at that point, so his track record didn’t faze me — I joined with a “let’s do this” attitude.

Once I actually started playing with them, though, the level was just way beyond me. I couldn’t keep up at all.

I got chewed out at every rehearsal. No matter how much I tried to adjust, I just didn’t fit the band’s sound. My technique, my tone, my arranging sense — none of it was working, and my confidence cratered.

After about a year, I came to terms with “I can’t do this band,” and ended up leaving.

And I quit bass entirely.

I genuinely could not play like S could. This was about 16 years ago now.

Time passed. Eventually, for a bunch of reasons, I came back to music, and more recently I’d been playing live shows as a support bassist for a rock band.

Then one day, at a multi-band show, it turned out we were sharing a bill with — of all people — S’s band.

The moment I saw his face backstage, my honest first instinct was to run. But instead, he opened with:

“Hey, Toru! Long time. Why’d you quit the band, anyway?”

“Here it comes,” I thought — and answered honestly:

“I just couldn’t play anywhere near your level. It broke me.”

And he said:

“Yeah, I get that. Funny enough, I went through the same thing later — got fired from a recording session with [a huge name], couldn’t cut it, and cried about it.”

That’s when it hit me: there’s always someone further up the ladder.

And it’s exactly because he’d had that kind of bruising experience himself that he could say something like that to me.

After leaving M-Rocks, I happened to get into jazz, and that’s the road that eventually led me here. But for a long time, I carried this quiet guilt — the feeling that I’d quit that band because I “couldn’t keep up.”

Talking to S again after all these years, I felt that guilt finally lift.

It’s a bit like 16 years of unresolved dominant tension finally landing on the tonic. Sixteen years on a G7, and I finally got my CΔ7. Way too long, honestly. (lol)

We ended up just talking normally after that. I told him I’m now playing jazz and upright bass, and working professionally as a bass instructor — and he was genuinely happy for me, which meant a lot.

Whether you’re a pro or not, if you take music seriously for long enough, you end up with all kinds of experiences — good ones, frustrating ones, exhausting ones. But I think that only happens because you were taking it seriously enough for it to matter in the first place.

Hard to put into words exactly, but that’s how it feels.

Like I said, hitting a wall is basically guaranteed if you take music seriously. And still —

If you’re gritting your teeth and sticking with it through that wall, you’re already a lot stronger than I was back then. Whatever’s waiting on the other side of it, I hope you get to grab hold of it.

So — a slightly more emotional story than usual today.

Hitting a wall like that is exactly the moment having someone in your corner matters most — someone who can tell you whether it’s really a skill gap or just the wrong next step.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

The Moment You Recognize a Phrase You’ve Practiced, In a Real Recording

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 why recognizing a practiced phrase inside a real recording is a bigger milestone than it seems.

A student of mine recently told me something like this:

“I was listening to a jazz recording, and a phrase I learned in a lesson just showed up naturally in the music — I actually heard it.”

That’s a genuinely great sign of progress.

Jazz can be enjoyed casually as background music, sure, but every single note carries musical ideas and phrasing that earlier generations of players spent years refining — and those ideas stacking on top of each other is what creates a rich ensemble sound.

Understanding all of that fully obviously isn’t easy. But “I sort of recognized that phrase” is real proof your ear is developing — and it’s the direct result of consistent daily practice.

I’ve had this experience myself. Back when I was still a beginner, jazz would be playing quietly in some bar, and I’d suddenly think, “wait, I’ve practiced that phrase before,” or “oh, this is that tune from that recording.” Those moments made me genuinely happy, and made me realize how much had actually built up over time.

If you’ve noticed jazz starting to sound different to you than it used to — if you’re catching phrases here and there that feel familiar — that’s a sign you’re practicing in a really good direction. Hold onto that feeling, and keep enjoying the process.

The more depth you can hear in jazz, the more your day-to-day relationship with music — and honestly your overall happiness — tends to shift too.

Noticing your own ear developing is one thing — but a teacher can usually tell you exactly which phrases are about to “click” for you next.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Is Music Theory Actually Necessary?

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 his honest take on whether you actually need to learn music theory.

Short answer: you can absolutely enjoy playing in a band without knowing any theory. If your hands move reasonably well and you can read tab, you can play. I was living proof of that myself.

When I first started playing, I was in punk bands, and for the first six years or so I didn’t understand any music theory at all. I still enjoyed playing live, and I even recorded and sold CDs.

But as I kept playing more seriously, I started running into the same frustrations more and more:

  • My phrases never got any more varied
  • My songwriting kept falling into the same patterns
  • I kept hitting some vague wall I couldn’t name

“I want to get better, but I don’t know how” — that’s when I started learning theory.

I bought a theory book and worked through it slowly, but I still didn’t really get it, so I started taking lessons at a local music school. Working with a teacher who explained things carefully, the understanding gradually stuck.

Honestly, it’s not something that clicks instantly or shows up in your playing right away. But at some point, it hits you:

“Oh — so that’s why this phrase I’d been playing by feel actually works.”

That moment is genuinely exciting. It’s like the dots suddenly connecting. That’s what really got my motivation going.

Once theory clicks, you get:

  • More phrase options to draw from
  • More range in your own songwriting
  • More credibility when explaining things to your bandmates

Naturally, how you see music changes too. To be clear — you don’t need theory to enjoy music. But if you’re feeling like “I want to get to the next level” or “I want to break through this wall I can’t quite name,” learning theory is a genuinely great way to do that.

No need to rush. One step at a time.

That feeling of hitting a wall you can’t quite name is exactly the kind of thing a teacher can usually name for you immediately.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

A Simple Way to Avoid Repetitive Bass Lines: Change the Octave of the Root

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 a one-change fix for walking bass lines that feel repetitive.

“My walking bass lines always end up feeling repetitive” is a question I hear constantly. When that comes up, instead of suggesting you change everything at once, I usually recommend changing just one thing: the octave of the root.

Say you’ve got a bass line like this one. The first time through, you play it in the position you’re used to:

A bass line over Gm7 to B-flat-minor, played in a familiar position

The second time through, shift the G in bar 1 up (or down) an octave:

The same line with the root shifted an octave, changing how it leads into the next chord

The caption in the second image reads: “Changing the octave naturally changes the movement that follows it, too.”

That one change alone naturally changes how you approach the next bar, B♭m7, and shifts the overall feel of the whole line.

When you try to avoid repetition by changing every single note or phrase at once, it’s often too much to keep track of, and you end up not landing on the line you actually wanted. Instead, just try “shifting the octave of the root” — that alone creates a real, musical sense of change.

Give it a try.

One-change fixes like this are exactly the kind of thing that are easy to overlook on your own — a teacher can spot the repetitive pattern and suggest the fix in seconds.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

The Best Players Keep Their Rests Just as Accurate as Their Notes

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 the one habit that separates more experienced players from the rest: accurate rests.

I review a lot of practice videos from students, and it teaches me just as much as it teaches them. There’s one thing I notice that makes me think, “this person’s good — they’ve probably had real music lessons before.”

It’s accurate rest timing.

A surprising number of players nail every eighth note and quarter note in a phrase, but then just let the last note ring out indefinitely instead of stopping it. If the notation says “half rest,” the correct performance is two full beats of actual silence.

A two-beat rest marked in the notation, circled in red

The more advanced a player is, the more precisely they tend to respect rests and note lengths exactly as written.

I noticed this constantly back when I used to host jam sessions, too — the stronger players in the room were almost always the ones with the most accurate rests.

This is something you can improve a lot just by paying attention day to day, so if you’re self-taught, it’s well worth focusing on rest length specifically. I’m reminding myself here too — it’s easy to get sloppy about it in daily practice.

I’ve also made a basic drill video for practicing accurate rests and note lengths. Just press play and run through 7 minutes of daily basic practice.

Subscribe to my YouTube channel here for more daily practice videos like this.

Timing details like rest length are easy to overlook in your own playing — exactly the kind of thing a teacher catches in seconds.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →

Posted on by — Leave a comment

Why Listening Closely Is the Real Key to Nailing High-Position Intonation

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 the one habit that matters most when practicing intonation in the high positions.

In the online community I run, “Bebop Practice Group,” we’re currently working through tunes that use the high positions a lot. It’s genuinely tough — upright bass especially makes you feel just how unforgiving intonation can be up there.

The higher up the neck you go, the narrower the spacing between notes gets, so even a tiny slip becomes much more audible as an intonation problem.

When it comes to copying a high-position line, I keep coming back to the same, almost too-obvious conclusion:

Listen to the phrase closely. Really closely.

That’s really what it comes down to.

When you’ve listened closely enough, you build a mental image of exactly what that phrase’s pitch should sound like. Then, the moment you play it even slightly off, you catch it yourself — “oh, that wasn’t quite right.”

On the flip side, if that mental pitch image stays vague, you’re much more likely to end up not even knowing what note you’re currently playing — especially up in the high positions.

Nailing a specific high-position note on the first try, especially on upright bass, is genuinely difficult. That’s exactly why training your ear to hear the correct pitch in your head — before your fingers even move — matters so much.

I’ve been getting back into high-position practice myself recently, and it’s been really rewarding. There’s nothing quite like the feeling of nailing a high-position note dead center.

Pitch in the high positions is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to self-diagnose — your ear adjusts to your own slight inaccuracies without you noticing, which is where a second pair of ears really helps.

Want Personalized Feedback on Your Playing?

This is exactly the kind of thing that’s hard to fix alone — 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 — 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.

Check Out the Lesson Service →