Learning To Jam

by Jesse Engel This lesson is geared towards giving you the basics to be able to jam with your friends. I'm primarily a guitar player, so whenever i've been playing bass in the last couple of years, it's been while jamming. This means that all I had to work with is a chord progression. The simplest way to jam over a chord progression is to just play the root of the chord. For easy reference, here is a nifty diagram of the fretboard:

As a Jammer, knowing the names of the root notes is probably one of THE most important things, because it makes it easy to play with others. If you ask someone what they're playing, many times, all you have to do is play the root of their chords. Its the strongest note you can play, and gives a foundation to the music. It's an instant recipe for music and, no matter how good you get, you're never too good to play the root, because the root really does groove.

Here is an almost overused example which you have probobly heard a million times(Stairway to Heaven, All Along the Watchtower, Nothing Else Matters... one of the most common chord progressions in rock).

In the Key of Amin it is (Amin, G, F,G).