Walking Bass Lines with Chords - Page 2

by Christopher Sung Let's just look at the first 2 measures of a G blues for now and get really in-depth. The first thing we need is a bass line. Our chord progression here is: G7 - C7 - G7. Usually, for a bass note on the first beat, you want to use the root of the chord, so in measure 1, our first bass note is a G, since the chord is G7. Now we have 3 beats to get to the C7 in measure 2, and a common device is to approach this ascending chromatically. Thus, we use A, A#, and B to fill out measure 1. In measure 2, we do the same thing. The root of the chord is in beat 1 (C for C7), and we approach the G7 in measure 3 chromatically with the E, F, and F#. So, here is our bass line: