The Duck Dunn Style Files
How YOU Can Incorporate The Ideas of Duck Dunn Into Your Bass Playing!
How To Learn From A Master Bass Player?
The process of learning from a master bass player - in this case Duck Dunn, but equally applicable to Jamerson, Flea, Jaco, Jack Bruce, Rocco, or anyone - is reasonably easy to understand and I think the process has been documented.
Basically you transcribe a bunch of tunes. Or get accurate transcriptions.
Then you analyze the bass lines looking for the devices player uses, the rhythms, the modifying devices, how he connects chords and so on.
And then you can assimilate those ideas into your own playing.
Fairly simple to understand.
But not easy.
Even if you can get accurate transcriptions (ideally 25 to 50) of your favourite player, it still requires a heavy time investment analyzing the lines and looking for the unique way each player approaches creating bass lines.
What If There Was An Easier - And Quicker - Way?
Sometimes you don't need to dive into the minutia of a bass player's style. Sometimes you can apply the 80-20 principle to this....you get 80% of the results with 20% of the effort.
Unless you're playing for a band like The Bootleg Beatles where everything has to be spot on, 80% of the results will give you an authentic vibe for 99% of the people!
Not only will taking the 80-20 approach save you time, but I've already done the process of picking out the 80% and packaging it into a condensed collection of Style Files for you!
Introducing The Duck Dunn Style Files
Over the upcoming months I'm going to be releasing a series of "Style Files" that take the majority of the hard work out of taking ideas from players like Duck Dunn, Mccartney,Rocco Prestia (both swing and 16th note), Geddy Lee, Berry Oakley and so on and using them in your own playing.
The Duck Dunn Style File is the first of these releases and covers Duck's R&B playing with Stax plus also there's a deeper dive into his blues playing as demonstrated in his Masterpiece bass line for Sweet Home Chicago with The Blues Brothers.
The important thing to note though: the ideas covered can be used in multiple genres. The primary difference between genres is mainly rhythmic.
Why Should I Listen To You?
Here's A Picture Of Part Of My Amazon.com Bookshelf (14 out of 22 titles pictured):
Since July 2021 I've been turning my years of teaching into books. So far I've written 23.
My advice: click this link for LEARNING FROM JAMES JAMERSON VOL 1 and then check out the reviews. That will tell you more about my teaching than almost anything, though there are some testimonials below too.
One other fact to consider about this: Amazon's data says that most books get 1 or 2 reviews per 1000 copies purchased. Jamerson Vol 1 currently has 241 reviews on Amazon.com from around 3000 copies sold since its release in 2021...so the fact that it's getting 50X the number of reviews that Amazon's own data suggests it should be getting, tells its own story.
In case you don't want to go and read those reviews, I took screenshots of three of them for you to read. Here's the first:
Here's another - I like this one!
And here's a third:
What You Will Learn
Here's What You'll Learn In The Duck Dunn Style Files:
Duck's Bass Vocabulary (Both R&B and Blues)
Duck arrived on the scene with Stax with a foundational vocabulary already developed. While that vocabulary did grow over his time at Stax and he incorporated some new ideas, it was reasonably developed from Day 1. If I had to summarize Duck, I’d say: great lines made of foundational ideas played with great time.
Note that vocabulary encompasses the devices Duck used, how he put those devices together, modifying devices and rhythmic vocabulary.
Distinct 'Stylistic' Approaches
There are three distinct stylistic approaches covered in The Duck Dunn Style Files: the predominantly straight 8th note R&B stax style; how this was varied with 16th notes in later (and lesser known) Stax tunes as well as great performances like She Caught The Katy, and the blues as exemplified in Sweet Home Chicago.
'Device Exercises'
For each stylistic sub-section there are devices listed that Duck uses…some ‘origin’ exercises are included in the Style Files so you can practice those devices in all 12 keys.
80-20 Song Sheets Of Duck's Lines
I’ve also included some of the analyzed bass lines I’ve used to create the style files. These are presented in 80-20 Notation format – which means you’ll need to understand roman numeral chord notation as well as be able to understand chord degree annotation (which is pretty simple?.
Devices And Two Chord Movements
The different devices in Duck’s vocabulary don’t work for every two chord movement. As well as Origin Devices for each of Duck’s favourite and most used devices, an ‘index’ of two chord movements is also included that you can use when creating your own bass lines.
What Other People Say?
Here's What Bass Players Just Like You Say About My Teaching - here's Rodi:
And Paulia:
And Rob (and Goran):
What Do I Get?
Here's What You Get When You Join The Duck Dunn Style Files:
The Stylistic Breakdowns
Each of the main Duck Dunn sub-styles covered will be broken down into constituent elements (devices, modifying devices, rhythms, chord connections). Each of these sub-styles will then be demonstrated using common chord progressions or song chord progressions, and bass line examples are created in each sub-styles. All examples are fully annotated. Examples are presented in either 80-20 Notation or Notation and tab. Plus there’s video of the examples so you can see and hear them being played.
Downloadable PDFs For Each Sub-Section
Each Sub-Section has a PDF version that you can download to print out and make notes from.
Downloadable MP3 Practice Tracks
For practice exercises and practice songs there will be realistic, band-style MP3 tracks generated by Band In A Box that you can download and use in your practice space.
The Million Dollar Question - How Much Is Enrollment?
If you were going to do THIS work yourself you'd either have to transcribe 30 to 50 songs yourself OR you could start with Soulfingers (which retails at $20) and analyze bass lines from there.
Depending on how accurate you are at identifying 80-20 devices, and how much you know about putting them together....on top of your $20 investment for Soul Fingers you'll also have to invest at least 50 hours of time transcribing further songs, analyzing and systemizing the ideas in Duck's bass lines.
I don't know how you value your time...and we've not even factored in opportunity cost ...but I'm guessing it would be more than $20 an hour...which equates to over $1000 in 'cost.'
Or you could just enroll on The Duck Dunn Style Files for a less than a tenth of that and be working on applying Duck's ideas to YOUR bass playing at your next practice session.
There are two options open to you. The Deluxe Version of THE DUCK DUNN STYLE FILES is just...
Your investment today is.....
Video Examples
I wanted to share three video examples to show you the kind of lines that YOU could create. The first one is a funky, 16th note style:
The second example is a swing 8th note bass line - based on Duck's swing 8th ntoe playing and devices - but to an R&B style chord progression:
The third example is a straight 8th note bass line in Duck's style - but played on a rock bass line to show you how versatile his approach is!