then
and
where of this
bizarre instruments built by couple Yorkshire weavers in 1840
is called a contrabass and also known
as an anaconda
it's huge and ungainly its kinda cross between a hole on a reptile
and it makes not entirely beautiful hooting noise
ones
the rim
it never really caught on but the deep tremendous sounds tried to make
did big-time the
0
base is music's youngest element it's only been around for centuries
but since then it's been on an extraordinary journey
the baseline a piece of music is its foundation its roots
these days is an essential component to practically all the music you hear
of so this program
is about how base works
in the
what
this music made famous by the Stanley Kubrick movie
2001 a Space Odyssey is by the German composer Ricard Strauss
and was actually written in Munich in 1896
one of its most distinguishing features once been imitated by thousands a
science-fiction thriller and horror movie schools
is the long held bass notes that begins it
its or some bottom see and
its big its deep and its powerful came to stand in our minds for a sense of
menace
all wonder or infinity just this one note
I'll but there are loads examples
a bass lines that give a piece of music its style
and its shape the
the rules
served
looked
ok
0
them
I'll
bro
well
bro it's fun to think that there was once a time when composers didn't have
at their fingertips the power and debt
up a dedicated baseline but the gradual emergence
base is a force in its own right is inextricably tied up in western music
with the development what has been called tonality
10 ality is a catch-all term that describes the whole package being greedy
ins
that make western music sound different from all the other music
world
at its heart Archies and combs to understand base
at its simplest level we need to know that the most important note in any
called
is the tonic after which the court his name
see in the court of C and so on think up a tonic
at the center of gravity of a simple cold the most basic chords at the tonic
as the lowest note and in music the bottom Nova called
is called the room
and the minute your music has a route you've given yourself a new job to do
playing the roots in other words independent states line was born
some
playing the roots might sound simple enough but as base developed it was to
have a profound impact on
all forms of Western music even determining the shape but the music
itself
around the time called 10 entity
roots grow in importance so the base
by the time we get to the Baroque period the 17th and 18th centuries
the based on has become so influential that it was often the only thing apart
from the June compose a bother writing down
his the baseline Jeremiah clocks from pitbull
trip
now those Brock composers may have elevated the baseline to position the
importance and music
but curiously enough the one thing they didn't have was a standard instrument to
play it all
even more curiously the ones they did have
weren't very basie in sound the one thing you'd expect a bass instrument to
be able to do
namely play very deep sound underpinning all the other instruments
they couldn't with one magnificent
exception
the
organs discovered base proper
deep throbbing muscle toning rib tickling
goosebumps inducing base long before other instruments
not only that organs show that any base worth its salt
had to be at least an octave lower than the notes that other instruments made
harpsichord shallows trombones and human singers
indeed one way of describing the notes employed by bass instruments is to say
they are
16-foot pitch as opposed to the eight-foot pitch
everything else this terminology derives from the link
up organ pipe required to make deeper sounds his that Jeremiah clock baseline
at its normal eight-foot pitch Rio
room
0
here it is at the deeper 16-foot page
room
and here it is again: at and even deeper 32-foot
the
that
low
and some organs have a slightly silly
64 Fort the
the
on
I'll until the late 20th century the organ reigns supreme
in the kingdom of the base when it was in a particularly flashy moody relied on
the organists
feet to provide the fireworks
such was the organs enthusiasm for deep
underpinning baselines but it triggered a desire to reproduce some of these
effects in music that didn't take place
in a church so during the 17th century
various experiments were made particularly with stringed instruments
stretching widening and lowering them in an effort to make them sound
deeper but one recurring problem was the technology wasn't up to making
instruments that sounded deep and audible
since the idea at least initially was that the new
deeper bases would many shadow or double let's note to the cello
harpsichord a concept of a string instrument that would double
a base emerged to well before the actual instrument and that name
was invented the double bass that we know and love today
reached it's recognizable shape size and shooting
in around 1800 to beethoven it was a novelty
and any later in his career that he stopped writing separate parts
for double basses I'm 1 a hundred years later when
janice was cracking into life the based Chuba had the job of taking the baseline
reflecting jazz background in March military band music
well well well were when
you
base instruments are all well and good but what really interests me
is the notes they play since it's in the shape and movement
baselines the bases had the most influence on the development
music the
one example of how the base has acted as an agent of change
is the way that it's provided a counterweight to the top line this
committee
in the phenomenon of contrary motion when the bass
Liberty moves in the opposite direction to the chain
as I play this family apiece watch how my hands move in opposite directions
they barely moved the same way in relation to each other
where the chain reaches upwards the base reaches down and vice versa
to create contrary motion
it's like their affection a mountain in the surface and related
on the roots of a tree balancing the branches about the ground
an example not be a piece commonly known as
handles Largo all to give it its proper name ombra mai Fu
from the opera's irks ease the method is journey
is a slow downward shift
mirroring the bases slow upward shift
and the second part of the phrase
amenity goes up again
wild guess it the base goes down
once you start looking for them contrary motion baselines crop up
everywhere in this particularly gorgeous personal with the Adagio
by Tommaso Albinoni the festival and the baseline going down on the tune going up
followed by the baseline going up and the June going down
cool
the new
if I know
ask all the musicians play in the lower instruments to leave the stage
you'll hear just how critical these gently prodding steps at the baseline
are
for
it still beautiful but without the contrary motion provided by the base
it's a pale shadow
part of the reason for contre motions ubiquity
is that the baseline in the Chi are often heading from one strong cold
to another and the best way of getting there is by approaching from
opposite directions say a piece of music wants to move from this court see
to this court at the base that you can go to Costco in the same direction both
upwards but it's much more attractive
all-round if they can go in different directions the base coming up
tuning down or vice versa
one of the nice byproducts of this mirror image
is that you can find satisfying called relationships simply by see-sawing the
base and the tune against each other
by replicating these patterns you can create a long strings of cords
and in just six moves like on a chessboard you can even
arrive back where you started
using this same basic principle
see soaring the base in the June against each other in country motion
you can come up with some storming called sequences
all of these chord sequences as they are now I generated by a simple move from
one base note
all root to another a course composers might eventually have stumbled upon
great called sequences
without the incentive for finding something nice for the basis to do
but there's no doubt that the emergence of a independent baseline with a pot
all on its own unlocked hundreds of possibilities for called
simply hadn't occurred before take this one her
Nina Simone's my baby just cares for me
features a simple patent familiar to all musicians
yes it's based on that thing
children dread most of all about learning a musical instrument
scales from
this seductive baseline
is often called a walking bass ma'am
me
shield man be
King yield
bambi here
home
mommy
home
car
membranes me
came
can to plea
scales maybe the stuff a young musicians nightmares but they have proved to be
the most successful components the baselines it all music
ever jazz bassist would be absolutely lost without them
there's always been something strangely cool about bass
scales as JS Bach found out although I don't think he knew just quite
how cool this little number would turn out to be
pure graceful beauty of this at owes much to it slowly descending major scale
baseline
seemingly the only moving object other instruments haha and glide like
kites about base effect that has been copied
thousand times
the
in
down one stepping major scale isn't the and the scale in town
there's another lost sources scale and its cold the chromatic
0
the chromatic scale opens up all sorts of new possibilities
especially when it comes to the effect that the baseline will have a lower
court above it
because the chromatic scale net re triggers
a more sophisticated an ambiguous setup accompanying
colds its mood is done
English composer Henry Purcell knew a thing or two about tension and anxiety
desperation the young love living in central London he witnessed first
playing and then the Great Fire blunder perhaps not surprisingly his most famous
work features untimely death
in his 1689 opera died on an AS
Queen Daido abandoned by another yes
decides to build myself a funeral pyre and throw herself onto it
a very desperate housewife it would seem
the reminder with appropriately suicidal music
purcell festival set up a chromatic into San
baseline
mmm
the whole song is then based on this base phrase repeated
10 times a recurring basis phrase like this
used to be called ground base just about every
rock-n_-roll baby with the baseline ever existed
is side in effect ground place it's just that no one analyst
cohen et al
in think wouldn't do that a piece made up solely 10 repeated base prices will
get a bit
for his the coveted per select the base price going up eating but he changed the
called about it
all the way through meanwhile died it was chain goes off on a completely
separate
Jenny orbiter what this does is it makes the whole
day being seen inevitable with its sad
descending chromatic baseline going on without faltering
on
my
I'm
I'll
good
the
day
the
I
the
I
are
Co
Purcell's ground base
in died as lament may seem stylistically like it belongs to a long-forgotten
era the time Christopher Wren and samuel peeps
but you can find the exact same technique in use
nearly three hundred years later in the hands of the mighty Stevie Wonder
the album is fulfilling this first finale the subject matter is life
after death and the song is they won't care when I go
stevie is ground base like the cells is simple enough
them
I'm
and also like to sell he gradually I it's cold to the baseline
and the melody line has a life of its own on
why
my middle
long true
G rent
I'll
bald
lines sorrows
right wrongs
plan
time
there
it
so
no
wrong
it
on
the walking bass can do happy and it can be sad
the base has another trick up its sleeve and it's one of the simplest
and most effective the mall so far we've seen how composers from many different
traditions have taken the route
note accord its tonic and used it as the baseline
but escorts became widespread in the late Middle Ages
another option presented itself that was to happen note
other anatomic in the base same if your cord was a simple C major triad
see you could have a tonic
naturally see the bottom
budget also have the Ian the base the magic could have the G in the days
this technique is called inversion
thing wouldn't you that just by changing which noted the tribe was in the base he
wouldn't have that much of an
or affect but you'd be wrong because weirdly
inversions sound like new chords it's a common optical illusion in sound
now I'm gonna pay data called sequins using the default
option just having the tonic all the route in the base
now what I'm gonna do is take each chord inhofe way through it
make it into an inversion itself should stop sound
quite different
on
I think you'll agree that by putting in those inversions the courts now have
some sense of forward movement
and progression in them you make also have recognized
to what song this famous aggression belongs
manner
st
mom
do
time
volume
team
in all examples and bass lines we've encountered so far the base
has been a loyal and me servant the harmony and the melody
it's always been a member of the supporting cast and never stop
adjourn the 19th century the base emerge from the shadows
began to have an important independent voice and its owner
this transformation and its fortunes had its roots
in an unlikely source
believe it or not historians have located
in the walls
think the waltz in and perhaps think I'm baselines
but something happened to the base in the world that though it seems
insignificant at first was to have considerable
impact on the future the base as time went on listen to this walls
roses from the south by your hand strauss the younger
the fact boys the eighteen seventies in this except
to musical phrases will be linked together by little solo homers from
all the bass instruments here it is may not seem that
earth-shattering these little in keep its what I have quite an impact
a point to them was to allow transition from one section of the walls to another
musically they might change P and interns on the dance floor they were
there to allow you to reset the offbeat
for the next set of moves
here's the base link
and here's another one
from these modest beginnings the base began its advance
the next staging post in its journey was the craze for marching band music that
swept the USA in the late 19th century
the greatest of the American band composers was John Philip Sousa
and in this is early March the globe in the Eagle
the humble bass bridge first heard in the waltz
now turbo charged with trombones and tubers asserts itself
with a vengeance
this very same trick a
joining two sections with the many bass solo was adopted by tuba and double bass
players in early jazz
many of whom X marching band members themselves
these links were given nicknames like the base filler all the base run
from these humble beginnings the base so no and indeed the base
with rebel
riffs are distinctive little nuggets choosing which might begin a song off on
the basis of a section of a song
there are hundreds and incredibly well known rips in popular music
like these
on
do well
well in some bass ribs and unmistakable feeling that we're waiting for something
else to happen
the boys to Soarin over the top for the key to change
drums to join in all the guitar to begin a solar
there are other examples obey sellers being much more than that
post-war jazz so the appearance virtuoso bassists in small bands
whose role was far from that of supporting stooge yet
me you
all me
Miles Davis's so what
from his influential 1959 album kinda blew
features a base Saturday from Paul Chambers the underpins and shapes the
whole peace
you
me
BG
me
money
all
mmm
G
me
EU
jazz bass players attitude to their old but they were no longer near
bricks-and-mortar
for the other players to stand on was to redefine what we expect as listeners
from base
in contemporary music I'm
me
home
sixties pop music the most influential bass playing
came from the house band Tamla Motown The Funk Brothers
its base maestro was the great James Jameson
the
most if not more love you will know the 1967 marvin gay
I heard it through the grapevine and it was first recorded for town that by
Gladys Knight & the Pips
a blockade original recording such energy and drive
was the way James Jamison played the bass line take the course for example
which is based on just two simple chords
see and F now
and unimaginative bass player was simply thrash out the route to those calls one
of two another
like this
but Jamison turns the baseline into a fireball
leaping about all over the place to create movement and excitement
in a compliment burn
on
do
by giving such life to the baseline jameson turn the bass
from a meek accompanying instrument into a chief ingredient in the success
have hit songs become
from the 1950s onwards amplification allowed the previously rather quiet
bass guitar to cut through all the other instruments
then in the nineteen sixties it was the turn at the keyboard to be
revolutionized through technology
up until then only the mighty all good was capable of playing the Nevis
notes that was about to change
bass notes as low as those to be found on the organ
only really entered the musical mainstream with the invention of Robert
mood
revolutionary synthesizer his arrival into the public arena
occurred in 1968 with the release up this
record the
album called switched on Barack in which pieces were performed on a move
synthesizer by Wendy Carlos
caused a sensation
but although the breakthrough featured classical music
it was in popular music the synthesizer was to play a starring role
what began life as a tangled web
wires knobs and circuits soon developed into this
nifty little box known as and many moon this
deceptively small sound generator a Tyrannosaurus Rex
in sheep's clothing appeared on the market first in 1971
and it was to have a huge impact on popular music from there on in
thanks to its extra low frequency oscillator it was capable
thundering out baselines on unprecedented power
and debt
thanks to its new full-bodied sound
base had added another string to its bow it had become
sexy
there you couldn't hear the MOOCs extra low bass frequencies on your portable
trainee at the beach
huge loudspeakers tax at clubs discos in arenas
could take these newly beefed-up bass sounds and literally
vibrate the bodies of people standing nearby
for this reason alone dance music became
inextricably linked with the synth base ok
on are
they produce a Georgia murders I feel love
it isn't just the baseline dominates the song it ease
the solemn don't
are
on
on at a
%uh
home this catchy
repeating baseline isn't played by a human being but by a computer
this is how it works first we have to prepare
a musical tools so we need a tone generating synthesizer some kind
a keyboard and a sequencer the next thing we do is select
our musical ingredients a fact bass sound on the synth
my and some notes I'm gonna play
say 16 notes into the sequencer
having got on aids into the sequencer I'm not gonna ask sequencer to quantize
them
now this is the musical equipment chopping up those bits of carrots and
cheese when you're doing
a recipe so it's gonna make all the nodes exactly the same length
and the same loudness now
the sequencer will play me back mind 16 quantized nets
they'd all be made the same length and the same loudness
the next thing I'm going to do is loop that sequence so the those 16 notes
repeat themselves endlessly in the chain because people might want to dance to
this I think we need to speed it up
up
and for a final little bit extra topping I'm going to add some seasoning and some
flavoring in the
form all some percussion sounds but I prepare dinner
love
well are
it's no exaggeration to say that in contemporary dance music the once humble
bases
outstripped the melody and the harmony in importance
and with the help of sequences as even taken a firm up to the job with the
rhythm
to this is a huge journey for something that once
didn't even have its own part name or instrument
saved
the now the base even has its own distinct Jonah
drum and bass mine
effect when sufficiently amplified in a calm environment
is of total immersion in body shaking sounds
scuba diving with the nuclear submarine would no doubt provide
a similar me
drum'n'bass is an extreme example on the bases power to drive a piece of music
forward but even though the impact if it sound is dramatically different from
other earlier baselines its intention
is not so very change from the days a disco all rock n roll
or even the stirring marches up sousa because of this
it can be hard to date a baseline with real confidence
or precision this into this one the man
the
on this haunting walking bass line might belong to almost
any period abuse ik james jamison might have played it for a sad motown ballad
Miles Davis might have used it the starting point for improvise a shiner
in fact it comes from georgian England
is the compliment for an anthem Lord let me know mine end
by the tone composer called morris green the anthem is a some setting in which
the poor sinner
asks the Almighty for mercy in the face of death the walking bass line seems to
be saying
I am time marching on nine
in this series we've been looking at beach music's main components its melody
its rhythm
company and its base but the more you lift the lid
on the separate functions of course the more you see that they are
inextricably connect a baseline would be nothing without some harmony to work
with
many might be dull without some really shape home is fine on its own
but well into a beautiful tree can school
out
it
what is also true is that we can respond to these elements from the very second
with a ball
what does this tell us tells us that we all know much more about music than we
think we do
the nuts and bolts are great to know but simply feeling
and loving the music he's enough
E
humans unnaturally musical which is why we found the same tricks
and the same truths cropping up in every style of music from
every culture honor that his how music works
the of
E
but go
well