BASS LESSONS AUCKLAND
  • Home
  • Teacher
  • About
  • Enrolment

Mueva Los Huesos Bass Lesson

4/16/2017

0 Comments

 

In response to a request from Ekerette Uko, here is a track called Mueva Los Huesos or ‘Move Your Body’. It was written by Gordon Goodwin (b.1954) , an American pianist, composer and arranger and played by the Big Phat Band. The style is a Latin-American groove I would describe as being in the big band tradition mixed with an element of a Disney Showband. It is jazz-influenced and has a childlike almost naive cheerfulness.

The style has a mixture of very tight sectional phrases played by the brass and saxophones, with a guitar and bass in the rhythm section and I think three drummers playing a complex layered line. There are also solos for soprano saxophone, trumpet and percussion.

Mueva is in A minor based on a 17 bar chord progression using: [Read column 1 then column 2. ]

8 bar percussion Intro
_____________________________

32 bar Unison Riff 2 (8 bar Riff played four times with polyphonic brass melodies)
____________________________

Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am (Bass plays melody)
Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am Ami
C F E7 Am C F E7 Am (Chords)
C F E7 Am C F B7 E7
Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am A
mi
_____________________________
33 bar Unison figures echoed by percussion solos.




____________________________
16 bar Unison Riff 1
_____________________________
4 bar Interlude
____________________________
Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am  Saxophone solo
Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am
C F E7 Am C F E7 Am
C F E7 Am C F B7 E7
Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am
____________________________

16 bar Unison Riff 1
_____________________________

C F E7 Am C F E7 Am
C F E7 Am C F B7 E7
Am B E7 Am C F E7
____________________________

Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am  Trumpet solo
Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am
C F E7 Am C F E7 Am
C F E7 Am C F B7 E7
Am B E7 Am C F E7 Am
____________________________

9 bar Ami Outro
____________________________

4 bar Interlude  (I play a brief solo in this clip)
____________________________

___________________________
For this video I mixed the bass louder than it would normally be just to highlight what I think is an interesting bass line that has a mixture of written parts and also opportunities for improvisation and variation.

The thing about playing with brass players is they are very much into rhythmic precision making sure that the players synchronise their articulations, staccato, legato, marcato, breathing, tone, and dynamics. This presents some challenges for the bass when we play unison passages because the bass is slow to speak as they say. So the bass needs to get up on the beat. To help most players would as in this video opt for a bright trebly sound in this case focused on the bridge pickup.

This tune was on the programme of a show I played with the West City Jazz Orchestra in west Auckland 25th March 2017. We rehearsed it but did not perform it. I hope we play it again another time.


Stephen Galvin
Musician
LTCL BMus BA MMus(Hons.) Diploma Teaching
www.basslessonsauckland.com
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Blogabout

    Archives

    May 2020
    April 2017

    Author

    Stephen Galvin - Musician
    LTCL BMus BA MMus (Honours) Diploma of Teaching.

    Categories

    All


Home
About
Teacher
Enrolment
Fees
Contact
Blog
Splash
Contact [Mobile]
Bass Lessons Auckland contact - Voice and Text: 0273089796