Stu Clayton

Are you in it for the trill? Then stick with Stuart Clayton as he takes his tapping lessons to the next level

Mastery is found at the limits of possibility. Stu Clayton reveals the techniques of bassists who invent their own rules

“ALTHOUGH THESE EXERCISES ARE LIKELY TO PROVE CHALLENGING TO BEGIN WITH, THEY WILL BE INVALUABLE FOR HELPING YOU DEVELOP YOUR LINEAR TAPPING TECHNIQUE”

Hello again, and welcome back to my series covering the tapping technique. In our last issue we focused on linear tapping, the single-string form of tapping that is often favoured by guitarists, as well as bassists such as Billy Sheehan, Stuart Hamm and Victor Wooten. We’ve covered the importance of basing such lines around chord tones or other appropriate melodic material, and in this month’s instalment we’re going to be taking the idea a step further and using the technique to play lines that move across the strings.

At the end of last month’s instalment, we looked at performing a rapid-fire trill by combining tapped notes, pull-offs and hammer-ons. In this column, we’re going to pick up where we left off and begin embellishing this idea.

Example 1

The rapid-fire trill example that we looked at last time can easily be expanded upon to include more notes. In this example, a repeating two-beat triplet figure is used. As before, the lowest note in the sequence – in this case C at the fifth fret of the G string – should be fretted by the first finger of the fretting hand before you start. The picking hand then taps the D, pulls off to sound the C, then the third finger of the fretting hand taps the D again.

This triplet is then followed by a second, in which an E is tapped with the picking hand, then pulled off to sound the D, and then pulled off again to the C. When this sequence of triplets is repeated, the picking hand will be moving rapidly back and forth between tapping the D and the E. This exercise is easier to perform than it is to explain, and hopefully you’ll find it easier than it sounds. You’ll notice that in the second half of the exercise the line has been doubled up to be played as sixteenth note triplets – and although this is double the speed of the first two bars, you should find it relatively easy to do.

Example 2

Let’s take this concept and apply it to a longer line. This example expands on the previous one. We’ll now be using the technique to play this idea as an ascending line that progresses up through the A minor pentatonic scale. Note that for the sake of space I have not notated this as sixteenth note triplets as well, but you should certainly practise it that way once you’re comfortable with the notes and position shifts.

The A Minor Pentatonic Scale

As you can probably imagine, many tapping parts are played on multiple strings rather than just on a single string. With that in mind, we’re now going to look at some examples that will help us to develop the ability to cross strings comfortably with the technique. In order to do this using some sensible melodic material, we’re going to be focusing our efforts within the A minor pentatonic scale.

The A minor pentatonic scale is a five-note scale created by removing the second and sixth scale degrees from the A natural minor scale (B and F). Note that in the example below, the scale has been shown with the octave A at the end. Guitarists usually learn the pentatonic scale as a series of box shapes, each of which begins from a different note of the scale. These can be thought of as modes of the pentatonic scale, if you prefer. Although I am not a big advocate of using box shapes on the bass, in this instance they prove quite useful. The five box shapes are shown above (root notes are shown with black dots).

In the next group of examples, we will use the linear tapping technique to play through pentatonic lines. The logic behind these exercises is simple: each hand will be tapping notes from a different pentatonic box shape. Although they are likely to prove challenging to begin with, they will be invaluable for helping you develop your linear tapping technique into something that you can play across all four strings.

Example 3

Here the fretting hand uses notes from the first pentatonic box shape, while the picking hand taps notes from the third.

Example 4

This example uses the second box shape for the fretting hand, while the picking hand moves around the fourth.

Example 5

Heading further up the fretboard, this example uses the third shape for the fretting hand and the fifth for the picking hand.

Example 6

Finally, this example uses the first shape in the picking hand and the fourth in the fretting hand.

String Skipping

In each of the previous four exercises we have been using the string crossing technique, where we always move to an adjacent string. It’s important when learning this technique to be able to jump to a different string, one that isn’t adjacent to the string you’re currently on. To do so is known as string skipping, and it is this that we will now focus on.

Example 7

Another pentatonic box shape exercise, but this time, rather than tapping across the strings in a strict low-to-high sequence, an alternative pattern is used: G string to A string, then D string to E string. This idea is then reversed. Each string sequence only lasts for half a bar before changing, so there is quite a lot of information to digest here! You should now explore other string crossing possibilities using the pentatonic scale.

Further Variations

Keep working on applying linear tapping technique across different strings; we'll be looking at some variations on these ideas in next month’s column.

Example 8

This line features two taps with the picking hand in quick succession: an E is tapped on the D string and pulled off to sound a C fretted by the fourth finger of the fretting hand. Although it's fingered as two notes followed by four, the line is still played in a triplet rhythm, which repeats for two bars before the same sequence occurs on the G-string. Next month we’ll be looking at further variations on the linear tapping technique. As ever, I can be reached through the magazine if you have questions, so feel free to get in touch. Until next time, have fun with this great technique.