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Slap and Pop Grooves (Part 2)

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The exercises in this course make use of the fundamental elements of the slap bass technique: thumb slaps, popped notes, hammer-ons and pull-offs. In addition to these basic elements, you’ll need to give consideration towards muting the strings that you aren’t playing, in order to prevent them from ringing unnecessarily.

If you require additional help with any of the techniques used here, the following courses (all included in the monthly subscription cost) should prove useful:

Don’t forget to hit the Download Resources button above to get the PDF worksheet and audio files for this piece (available to subscribers only). The worksheet is available with TAB and without, for those who wish to give their reading skills a workout.

This course is 1 HOUR & 14 MINUTES long and contains the following videos, each of which can be selected from the video player above:

Exercise #16

This exercise has been written in the style of slap bass pioneer Larry Graham, who played a similar line on the Graham Central Station classic ‘Release Yourself’.

Exercise #17

This line is built on the E Mixolydian mode. The sliding double stop figure in the fourth bar requires you to pop with the first and second fingers simultaneously.

Exercise #18

This up-tempo exercise makes use of the same rhythmic figure on each beat of the first and third bars. This one requires some rapid position shifts.

Exercise #19

This line is built around major and minor sixth intervals, which are used extensively in the first and third bars. These help to outline the tonality of the line.

Exercise #20

This line makes use of tenths. Rests are crucial to the groove here, so be sure to choke off the notes at the end of the first and third beats in the second bar.

Exercise #21

This exercise is based around the G minor pentatonic scale and features some upper register melodic lines combined with descending octave-based figures.

Exercise #22

This is a slow groove based around a C minor chord. The fourth bar contains a challenging minor pentatonic run that can be difficult to play with slaps and pops only.

Exercise #23

This is another slow-tempo line, this time played in drop-D tuning. Double stops are once again used here and should be plucked with the thumb and first finger.

Exercise #24

This line is built on the G# blues scale and is heavily syncopated in places. The fill in the fourth bar requires you to pop notes with both your first and second fingers.

Exercise #25

This quirky line makes use of the ‘funk double stop’, the seventh and third (D & G#) of the underlying dominant seventh chord played together.

Exercise #26

This line is built around an open string hammer-on phrase that consists of fourth sixteenth notes: a slapped note, a hammer-on, another slap and a pop.

Exercise #27

This exercise is in the key of F# minor and makes use of the minor pentatonic scale. Consideration should be given to note placement here.

Exercise #28

This line outlines an A7 chord using the A Mixolydian mode. Watch out for the pentatonic lick in the fourth bar, which requires you to slap and pop on the same string.

Exercise #29

This fast-paced line is unusual in that you are required to pop notes on the A-string. The popped/slapped octaves in the fourth bar match the snare hits in the drum fill.

Exercise #30

This line is played at a very fast tempo. The pentatonic phrases in the second and fourth bars are simple enough but become more challenging to play at this fierce tempo.