‘Zender Jazz’ was written to represent Stuart Zender’s ground-breaking bass work on the first three Jamiroquai albums. The bassline features many common elements of his playing style, such as syncopated funk grooves, disco octave lines, and the use of both fingerstyle and slap techniques.
If you enjoy working through this piece, you might also find the following courses useful (Access to ALL of our courses is included in the subscription cost):
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This course is 35 MINUTES long and contains the following videos, each of which can be selected from the video player above:
This video is a full demonstration of ‘Zender Jazz’ performed on a Guitars Rumour 5-String strung with stainless steel Rotosound strings.
This video gives a brief overview of this difficult piece and the technical challenges that it presents. I’ll also be offering advice on finding a suitable tone.
This lesson will show you how to play the opening bass groove, a chord tone-based line that uses double chromatic approaches. This lesson covers bars 5-8.
This lesson covers the C section, which features a more active chord sequence and some great bass licks. This lesson covers bars 13-16 in the transcription.
This section is supported by an octave-based line that ascends through a root-second-third movement for each chord. This lesson covers bars 17-27 in the transcription.
This section is essentially a repeat of the D section. The line closes with a descending sequence, which is the main focus of this lesson. This video covers bars 36-47.
This breakdown section is anchored by a slap and pop line based on the chord movement from the previous section. This lesson covers bars 48-51 in the transcription.
In this final section, the established ‘chorus’ groove is now played with the slap and pop technique. This lesson covers bars 52-63 in the accompanying transcription.
This lesson covers Stuart Zender's tone and offers advice on how you can achieve something similar.