It’s Christmas time and although it has been a crazy year with the ongoing pandemic I hope some Holiday music can help sooth and heal at least a little bit.
I decided to arrange a (fairly) simple solo ubass arrangement of Silent Night by Franz Xaver Gruber composed in 1818.
The arrangement is based on the melody and a simple bass part that has mostly a root motion meaning I go from root to root in the chord progression. I choose the key of A major simply because the possibility to use a lot of open strings for the bass line part of the arrangement. This way I can focus on the melody and also get a bass part with a long legato feel. I want to make a contrast between the melody and bass rhythm is possible.
It would not have been so nice if I used the same rhythm in the melody and bass part throughout the arrangement. Although we as bass players really love bass this technique will let us focusing on the most important part of a song, its melody!
Tricky Bit 1: The highest note of the melody is a D. Since most Ubasses only has 16 frets and the D we want is located at the 19th fret we need to play the D as a natural harmonic. This note can be found where the 19th fret would have been if the fretboard was extended that far. You play a harmonic but lightly touching the string and then play with your plucking hand. You might need to play a little bit harder with the plucking hand than you usually play to get the harmonic to “ring”.
Extra info: If you play a 12th fret harmonic you get the same note as if you press down on the 12th fret. When you play the 24th fret harmonic you get a pitch that is one octave higher. If you can find the spot in between the 24th fret and the bridge you will get a note that is yet another octave higher. And now the crazy bit. If you do the same dividing the string from the 12th fret to the nut you will get the same results as in the 12th fret to the bridge area! More on this in a later blog post.
Tricky Bit 2: To get the C# you need to use a technique called false harmonics. The false harmonic technique is based on the same technique you use when playing a natural harmonic. You want to get the pitch that would have been find on the 18th fret. To get this note you fret the C# at fret 6 on the G-string. Then you find the spot exactly in the middle between the fretted C# and the bridge. You need to play that harmonic with you plucking hand. There are different ways of doing that. Here I’m using the first finger of my plucking hand on that “half-way-point”. (See Extra info!) I then pluck with the ring finger of my plucking hand. This will take some practice to find the right spot and get the note to ring and sound as close to the regularly fretted notes! Play slow and gradually add speed!
Tricky Bit 3: Getting from to the part with “Tricky Bit 1 & 2” can also be a little challenge since you need to quickly go from the lowest to the highest part of the fretboard. Practice slow and make sure you aim for that B. Best way to do that is to “look ahead” and aim with your eyes. That way you’re helping your brain to gules your hand!
In the performance video I play only one verse of the song. My goal is to work more on this arrangement, maybe add an intro, develop a second verse with the use of other rhythms and maybe some re-harmonization and so on. I decided to record this very short version to give you something to work on during the Holiday’s!
Maybe this will be your first go at playing a solo ubass arrangement? I hope this will inspire you to make your own solo arrangements. The melody and bass approach is a great staring point! Please let me know if you decide to make your own arrangements. I’d love to feature your arrangement on playubass.com if you want to share something!
I wish you all a Merry Christmas And a Happy New 2021! /Magnus
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