This lesson deals with how to incorporate muted ghost notes into your fingerstyle funk playing.
What Are Ghost Notes?
Ghost notes are notes that are muted while they are plucked to give a percussive sound. They are often used before a note to give a funky feel to the line. To play a ghost note, you simply need to rest the left hand over the string to deaden it and pluck with the right hand.
Playing closer to the bridge where there is more tension will make your ghost notes louder and easier to play.
Have a go at playing a few ghost notes on each string to get a feel for each one.
When you are confident that you can put ghost notes into a groove, try the next couple of exercises.
Eighth Notes
Sixteenth Notes
These grooves are similar to the eighth note rhythms, except the ghost notes are half as long and therefore shorter.
Tip: Try playing the groove excluding the ghost notes. When you add them back in, you will hear that the main body of the groove doesn’t change, but they add a feeling of propulsion by filling in some of the dead space between notes.
Muting With Fingers
Up until now, we have been muting with all of the fingers on our left hand laid across the strings. An alternative approach to this is to mute using individual fingers on the left hand – this can be more precise and handy to have under your belt. A good way to start with learning this is to take a simple chromatic pattern and repeat it whilst adding a ghost note before each tone. After playing the first note, keep the finger resting on the strings to perform the next ghost note.
Eighth Notes
Sixteenth Notes
Scales
Adding ghost notes to scales is a great way to practice two techniques at once. Here are two variations you can try using sixteenth ghost notes:
December 1963 (Oh What A Night!) – Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons
The riff in this song is based around the Db major scale and uses ghost notes to add a funky edge. Follow along with the notation and video to get a grasp of the part, then slow it down and focus on perfecting the ghost notes and rhythm.
Funky E7 Groove
Now we can look at another funk example that we can build on. This line is over an E7 chord – E G# B D – and we are going to be using a cross between an E blues, an E Dorian and an E Mixolydian scale.
The main groove can be altered in loads of interesting ways, so make sure you have mastered that first. Once you have this under your fingers, take one of the variations below and work on that for a while.
excellent lesson…..
Hi Mark
First, I want to thank you for all the hard work you put into these videos, you’re a walking (talking) treasure!
I’m taking my first steps on the Bass and your stuff is the main resource for my learning.
I found that there’s one thing missing in the video, that I couldn’t hear when I followed the video.
After each full note pluck (not ghost notes) there’s a slap sound.
At first I thought it was made by the left hand when you mute the strings, but after a while
I figured that it is actually made by the fingers of the picking hand.
After resolving this I was able to play exactly as shown.
Thanks again, you ROCK!!
Very good lesson
Yeah, I spotted it while I was editing the video. That’s mainly because of the lack of drums. I subconsciously hit the strings to give that heavy snare emphasis. You certainly don’t need to be putting that hit in there. But you can if you want.
Good to know, anyhow, I’ll practice both ways :)
But i love this heavy snare emphasis..actually 4 a while m trying to learn this thing..but fortunately i found it here..thnxz for this lesson..plz upload a lesson on using staccato note..
Nice lesson!
If I could express some constructive criticism. I think you should adjust your string height on that Ibanez. You’ve got massive buzzing on almost every long note. Now, I don’t want to start any brand bashing, but your older tutorials with the Fender didn’t have that buzzing.
Mark this particular lesson helped me very much with ghost notes,,, I had to slow everything down I’m was so eager to play. First I finger in the notes of what you show us to make sure I have it down correctly then I add in the ghost notes. It depends where I’m at when I find it hard to slip in the ghost notes, usually when changing ,not notes on the same string ,,, but I’m getting there.
Mark my D string has a harmonic sound to it when I slap it open, plus on most frets up the neck, I’m afraid to adjust the string on the bridge on this new Fender bass , but I think its a easy fix. When does the truss rod come in to play and how does it affect the neck, is it a bend forward and backward .
Do I loosen the string when adjusting it up or down on the bridge. Well I will look it up on the Fender website.
Thank you for your terrific bass lessons.
I finally got the fretting hand muting down. Thanks Teach. I think muting is crucial for bass slapping. I’m heading there next.
Thank you Mark for great lesson again and your teaching is amazing and pleasant……….
Fantastic Lesson Mark. It’s funny how I can get the faster exercises down, but the beginning slower exercises really showed me the right way to play ghost notes. Now my playing has improved and is really starting to sound much cleaner. I cannot tell you how important you are to the bass playing community. You are the Mother Theresa of the bass playing world. LOL
I think this is the best lesson I watched… This and the Blues Rock one… Can you do some lessons on sincopation?
Thanks for this lessons Mark
again , a great lesson !
I’m finding it easier to use the same finger to play the choked note as well as the non-choked note. Will this become a problem for me? Are there benefits to using the other fingers to choke the note?
Thank you so much for the wonderful lessons!
Please be patient with me. I’m seeing more now but still not sure what minimum requirements are needed to just play the ghost and non-ghosted note. It looks as though there are three things going on here. 1. The ghost, 2. The non-ghosted, and 3. The muting. The finger playing the note is handling the ghosted and non-ghosted note. The other fingers are merely there to mute. So, it looks as though just playing ghosted notes involves a single finger – but when you incorporate the muting; the other fingers come into play.
Am I out in in the weeds?
Loving these lessons! I thought that your lesson on the cycle of fourths/learning the notes of the fingerboard was one of the best Ever! Thanks for the lessons!