TalkingBass Courses Breakdown 2023

TalkingBass Courses

This week we are running the End Of Summer TalkingBass Sale with a discount on all courses. But many of you may be wondering which course is right for you? You might also be wondering which course you should work on next.

So today, I’m going to give some brief details on each course in the TalkingBass Store alongside some links to downloadable PDF brochures that provide a breakdown of all the course lessons!

Beginner Bass Guitar

Beginner Bass Guitar is the starting point for every beginner bass player. This short 10 lesson course serves as introduction to the absolute basics of bass guitar.

You’ll learn how to hold the bass, play simple riffs, the basics of technique in both hands, the notes of the fretboard and I give you some pointers on how to proceed with the next step in learning the instrument.

I would recommend this course for ‘absolute beginners’ only.

Bassic Fundamentals

Bassic Fundamentals is the perfect follow up to Beginner Bass Guitar.

In this 48 lesson course, spread over 10 hours of video content, you will develop your technique, learn a set of basic scales and arpeggios, learn how to tune your strings, change your strings and setup your instrument, you’ll learn the basics of reading music and there’s also a complete module on tone shaping/effects as well as many more useful lessons.

This course provides a general foundation in bass playing and is great for beginner to intermediate level players.

TalkingBass Starter Pack

The TalkingBass Starter Pack is simply a bundle package containing both the Beginner Bass Guitar and Bassic Fundamentals courses.

This is the perfect course purchase for absolute beginners looking for a longer set of lessons.

Purchase Starter Pack

Groove Trainer

Groove Trainer is a great follow up to Bassic Fundamentals. This is a step by step approach to developing your bass skills by way of 120 progressive grooves. The grooves work up from incredible simple, whole note bass lines to sophisticated 16th note funk grooves.

The complete course also features 30 lessons on all facets of groove playing, harmony and rhythm. This is a fantastic course for those of you looking to develop your bass skills through bass riffs and grooves.

Technique Builder For Bass

Technique Builder is a deep dive into the intricacies of your technique in both hands. There are 12 in depth video lessons providing you with a strong foundation in technique before moving into the main module of 60 technical etudes.

These etudes are short in length and specifically designed to work on all aspects of your technique. There are major and minor scale fragments, arpeggio sequences, stylistic lines from the Jazz and Classical genres, wide intervals, repeated notes, legato lines, chromatics, pentatonics and much more.

These etudes should be played through all keys and will provide a huge leap forward in your technical prowess whatever your level.

Simple Steps To Sight Reading

Simple Steps To Sight Reading is the flagship course here at Talkingbass and provides the only complete method for music reading on bass guitar from absolute beginner to advanced pro level.

The course is very progressive in nature and takes small, incremental steps at every stage. You’ll begin with the absolute basics of music notation and incredibly simple exercises on each string that eventually work through every key, every note on the bass, every rhythm you’ll ever encounter and all of the other music theory required for reading music at the highest professional sight reading level.

The complete course features over 25 hours of video content and over 700 pages of exercises in the accompanying PDF booklet. This is a huge course that will provide years of progressive content.

The course is split into 9 progressive Levels. These levels are split into three volumes (3 levels each). You can purchase each volume separately or purchase the whole course.

I highly recommend this course to players of all levels. If you want to learn every note on your fretboard, understand all areas of rhythm and, most importantly, learn to read music… this is the course for you.

Chord Tone Essentials

Want to learn how to create melodic bass lines through over any chord or through any chord progression? Want to learn how to create riffs, fills and solos? Want to understand how to create bass lines in any style? Want to develop a complete fundamental understanding of harmony and music theory? Want to learn how to play all over the fretboard with bass lines and runs in any style?

Believe it or not, this course is the key to unlocking all of those skills!

This is NOT a course about chords. This course is a deep dive into Chord Tones. Chord Tones are the individual notes of a chord that generally learn as arpeggios. By learning about chord tones you will understand which notes work with any chord and as you learn how to use chord tones and non-chord tones together, you’ll be able to create bass lines and fully understand the notes you are playing in other bass lines.

The course features 53 lessons working through all aspects of chord construction, how to apply those chord progressions over the whole fretboard as arpeggios and then how to apply them in your bass lines, fills and solos.

This course is highly recommended and, when combined with Simple Steps To Sight Reading you will have a HUGE amount of important material for developing as a bass player and musician.

Scale Essentials

Scale Essentials takes the same approach to learning as Chord Tone Essentials but applied to the more general topic of Scales.

The course features 65 lessons and 178 pages of lesson material. You will learn everything you need to learn about scales and modes. We work through the basic major and minor scales before moving into pentatonic scales, harmony within scales, modes of both the major and minor scales, diminished scales, exotic scales and much more. These scales are then mapped over the entire fretboard before moving into a set of exercises designed to help you practice any scale in every position.

If you have ever wanted to learn about scales, then this is the course for you. However, I would always recommend purchasing Chord Tone Essentials before Scale Essentials. Scales are important, but chord tones should always be your first priority when it comes to useable bass content.

The Cyborg Bassist (Ebook)

The Cyborg Bassist is a series of books I’m writing to help develop your fretboard familiarity, your harmony knowledge, your position shifting and technique.

Volume 1 focuses on the Major Scale and provides 96 etudes working through all keys. Each etude works through multiple octaves and positions of the fretboard. This book and those that follow will provide a huge amount of practice material.

The book is currently presented as a downloadable PDF Ebook with an additional course detailing best practices for using the etudes.

Purchase Cyborg Bassist Vol 1

Simple Steps To Walking Bass

Simple Steps To Walking Bass is a complete method for learning how to create improvised walking bass lines. Every aspect of walking is covered, starting with basic 2 feel bass lines and progressing to quarter note walking through any chord progression over the entire fretboard.

This is an essential course for those of you wanting to play in a jazz or blues style but also serves to improve your bass line development in any style. You will also improve your fretboard familiarity to an intuitive level.

Walk That Bass (Ebook)

Walk That Bass is an Ebook providing a set of pre-composed walking bass lines over common jazz standard chord progressions for learning, practice and study.

Each line occupies a specific range of the fretboard and are all written from an educational perspective. This allows for progressive, step-by-step learning for each of those presented.

Volume 1 also contains multiple chapters devoted to functional harmony, chord scales, chord tones and vocabulary development. This is the perfect supplementary text to practice alongside the Simple Steps To Walking Bass course.

Purchase Walk That Bass

Ear Training For Bass Vol 1

Want to learn songs by ear or transcribe? This course is for you.

Ear Training For Bass is a course devoted to development of your musical ear. Volume 1 is aimed at beginners to ear training and provides drills for working on interval recognition, scale movement, chord recognition and more.

The course contains 33 video lessons spread over 4 hours of content.

Simple Steps To Slap Bass

Simple Steps To Slap Bass is obviously dedicated to Slap Bass technique. The course works through the technique from the absolute basics through to advanced funk riffs, fills and double thumbing.

The course is, as the name suggests, presented in simple steps. Slap Bass can seem very difficult for beginners to the technique but with the correct direction you will be up and slapping quicker than you ever imagined.

As with all courses, there are audio practice tracks and a huge lesson material PDF to download. If you want to learn the slap technique then this is your first port of call!

Chords For Bass Guitar

Chords For Bass Guitar is dedicated to actual chordal playing on bass (unlike Chord Tone Essentials that deals with ‘Chord Tones’).

You’ll learn how to use basic double stops in your bass lines before moving onto complete triads and seventh chords. Then in Module 3 you’ll learn how to construct your own solo chordal arrangements by harmonising a melody complete with a moving bass line.

Both Chords For Bass Guitar and Simple Steps To Slap Bass are very ‘stylistic’ in nature and focus on less common techniques. Therefore, I’d recommend these two courses to those of you with very specific interests.

Classics For Bass

The Classics For Bass series of courses provide study pieces for working on your technique and overall playing performance.

At this time, there are two pieces available by J.S.Bach: Prelude #1 from the Well Tempered Clavier and Prelude from Cello Suite In G Major.

The courses work through each piece in a simple, step by step coaching manner. Every technical hurdle is addressed along the way and you’ll finish the course a better player with the ability to play a beautiful classical piece on bass guitar!