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  Bass Line Creation
Root - 5th bass lines

The Exception

At the beginning of this lesson I said that you can play the same root and 5th "shape" regardless of what type of chord is being played (most of the time). Well here is the exception to this. Augmented, diminished, 7(#5), 7(b5)...these use a different type of 5th. You can still play a root-5th bass line, but you will have to alter the 5th to fit the chord. Part of this will involve an understanding of theory beyond the scope of this lesson. But if you see this in a chord symbol (#5 or b5), then you have to alter your 5th accordingly. So if you see C7(#5), you will have raise the 5th (5) up one fret to #5 (sharp 5). And if you have a C7(b5) you will have to lower all the 5th down one fret to b5 (flat 5). Augmented chords used #5, and diminished chords will use b5.

Here are the shapes used for b5 and #5. Remember that the you can apply these to any set of string.

|-----|-----|-----|-----| -1st string
|-----|-----|-----|-----|
|-----|-b5--|--5--|-#5--|
|--1--|-----|-----|-----| -4th string


|-----|-----|-----|-----| -1st string
|-----|-----|-----|-----|
|-----|--1--|-----|-----|
|-b5--|--5--|-#5--|-----| -4th string

Page 4, Root - 5th bass line examples

Page 1, Intro to root - 5th bass lines





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