I started playing music at a very young age. I just so happened to grow up where steel-pan music was played, or if you took a little walk from my house, you’d most likely walk into the steel-pan band room or the steel-band shed , as they called it.

What I remember is that I used to take our galvanized garbage can lid, hold it between my legs like it was a steel tray and play with a stick, hitting the garbage can lid, and what I heard coming out of there at that moment some interesting melodies came up, I felt some kind of connection with the music at that moment, although I couldn’t interpret the experience. I don’t think others could have heard what I was hearing, but what I heard sounded so good that it made me realize that something bigger than me was going on inside of me. Looking back now makes me believe that it was my inspiration and a foretaste of what I would be doing in life.

Sometimes band members would call me into the band room to play a song with them, they thought I had a good ear for music and picked up music very quickly, and I loved it. I also remember playing with a friend who played acoustic guitar, and I played another acoustic guitar, but with only four strings. I think he was training then, and didn’t know it.

Even in elementary school I had the privilege of playing in the school metal drum orchestra.

My hearing improved at that time. All this time I lived in Trinidad. Then we moved to live in Tobago, which is the sister island of Trinidad. There my cousin and uncle took me to a combo, a band that had just started, and my uncle and my cousin told the captain of the band that I was interested in playing bass, which I never remembered telling them, though. , the captain was willing to give. I a test.

There were other bass players in that band at the time, although we were all learning, but with a bass that had all the notes written down and glued to the fretboard, like they knew it was coming, then I made it my duty to take this opportunity. Well, that interested me a lot.

What happened next was an experience he would never forget. After classes at school, I would run to the band room to practice by myself and learn about that bass, and after about three weeks I removed the paper that had the name of the notes stuck to the fretboard. I think my wish and delivery it made me become the most used bass player in that band, more used than the other two bass players.

When I really started playing; my initiation, or rather to learn songs with the band, the leader of the band who was the organist, asked me to hang the bass around my neck, and while they played the songs I shouted the notes that I saw stuck to the fretboard, and the played, and although I didn’t have the correct fingering like all bass players should, (this should be corrected when starting to practice playing the bass by ear – you can find help on some social networking sites), I was able to see, hear and play the notes.

I got better with time and experience, and with the opportunities to play with other bands that I think liked my style of playing. Being on the island of Tobago, musicians from Trinidad would come, who had heard about my playing and asked me to play with them, which I did. I learned quite a bit from them. In all this time, playing with those groups, I had never read a note of a score, or a bass score; I really didn’t know anything about that at the time. I played many styles of music just by listening and transferring what I heard to the bass.

I remember a popular nightclub where I was a member of the resident band. There were situations where I had to play songs that I only listened to for about a minute and then I had to accompany the singers and play the full songs only a few minutes later. In fact, they only came to us to give us a taste of what we should expect. I also loved that experience, I think it helped me train my hearing.

The bottom line is that playing music by ear has its challenges, but it’s not impossible to be a good bassist playing by ear. My only advice is that, even if you like to play by ear, learn to read sheet music notes and bass tabs, it will help you to know the values ​​of the notes, learn scales, arpeggios, etc. Listen and try to play all kinds of music so you can be a complete player; not just restricted to one style of music.

I just thought I should encourage beginners who would like to play the bass by ear.

Have fun!