My composition ‘Minor Turnaround’ is a study piece for beginner/intermediate jazz bassists. If you are learning jazz it’s very important not to focus exclusively on improvisation as there are many benefits to learning set work. Classical bassists routinely learn new study pieces (etudes) which result in improvements to their technique.

Learning the bass line to ‘Minor Turnaround’ will help you improve your intonation around the note D on the G string. Locating that note with the 4th finger can be tricky so use the D harmonic to help. Focus on playing with a good hand shape to play the chromatic descending line.

The melody is in thumb position, which if you are not familiar with you could leave and focus on the bass part for now, but if you are looking to work on thumb position this is a suitable piece.

I hope you enjoy the lesson and if you want to check out the transcription and backing track for this piece are included in my YouTube Lessons Guide.