Simplified Sight-Reading for Bass

This will really help me get used to playing rhythms without really thinking - more reactive. The notes can be worked on later - when playing bass, it is much more important to be accurate rhythmically. With all the notes that are technically available, you can fake the sonic relationships, but if the beat is in the wrong place or is wrong rhythmically, you will really hurt the music. I highly recommend trying to learn the notated rhythmic score for whatever piece you are working on, or develop a proper rhythmic sense for a piece if you just have a chord chart. A book like this is one great way to expose yourself to reading the rhythmic score and being able to quickly familiarize yourself with the intended rhythm written by the composer.I have personally noticed when the bass and drums are locked in an pumping out the correct rhythm for a piece, the rest of the band usually follows along and some great magic happens, but if the bass is off - there is little hope for the magic to be there!

5 stars for the book, minus 1 star for the annoying metronome. Great exercises and the CD which has many of the tracks in the book in it is very helpful. The only problem I have with the CD is the metronome clicks that accompany the tracks are louder than the bass part itself. It would be fine to have a lead in metronome just to get the tempo and then have the metronome drop out once the bass starts. Or have a full metronome on a quarter of the tracks and leave it off of the rest of the tracks. Or turn the metronome volume down so it's not louder than the bass itself. The annoying metronome aside this is a great book if you're interesting in developing your sight reading for bass. There is no tablature anywhere in this book which forces you to read the music. If you can't sight-read very well now and you work through all of this book your sight-reading will improve by leaps and bounds. It's hard to go wrong with a Josquin des Pres book. Also try his book  Bass Fitness - An Exercising Handbook (Guitar School) .

What I love about this book is it starts off with learning to sight read rhythm. Sight reading is actually a two handed process, with rhythm controlled by the plucking hand, and pitch controlled by the fretting hand. It is always difficult trying to learn two things at the same time, so kudos for teaching rhythm and pitch separately.The CD is useful, but mostly I play along to a metronome.My only criticism is the book has almost no instruction on how to practice.

As an old bass player from the mid 70s, I am just getting back into playing again. Virtually none of the books such as this one actually existed or were very difficult to find anywhere. (I was from a small town and not near a major city.) I would have given my all for a few of the books now available. This one in particular, at least for me, gave me a great deal of enlightenment about bass music in particular. I recommend this one to anyone who wants to do serious music.

This book is a must have for serious bass players/musicians Josquin des Pres is one of my favorite Bass Players, it's full of great information and will definitely help you grow more musically. A lot of great exercises that will help you get better for sure!

Love how this book progressively moves through it's goal towards sight reading. Especially love how it focuses on rhythm first, to Rhythms and pitches, to intervals, ect. up to typical patterns and styles.Benefits my reading for my other instruments I play as well. The bass is just a tool for working through the exercises .

ok, but it gets boring using the same D note for everything. I prefer a book with different note that progressively gets harder.

Great book

Book was highly recommended - but I never got to grips with it. Found some free apps on Android got me reading bass clef quicker plus some of Jim Stinnetts techniques.Your mileage may vary. Once I could see bass I treble but shifted down 2 things got easier + Jim showed it is all relative too.

I previously owned this book in 2006 and it really helped with timing and sight-reading of bass notation. After an 8 year gap this was the first book I looked for.It lays out increasing difficult timing patterns and each is introduced on an accompanying CD, so you know how it should sound.I would recommend to all levels from beginner to experienced players.

some nice excerises in the book - a little tricky to download the audio. It seems it will only download once and haven[t been able to download onto my tablet for travelling purposes - have to Google first all the time, tricky if no internet connection.. Although this may be my lack of IT knowledge.We'll see if I can resolve situation when I have the time.A good tool for the beginner to intermediate player though.

Love this book. excellent exercises and downloadable content so you don't have to store another CD. Just keep working through at a steady pace and it is amazing how quickly you can pick up things that seem hard to start with.,

Yes solid practice course,takes you back to watch your timing ,the audio is firstclass and a great part of the course,well done,Josquin!.