The Bluegrass Bass: Wallowing in Root-Five
My particular involvement with the string bass started with the Swamp Opera string band, an Old Time New York City street band from about 1973. I have been playing this lowliest of instruments on and off ever since. In the photo below, I am playing with the Faast and Blair Band in a concert in Washington State sometime during the summer of 2014 (credit to Eric Frommer for the picture).
Our co-instructor, Andrea Westerinen, has this to say about her bass journey:
Up until I met Jeff, I was a “rock-n-roll” girl. But, we went to bluegrass jams together and he always was playing. I wanted to join in. My previous musical experience on piano (and reading sheet music) was useless. Jeff taught me to read the guitar player’s fingering (I didn’t play guitar either!) and translate it to root-five. I found that I could do it and became part of the community. It was an amazing feeling. It took me a long time to hear note transitions, but I got there!
Our co-instructor, Brian Duffy says this about his bass playing:
Learning to play upright bass gave me the opportunity to play in a real Bluegrass band for the first time. I did not sing, but I was able to listen and learn from the singers as they worked out parts and arrangements. It was a door opener for me.
Before getting to the important matters of root-five, limping bass, slapping, ghost notes, and the emotional wounds suffered by bass players everywhere, it is worth stepping back and asking: what exactly is the role of the bass in bluegrass music?
Bluegrass inherited the upright “doghouse” bass from earlier string band, old-time, jazz, and country traditions. But in Bill Monroe’s classic bluegrass bands of the 1940s, the bass settled into a particularly important mission. It became the low-end foundation of the band, the rhythmic anchor, and the keeper of the bottom. It is the instrument that gives the music weight, pulse, and a good portion of its forward motion. In the words of a drummer, if the mandolin chop is the snare and the guitar is the high hat, then the bass is the kick drum.
Unlike jazz or swing bass, bluegrass bass usually employs a simple, driving quarter-note style built around strong timing and clear chord roots. Early players such as Howard Watts — better known in the Bluegrass Boys as Cedric Rainwater — helped define the role. The job was not to show off, play sixteenth-note bebop licks, or emote dramatically from the low end. The job was to make the whole outfit sound solid, steady, and alive.
That basic job has not changed. Referring to the picture below, today’s bluegrass bands may feature a traditional upright bass (left), a Fender-style electric bass (middle), or one of those electric upright contraptions that look like a bass after going on a six month course of the weight loss drug Ozempic (right). But the musical responsibility remains the same: support the groove, establish the beat, and help drive the band forward.
We will cover a number of things regarding the bass and bass players in this chapter. I think you will find these useful whether you are a listener, a bassist, or simply a person in a band who has been wondering why the bass player is muttering darkly in the corner while loading out alone after the show. I will use the standup or doghouse bass as the main example here, but similar principles apply to electric bass as well.
Sound Production
Basic sound production for bluegrass bass is relatively straightforward (as long as you are sticking with pizzicato or plucking the strings). Bluegrass bassists produce sound with either a “classical” or a “traditional” technique.
Classical technique (on the left in the photo) generally produces better tone, but I’ve heard some great sounding traditional bass players too (on the right). Some bassists (such as yours truly) will use both techniques – classical for when tone and agility is needed and traditional for when the band wants to do 12 songs back to back in the key of B and the left hand starts to fatigue. You can tell a bass player is using classical technique if they have their left elbow in the air and a serious expression on the face – for example the photo of me earlier in this chapter. If they are gripping the neck like a baseball bat and grinning from ear to ear then that is the traditional approach (expect to see a comedy routine too, as these guys are usually pranksters). In the picture below, I am playing with a traditional approach and have a shit-eating grin on my face (hidden by the mic). Photo credit: Clyde Clevenger.
With either technique, the objective is to sound just like Barry Bales, who always produces a big, warm, rich tone with Alison Krauss and Union Station that rattles the windows and shakes your haunches.
Timing
This is where the bass player earns every penny of the ten dollars that they will receive in salary at the end of the night. Once the song gets started, the bassist acts with impunity to place a note where the beat is. Bass notes are easy for anyone to hear, as there are no other instruments competing for sound in that low octave. Further, as anybody who lives in an apartment with a partying neighbor knows, low frequency sounds can penetrate anything (even concrete). This makes the bass the perfect pacemaker for the band: all the other instrumentalists should be able to hear and feel it perfectly well and they need to follow along with it, else suffer the wrath of the bass player.
Note that most experienced bass players generally have good timing and are consistently able to place the beginning of each thunderous note right on top-dead-center. Assuming other band members cooperate, this helps considerably to reduce disorder in what otherwise would be a cacophonous situation.
But what about the duration of each bass note? Many bluegrass fans in general and novice bassists in particular don’t think about that. Next time listen carefully to every bass note. Are they all even in duration or is one note shorter than the other? There is a syndrome that is whispered about in bluegrass circles called “limping bass.” It sounds like this: long/short – long/short – long/short… It is highly contagious and is ruinous to the groove. If everything else is good and you still can’t dance to the music, this is where to look. If your local bass player has contracted this affliction and you really want to dance, be sure to address it with him carefully and in private along with a good bottle of single malt.
Root-Five
Melody? What melody? Well, Root-five. Sounds like a sporting event? Maybe the road that takes you to the gig? Is it a term from dental school? Nope, it’s none of the above. Root-five is just the sequence of two notes played by a bluegrass bass player at least 90% of the time, over and over, like a broken record. “Root” refers to the note in which a particular chord is rooted and “five” refers to the other bass note that is located five notes above “root.” As our title of this chapter suggests, bass players do indeed wallow in root-five and focus on the groove. They don’t need no stinkin’ melody.
This is not a bug in the system. It is a feature. Bluegrass music is already full of activity: banjo rolls, fiddle lines, mandolin chops, guitar runs, vocal stacks, instrumental breaks, and occasional outbreaks of pandemonium. A simplified bass line brings order to the proceedings. It says, in effect: “Ladies and gentlemen, let us remain calm and carry on. I know right where the beat is.”
Remember the golden rule of good bass playing: when bassists are excelling, nobody notices. They are totally stealth, no ego, and no flash. They wear black clothes and dark sunglasses to all the gigs. They blend in completely with their root-five; nobody in the audience even knows they are there (this leads to widespread insecurity complexes among modern bluegrass bass players and can go a long way in explaining their reclusiveness).
Root-five (90% of the time) is really important to achieve the sound expected in most traditional and contemporary bluegrass music. I can imagine the non-traditionalists rolling their eyes right about now, and yes there are important exceptions to this. For example, Tom Gray did some outstanding and very tasteful work with the Seldom Scene, much of the time deviating from root-five. But generally speaking, bluegrass music is already chock-full of busy-ness and a simplified bass line really helps bring some order to the situation.
What about the 10% of the time the bassist is not root-fiving? Of course, there is the rare bass solo where the bassist steps into the limelight. We will discuss this more below. Other exceptions to the root-five rule include bass runs and a walking bass line, and both of these are also discussed below.
Groove, and Drive
This is where the bass player makes huge contributions to the sound.
In bluegrass, the bass sits at the absolute center of both groove and drive. Those two terms are closely related, but they are not exactly the same.
Groove is the pocket and feel of the rhythm. It is the sense that the band is locked together and breathing naturally. Groove makes the music feel good.
Drive is the forward energy of the rhythm. It is the momentum and urgency that make the music sound like it is moving forward into the next beat. Drive makes the music move, and causes you to want to dance… or at least move your body around and shout! (Please, for the sake of keeping bluegrass dignified, don’t slap your knee or scream “yee haw”.)
Important: Note that a song does not have to be fast to have drive… many moderate or even slowish bluegrass tunes can have excellent drive.
Here is an example, this is a random hallway jam in 2023 from the SPBMA conference in Nashville (pronounced “spigma” – one of the most awkward acronyms in bluegrass, it stands for the Society for the Preservation of Bluegrass Music of America). It actually features a few pretty prominent players. These folks are laying down BOTH tremendous groove and drive and the song is not blazingly fast. Have a listen!
As you can tell from the video, the bassist has a hand in both groove and drive. By placing the beat cleanly, shaping the length of the notes, and choosing a more legato or more staccato approach, the bass player can help determine whether a song feels peppy, relaxed, or hard-charging.
Accomplished bluegrass bassists will play with more sustain in syncopated, slow to moderate speed songs, and more staccato in peppy tunes. This is one of the ways the bass helps shape the character of the performance without ever stepping into the spotlight and demanding praise, flowers, or any of the other luxuries normally reserved for lead singers.
This is the place where the bass player makes huge contributions to the sound. It is where the groove really starts to develop for the band, and the bass is at the absolute center of it. What kind of feel does the song have? Is it driving? Greasy? Peppy? Accomplished bass players will alternate their technique – and most especially note sustain and feel – depending on what the song demands.
See how much greasy sustain the bassist Ronnie Bowman gets on the Lonesome River Band Recording, “I’ll Take the Blame” and how much it seems to match what is going on with the rest of the band.
Contrast that with the recording of Georgia Mail by the same band, which features a more staccato approach.
Rest in peace Ronnie Bowman (the bassist in both of these videos) who passed away recently. He was one of the finest.
Grace notes and ghost notes can also add a lot of rhythmic feel, especially on slower and medium-tempo songs. A good ghost note anticipates the beat just enough to create a little extra motion. It is a subtle thing — more felt than announced — but it can make the difference between a bass line that merely functions and one that quietly pulls the whole band along.
Check out the recording (below) of Eric Troutman playing bass on the song, “I Overlooked an Orchid” with Danny Paisley and listen for short ghost notes that anticipate the beat on this slower song. See if you can’t hear the “broken wheel” bass line (making a “pa-boom pa-boom” sound on each revolution):
The “pa” part is the ghost note and is a very short precursor (~ 1/32 note right ahead of the beat) to the “boom” notes. And if you think about it, this sounds just like the broken wheel in the picture above, if you were to put this on your donkey cart. Pa-boom, Pa-boom, Pa-boom.
On a side note, Bobby Lundy plays banjo on this cut – he is, in my view the world’s finest when it comes to playing a banjo break on a slow/moderate country tune like this one. Listen for his banjo break later in the song.
Of course grace notes and ghost notes are used in all kinds of bluegrass songs and not only in a broken wheel pattern. The next time you see or hear a competent bassist playing, see if you can find the ghost notes, I’ll bet they are there, especially if the song has a good groove.
Slappin’ It Around
I feel compelled to write a few words on slap style bass, which is used both in bluegrass and old-time music.
A bassist can turn heads for hundreds of yards around the jam by slapping the bass. It is a genuine attention-getter. However, like hot sauce, cologne, and banjo volume, it should be used carefully and judiciously.
There are three basic slap styles: single, double, and triple.
A single slap is simply pulling the string hard enough that it rebounds against the fingerboard with a snap.
A double slap adds a hand slap between the string snaps, typically in straight eighth-note time.
A triple slap is a bit more complicated and harder to describe in words, but briefly it consists of the string snap plus two quick hand slaps. The resulting sound resembles a fiddle shuffle or “do-dickey-do-dickey-do” pattern. It is festive, energetic, and capable of delighting audiences when used tastefully.
One interesting variation is to reverse the pattern for a measure or two, putting the downbeat on the upbeat (and vice-versa) while performing the triple slap maneuver. This allows the bassist to impress friends, confuse bandmates, and engage in the kind of cheap rhythmic showmanship that has always had a small but secure place in American music. Here is Terry Smith, of the Grascals, demonstrating that very lick: the reverse triple slap, but this time, in an appropriate and tasteful way. Forward to the 1:00 mark if you don’t want to hear the band introduce him and just hear the slapping:
You can imagine what would happen if your local bassist employs this tactic continually and without discretion (and yes this does, indeed, happen from time to time). Slap bass is great fun, but one should remember the central rule: just because you can do something does not mean you should do it.
Walking and Running
Phrasing really comes into play during bass runs and fills.
Bass runs are short note sequences — often drawn from the scale — that help pull the song from one chord to another. They are especially useful in slow and medium-tempo songs and can give a performance a welcome sense of motion. They can also fill spaces under vocals when the other instruments are staying out of the way and behaving themselves.
Walking bass is another useful tool, particularly in country shuffles. A walk generally means the bassist doubles up the number of notes being played. Some of the best country walks are referred to as a three walk — root-three-five-three-root — and a six walk, which adds the sixth degree into the picture in tasteful ways.
Many random Ray Price songs feature a three walk and they really make you want to get out on the dance floor. This is one of the finest compliments rhythm section players can receive. If people are moving, smiling, and not glaring at the stage, something good is happening.
Improv and Soloing
OK I’ll go ahead and state what everybody is thinking and won’t say out loud: Improv is not exactly encouraged for bluegrass bass (or airline pilots for that matter). It can cause ugly crashes.
If your bassist wants to improvise continuously like the rest of the band, he may need to join a jazz group, grow a beard, and begin using words like “harmonic dissonance” in casual conversation. In bluegrass, the bassist is usually expected to hold down the rhythm in an uncluttered fashion, stick to root-five with occasional tasteful departures, and create a great groove 100 percent of the time while receiving little praise and some blame. Indeed, bass players are often held responsible for everything that goes wrong, especially speeding up. When the groove is perfect, everyone congratulates the band. When the rhythm falls apart, everyone looks at the bassist as though they have violated a municipal code.
Still, there are moments when the band may feel sorry for the journeyman bassist — hauling the heaviest instrument in and out of vehicles, up and down staircases, through mud, across fairgrounds, and onto stages not designed by people who had ever seen a bass. In such moments of pity and fellowship, the other musicians may grant him a solo, sticking to root 5 with an occasional run, doing a great job of laying down a great groove 100% of the time and never complaining. Further, they always seem to get blamed for things going wrong (especially speeding up) and never get any of the credit when the groove is just perfect.
Well, the solution to the bass player’s now totally bruised and suppressed ego is for their (hopefully empathetic) band mates to give him a bass solo once in a while. Turns out that absolutely anything they play (even just continuing the root-five pattern while everybody else in the band stops playing) will elicit tremendous applause and admiration from the audience. After all, the audience didn’t even know they were there the whole set and now all of the sudden there is this new really cool sound that pops out from behind the band all by itself… what is that? THE BASS! Oh look, my gosh, honey, it’s a BASS SOLO! Let’s APPLAUD! This is their chance to improvise… take some risk… play some wild notes… People will clap even if they don’t have a clue what they are trying to accomplish. Of course, it is much better if he pulls off some pyrotechnics that even the Zambelli family would be proud of.
Providing the Foundation for a Great Performance
The very best bass players will make an entire band sound good and raise chill bumps on even the most unenlightened souls. And they will expect absolutely no recognition for the essential contribution, as they are merely the bass player. So, the next time you experience that rush of emotion from a great performance, you should not forget to thank the bass player. It is simply impossible to produce a solid, awe-inspiring bluegrass performance without excellence on the part of the bassist.
One thing worth mentioning to bass players and interested bystanders in the Internet age is the Talk bass forum (http://www.talkbass.com). This is a great place to get solid information about bass technique, advice on buying equipment and repairs. And they do have a bluegrass bass section!
To conclude this section, I’ve included a table below of some of the more prominent bassists in bluegrass, both historically and today. Make sure to check out their recordings, and even better, seek out some of the current bass players for live performances.
Foundational / Historical Figures
| Howard Watts (“Cedric Rainwater”) | One of the defining early bluegrass bassists; played with Bill Monroe and is tied directly to the sound of the “Original Bluegrass Band.” |
| Bessie Lee Mauldin | One of the earliest prominent women in bluegrass, she played bass in Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys during the 1950s and helped establish the instrument’s visible role on stage. |
| Roy Huskey, Jr. | A major later bridge figure whose musicianship and tone influenced modern acoustic bass playing; he won IBMA Bass Player of the Year in 1991. |
| Tom Gray | Groundbreaking bassist with The Country Gentlemen and the Seldom Scene; helped expand the bass’s melodic and modern role |
Modern Masters / Major Influential Players
| Missy Raines | A central modern figure in bluegrass bass; she became the first woman to win IBMA Bass Player of the Year in 1998 and has won it 10 times, more than any other bassist in IBMA history. |
| Mark Schatz | One of the most admired acoustic bass stylists of the modern era; a two-time IBMA Bass Player of the Year known for work with Tony Rice, Béla Fleck, John Hartford, Claire Lynch, and others. |
| Mike Bub | A major modern bluegrass bassist and repeated IBMA Bass Player of the Year winner; long associated with top-tier Nashville and touring bluegrass work. |
| Todd Phillips | Highly respected for both traditional and progressive acoustic work; frequently recognized among elite bluegrass bass players and regularly appears among IBMA nominees. |
| Barry Bales | A key contemporary bassist, especially known through Alison Krauss & Union Station and his 2016 IBMA Bass Player of the Year recognition. |
| Vickie Vaughn | The current IBMA Bass Player of the Year, winning in both 2023 and 2024 |
| Alan Bartram | 2017 IBMA Bass Player of the Year and an important recent player in contemporary traditional bluegrass |