Foundations

Bass: long scale (usually 34"), fretted or fretless, 4–6 strings. Sit or stand with the neck slightly up — the nut should sit near shoulder height so the fretting wrist stays relatively straight.

Fretting hand: thumb behind the neck (roughly opposite the middle finger), one finger per fret when possible (1–2–3–4 in a four-fret box). Keep the palm off the neck; only the thumb and fingertips contact wood/metal. Bass frets are wide, so shift the whole hand instead of stretching.

Plucking hand sits near the end of the neck or over the pickups. Most rock / metal bass here uses fingers (index + middle), not a pick — see Fingerstyle. Stopping the strings you are not playing is half the job: Muting & ghosts.

• Strap height — standing and sitting should feel similar. If standing feels like a different instrument, raise the strap.
• Action — strings high enough not to buzz, low enough that fretting does not fight you.
• Intonation — fretted 12th and harmonic 12th should agree; otherwise pitch lessons lie.
• Warm hands — 60 seconds of open-string i–m before anything fast.

How a bass differs from a guitar, and what to unlearn: Bass vs guitar.

From thickest (lowest) to thinnest (highest):

Tune so each open string matches the pitch above. Use the live Tuner (mic, bass · EADG) or a clip-on tuner; the buttons here are a pitch reference. Same letter names as guitar’s bottom four, sounding an octave lower. Drop D and 5-string: Tunings.

Reference drill: tune open strings, then check fretted 5ths (E5 = A open, A5 = D open, D5 = G open). If fretted and open disagree, the instrument needs setup — do not “practice around” bad intonation.

Click a string at a fret to hear it. Open notes sit left of the nut (unfretted). G is on top — the same orientation as TAB later. Listen for even volume and a clean attack with no neighbor-string buzz; that is your baseline tone for every later drill.

Each fret is one half step — the same twelve-note grid as piano. A finger just behind the fret, not on top of the metal, keeps the note clean.

TAB is a grid. Four lines — G on top, then D, A, E at the bottom (same orientation as the neck on this site). Read left to right: each column is a moment in time. A digit is the fret to press, not which finger to use. 0 is open (no fret). A vertical bar | is a barline or beat marker. Rhythm is often implied by spacing or written above the staff — always prefer a click over guessing.

G|--------
D|--------
A|--------
E|---0----   → open E

Letters and marks (left hand unless noted):

• h — hammer-on (pluck once, then fret the next note with the left hand)
• p — pull-off (flick off to the lower fret; the lower note must speak)
• / and \ — slide up or down to the next fret without lifting
• b — bend · ~ or v — vibrato on the held note
• x — dead / ghost note (percussive thud, not a clear pitch — see Muting & ghosts)
• <12> — touch harmonic at that fret (see Harmonics)
• T / P under a line — slap thumb / pop (see Slap & pop later)

On song pages you may also see chord names (G | D | Em | C) above the grid — that is when the harmony changes, and the root is usually where your line starts.

Example on the A string (pluck → hammer → pull → slide):

G|--------------------------------
D|--------------------------------
A|---3---h---5---p---3---/5-------
E|--------------------------------

All open strings (low E up to G), written the TAB way — read left to right; each 0 is the next string, not a chord:

G|-------------0--
D|---------0------
A|-----0----------
E|-0--------------

Play all open strings

Hear them with Play all open strings (low E up to G), then match the same notes on the neck diagram earlier on this page.

Next layer — how long notes last, chord letters above a staff, and reading pitch in bass clef — is on Neck and names · Reading (TAB is assumed; staff sections are at the end of that page).

Move on when all of these are true on a normal day, not your best one:

• All four open strings match the tuner and ring clean, with no neighbour-string buzz.
• You can read the open-string TAB (G on top, E at the bottom) and say which string each line is.
• A fretted fifth on the string below matches the open string above it: E5 = A, A5 = D, D5 = G.