I'd never heard of Jacob, but I love that his approach to music is so organic and enthusiastic, not rule-bound.

Starting singing my bass lines while i was screwing around like 10 years ago. Took a super short time to lock in, and the ability to land on exactly the note I am hearing in my head ever since has been amazing. Locking that ability in was crossing a threshold from my bass being an instrument i was playing to my bass being my musical voice. Go figure. Now I am limited only by what i can imagine, the actual playing part is no longer a barrier.

Contemporary jazz guitarist George Benson started doing this in the 1970s and eventually his producers started mic'ing his singing into the mix. It's a really great way to get the hands to do what the brain wants.

The barely eaten bagel seems like further insight into Jacob Collier 😂

As a bassist, i must say this is one of the most F*****g good lessons i've ever listened to!

Its always such a joy to hear jacob speak, he breathes music effortlessly!!!

Jaco: Casually pulling Polish anthem out of his sleeve and riffing voicings . Scott thinking: “act casual, act casual ..

In a lot of cultures music is taught orally, sometimes the teacher has no instrument when teaching. I come from a family of bagpipers and vocalising the tune was an important part of learning called Canntaireachd ( kan-ter-ach) this was the tradition method of teaching before being introduced to western written music. Cultures all over the world have the same thing.

Richard Bona is also a perfect example of that spirit 🙏

Glen Gould famously sang along in some of his recordings of JS Bach.

So awesome to see this two faces in the same video just talking about bass. Anyone else notice how Jacob always talks about this stuff like he just found it out yesterday and you’re the first person he’s told even though he mastered the concepts years ago and travels the world performing and giving seminars. Inspiring to see that kind of passion.

Awesome, just got my very first bass yesterday.

Haven't tried this with rhythm sections but singing out loud while playing a melody really helps me get out of the shapes and licks I am stuck to and as Jacob said, it is a part of me choosing that specific way. It really helps since I don't have to think what is going to come out of my mouth improvised, unlike the improvisation on my instrument where I have to think a little my way around shaping the melody. It is a great system since your fingers lead to you to the notes you are singing.

A real basass player. Extremely creative, humble and exhuding music. Great Jacob Collier

In reggae I was taught by my keyboard player first then one of my mentors to sing the bass line, even if you don't reproduce a bass sound w your voice, to get the phrasing spot on.

Kind of hypnotic listening to him sing out and play the bass

This is a great tip, not only does it give a nice feel to the line but it helps you to practice playing the notes you hear in your head. Cool video and Jacob is such a great guy and so good at explaining things. Love the enthusiasm!

I’ve always loved this lad from the early days it was so obvious he is possibly the epitome of musical achievement. He is a genuine 💯 bonafide Genius

Always good when Scott uploads

I found out abt Jacob a few days ago. I am obsessed with him ever since! Amazing how inspiring his talking is :) Always makes me pick up my bass!

This channel is in its exponential phase of providing amazing content. Keep it going. Thanks!

That Was Awesome. So great. Thanks for sharing this interview!

JC is such a uniquely talented musician, really one in a million.

Thankful for both of you guys

Spot on! Sing, hum, whistle your solos, etc! I never knew the importance of of doing this until I heard what Gary Willis says at 10:17 in this video: Advanced Bass Soloing made Easy with Gary Willis. Now, I hum, whistle, scat everything I want to play and record it. Then I transcribe/migrate it to the bass. BTW, is that class available for download? Link just says enrollment now closed. Cheers.

humming a bassline before i start playing it is something that has actually worked for me, idk why but it makes sense

YES!!! Everything he says is spot on. Singing is the spirit- the breath, the phrasing - soul of the music. We just transfer our song from our voice to our bass. I sing all of my parts first before I even pick up my instrument. And back when I was learning off record, I would sing the parts and have line and the groove down before I attempt to learn it on bass.

What a unique man! Music is effortless for him 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

This is excellent and fundamental music education knowledge. Even drummers and percussionists gain a lot from vocalizing their parts. Looks at the tradition of learning to play Tabla in Hindustani Classical style, they vocalize every part before they even touch the drum. Thanks for sharing - you’re both making the world a better place through music.

Even moviemakers didn’t see this level of giftedness coming. I love his advice about singing. ❤

Jacob ti amo

Thx Scott, Jacob is awesome.

It's always nice to learn from a classically trained musician with endless power of imagination and eye level infotainment skills.

Scott!! Thank you so much for turning me on to Jacob Collier. He is easily one of the most fascinating musicians I’ve ever listened to. Cheers!!!

Less than 10 minutes of Jacob trying to communicate with ordinary mortals... although his genius cannot be expressed in words, speeches like these should be heard in all schools. he easily spoke about emotion, about corporeity, about music as a extenions of personal communication, about the most mechanical and rational part of each of us... Maybe these are things that can never be fully understood, but people like him make you understand the importance of considering such themes

This is exactly how I learn difficult bass lines. Sing it first and then it translates to the fretboard easier.

As the bassist, i picked up the "Newsted role" did backing. Fun

Awesome...! Thanks guys!

I agree. Sing what You play and sync Your mind with Your hands. Simple as that. Thanks for the affirmation.

Great lnterview great show

Thanks, this was so cool. I suppose the learning goes faster with first singing it. The Indian tabla players do sing the rythms before they play it, and it is also a tradition in Cuba for the congeros to articulate the drum sounds, though not at the same time as performing. I once went to a course in Cuban percussion, and the first lesson was to learn the fonetics. 'to ga ba ga to ga gong gong' and so on. Real fun :)

people that say "jacob as technical skill but no soul" need to hear him play bass, i dare them to say it again 4:24

Super interesting, and again, makes total sense to me. Just great! 👍🙏👍

Yeh honestly doing this has leveled me up way faster . But you know a secret ? The same concept applies to dancing with rhythm. All this music has roots in west African music which dancing is a foundation of so it makes sense

I think this man is musician

Really really cool approach. Totally applies to grooves too. I feel like such a tight drummer playing something and beatboxing too it. When it starts to feel more like an extension of my voice I become way more comfortable with busier grooves that I was just trying to think out the coordination to

Thankyou man, I sometimes done that but i'm not sure but after see this video i become confident

Singing! GLENN GOULD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jimi Hendrix was doing that and band of gypsies. it was called scat with the Jazz players many years before that, and George Benson most notably sings the notes while he plays

This is absolutely genius 😳 and instantaneous made my bass lines and solos sound different.

I've been trying out this idea of doing things with my whole body (or as much of it as possible). Whether it's chopping vegetables, walking, or eating, or playing an instrument while dancing to the rhythm. It's like the opposite of multi-tasking. I think focusing wholly on one thing at a time eventually leads you to doing MORE than multi-tasking would. This idea of singing while playing sounds like it's so in line with that, and definitely looks more fun!

Jacob is the man! I like to sing when soloing, but I don't do this as much...very cool perspective!

Lovely approach. We should view the instruments as simply an extension of ourselves. We are the vibration.

Doing "bom bom bom"(singning I guess) really helped my right hand follow the beats, as weird as it might sound.

Wow. The dude fan actually sing very nice!! I love listening to him talk about music

"If you can't sing it, you can't play it." The greatest and most memorable quote ever given to me at music school. 1M% agree with you two and you are the only ones I've seen call people out for this in my hast 25yrs of music. GJ, keep up the good work.

I find a good way to come up with a bass line is by playing the music without bass and then listening and humming a line I hear works and then sit down and work out how to play what I've heard

Hes right. I learned a lot of bass vocab, lines and phrases by singing or humming.

I play by ear, learned so many songs that if I forget what to play on the bass, I just sing the song and the bass riff comes to me. I can remember songs I played back in the 60s this way. Also if you sing while playing I get the order close. But nothing helps better that to play with a band. It's good to have a lot of different songs in your head, cuz bands would call me out of nowhere and I'd not have much time to practice maybe just a few minutes and rush off to play.

As a drummer in the 80’s I used a headset mic. This video reminded me that I often grunted the beats as I played them.

Yup, this is the approach that works for me as well (at least most of the time)

wooowww what a rich lesson!!!! thank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We'll all take a leap forward when we put singingphobia behind us.

Scott like all of us right now, just like, damnnn.

What a amazing guy…

I only started seriously singing age 32 and for me it was the missing link in my musicality. In my experience it was very hard to translate my internal music to an instrument without being able to sing. That music your hear in your head is directly tied to your vocal chords, there are actual physical nerves going from your brain to your vocal chords. Ever since I sing everything is easier. I can read a score and actually know what it sounds like because I have made that direct connection between seeing notes on a score and producing those tones with my own voice. Hearing is easier because I know what it feels like to produce certain sounds and I can connect that to music I’m hearing. I did conservatory and finished my theory with an 8.5 average like 10 years ago, I have heard a billion major chords in my life but it is only since I can produce a major triad with my voice with confidence that I easily recognize it in. The ability to transcribe music by ear was something I thought only the elite of the elite could do. I’m wondering if we all posses flawless relative pitch but that we simply never learn to associate it with the right words (the notes) because most of us never sing seriously. If we lived in a black and white world and barely anybody knew the names of colors how hard would it be to describe a colorful dream? Seeing color is not something we have to learn, it is a physical property of our eyes, in most cases. In our world color is vitally important, when a slice of bread looks green it is pretty important that you don’t eat it. Our entire society is build on our ability to see colors and that is why everybody constantly practices their ability to detect colors and associate them with the right words. With music it is completely irrelevant to the average person’s daily life. You never need to use that ability for anything. So nobody, except for a small group of musicians, practices it. But relative pitch might nonetheless be a physical property of our brain in the same way seeing color is a physical property of the eye. Not a skill but an innate physical ability. We are not certain yet how and when musicality developed in humans. There is some evidence that suggests musicality might have predated language, or even caused language. Maybe at some point in our evolution relative pitch was vital in our every day life. Instead of the stoned ape theory it should be called the singing ape theory. And maybe language is a refinement of that singing. Birds poses absolute pitch because they use that to determine the size of their competition, the lower the bigger. So if we developed relative pitch that could point to us listening for intervals and not frequency. Before we had complex facial muscles and lips we couldn’t produce words so it had to be yells and grunts. If you sing a perfect fifth interval you feel it, you could imagine that it could be used as some form of communication by ancestors. I’m going full on speculation now but you could imagine something like females listen for the most perfect fifth interval for a mate, or maybe it could be a general sign of competency or age. And as time went on those intervals became more complex, until there are actual melodies and songs. The more complex the more you can communicate. And as time went on maybe that singing refined into words. Saying apple is easier and quicker than singing a little motif.

Love singing what I play. Lead vocals plus bass=pure torture to start out singing and play for my band though lol. Some don’t have a Nick of trouble with it. Not me though. Gads. Rarely does the bass line and melody seem to line up haha. Guitar has never given me the troubles with singing- funny.

Wow, that was amazing

That's the most normal outfit I've ever seen Jacob wear.

Tigran Hamasyan sings when he improvises Piano too. Must be something to it.

just WOW....

So interesting the relation from the Voice and the music. ( But I must say your inner rhythm is from somewhere else. Tx.Jacob J.p.

I want that bass. Give it!

that explains Flea being the bass on carpool karaoke

Words!!!

yup

I Wonder If this was one of my students, I taught him this over 20 years ago...(In Oakland ca..)

genius

thanks m8

Agreed!!!!

How can someone practice this skill? I don't have a particularly good ear for tones and whenever I sing it all comes out as the wrong notes

I’ve always had to be able to sing a bass line before I could really feel it. I need to internalize the part

Jacob Collier Is a true Alien of Music! Glad he landed on Earth. Cool video!

So cool

Paul McCartney, Phil Lynott, Sting, Mark King etc.

6:05 It sounds more like the Yugoslav anthem :) 👌🖖

Sound.

I find notes easier from listening to vocals, so this makes a ton of sense for many people I'm sure.

I thought this video would be about the importance of bass players in bands singing the lyrics in songs. Enjoyed it anyway.

I kept waiting for a dog to wander into the room and clean that plate ☺️

My virtuoso radar is going off

awesome

This has been my opinion for 50 years.. I totally agree ..

4:26 which live session is that from? would love to hear the whole set!

Polish Anthem, what a nice suprise ❤️

Hendrix sang his guitar rifts.

ragas

Not one mention of scat, even though that is what he's doing while playing.

I'm pretty sure an absolute boatload of people sing internally when they jam.

Record, sing it, play it. Listen back. Does it groove and (more importantly) does it serve the song? If not, try, try again. 😃