GIANT STEPS
STUDY STANLEY CLARKE'S PLAYING
Ace bass educator Stuart Clayton guides us to the peak of the bass skills pyramid. Achieve your goals here!
Getty
Welcome back to my long-running advanced techniques column.After dissecting the slap technique in intimate detail over the last year or so, in the previous issue we focused in on the bass player who started it all: Larry Graham. In this month’s instalment, we’re going to shift our focus to another bassist who has played a vital role in the development of the technique: Stanley Clarke.
Stanley developed an interest in music at an early age and initially picked up the violin. Before long he switched to the cello, and then again to the upright bass. After completing a doctorate at the Philadelphia Academy of Music he moved to New York in 1970, where he found work with reputable band leaders such as Dexter Gordon, Horace Silver, Stan Getz and Art Blakey. By this point Clarke had developed an ability to solo melodically on the upright in a manner that was rarely matched. After forming Return To Forever with the late Chick Corea in 1972, Clarke began using the electric bass in addition to the upright. A year later, he was approached by Rick Turner, a luthier at Alembic. Unimpressed with the sound of Clarke’s electric bass, Turner gave him an Alembic bass to try on a gig, thus laying the groundwork for a partnership between artist and luthier that endures to this day.