Bb at the Electric Bass Seat

Everything a chart can write over the letter Bb, in 10 families. Four or five of them carry most of the repertoire; the rest are what a reharmonisation reaches for when four or five stop being enough.

The electric bass seat carries the amplified bottom — the same harmonic duty as the upright, played with a fingerboard that answers back and a sustain the room can hear over a backbeat. The chord tones are the same ones the upright would choose; what changes is that a note can be held through the bar instead of dying, so a line can lean on a chord rather than announce it.