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I'm playing the piano a little bit and totally just for fun without any big ambitions. I often improvise, playing some pattern for the left hand which will stay the same (well, the chords obviously change), but I see myself ending up with almost always the same patterns. For example I often play the following (the numbers represent the intervalls being used):

1 + 2 + 3 + 4 +
1 5 8 1 5 8 1 5
1 3 5 8 1 3 5 8
1     5     8
1 5 1 8 1 5 1 8

What are some other "famous, often played" patterns?

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  • 1 . 1 . 1 . 1 5b3 .b3 . 2 4 2 5 1 . 1 . 1 . ... :-) Apr 15, 2014 at 12:34
  • 1 . 5 8 1 5 8 . 1 . 5 6 1 5 6 Apr 15, 2014 at 20:08

2 Answers 2

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There's a boogie pattern 1-3-5-6-b7-6-5-3- used for 12 bar blues. Walking bass patterns (usually on each beat) use all the notes from the scale of the key you're in,- you can use any order, preferably starting a bar with the root note. Theory says that there's a good chance one or two of the other notes in the bar will fit the chord, even random notes ! But that's not really what walking bass should be about. You can also use other beats to place notes on, it doesn't have to be just beats 1,2,3,4 and the quavers in between. Use one of your examples, and change the timing but not the note order.

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Just a few notes: What Tim describes as "a boogie pattern" some people call the money-walk and it varies slightly, sometimes walking half-steps up and down from the 3rd to the 5th and occasionally touching on the flattened 5th. Play around with this one, it's (over)used in 50s and 60s rock quite a bit.

A common country bass-line (some call it the eat-shit bass-line) alternates between 8 and 5 with walk-ups to the 1 every other measure or so. This is extremely common in country and country-rock

A common Texas blues bass-line: Walk down from the root: 1, b7, 6, 5 and repeat. Used in parts of Pride and Joy by Stevie Ray Vaughan.

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