Easy Folk and Country Songs for Bass Beginners

Neil Young, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Johnny Cash

Mar 31, 2009

County and folk music has a warm, earthy tone that can remind one of summer, kitchen parties, and a good beer and bbq. This grassroots style is simple and fun!

The wonderful thing about deciding to play country and folk music is that the canon has a great deal of established content produced by legends, ranging from Johnny Cash to Garth Brooks to Neil Young and the entire spectrum in between. Country music is generally fairly simply to play, almost always in standard time and tuning, and is recognizable to most music fans – meaning that it is always welcome at most local bars, pubs, or watering holes.

Keep on Rockin' in the Free World

A great folk rock song to learn, Cinnamon Girl by Canadian artist Neil Young is possessed of a simple yet very memorable chorus bass line, and a very relaxing gallop throughout the rest of the verse. The timing takes a little getting used to for those beginning bassists used to playing more standard riffs, but since the bass guitar is so prominent in this track one should have little problem nailing it down with some slight practice.

A legendary band fronted by John Fogerty in its heyday, Creedance Clearwater Revival – commonly known as CCR – are one of the most popular and timeless icons of the country and folk music scene. The litany of good tunes put out by the band is nigh-endless, including Suzie Q, Fortunate Son, Looking Out My Back Door, and many others. For the purposes of learning one of their greatest, and easier songs – Bad Moon Rising fits the bill entirely. Very simple to play and a great deal of fun with a jam band!

Johnny Cash is a man who towers above many other music icons as a universally beloved figure who fought for the downtread men and women of the earth and wrote songs that resonated within the hearts of the working class – and others who had seen a great deal of hurt in their lives. Though he has passed away in recent years, his legacy lives on and so does a catalogue of excellent work. One of his classics, “Walk the Line”, is a great song to play on bass that requires attention to detail but should not require a great deal of skill in playing the bass portion.

Beer for My Horses

While it is certainly true that a great deal of modern country music has moved away from these roots, it does not mean that the genre is bereft of great artists. Alan Jackson continues to produce some excellent music, generally fun loving much like “Chatahoochie” but also sometime reflective and haunting as seen in “Midnight in Montgomery”.

Other artists such as Garth Brooks continue to be popular around the world. Being a bassist in a folk or country rock band can be a lot of fun and give one a great sense of rhythm as well as tone – country and folk music should be played with a warm resonance that supports the nature and emotion of both of these populist genres.

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The copyright of the article Easy Folk and Country Songs for Bass Beginners in Guitar is owned by Nicholas Morine. Permission to republish Easy Folk and Country Songs for Bass Beginners in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.