When reading sheet music, how do you know where to play the notes on bass guitar?

Since you can play a note on multiple places on the fretboard, how do you know which place to play them on?When reading sheet music, how do you know where to play the notes on bass guitar?
try tabsWhen reading sheet music, how do you know where to play the notes on bass guitar?
Forget tabs dude. Tabs are for loosers who cant read music. Reading music is not 'necessary' but its practically the foundation of you being able to communicate with other musicians. As a classically trained bassist let me try to explain this to you to the best of my ability.





what you are asking is how do you know what position to play in when (after knowing what the note is from the sheet music) you realize you can play it in more than one spot.





What you want to do is you want to stay in first position for now. First position is where your index finger is on the first fret (makes sense). The reason for that is that those notes in that area are the easiest for most people to remember. Its a lot easier to play the F sharp on the fourth fret of the D than the F sharp on the 9th fret of A or the 14th fret of E (even though they all sound the same) because you know that that if you are on the D string the F sharp is only a couple of steps away. Overall its a lot easier to know what the notes are and memorize them in first position.





THE ONLY time where shifting becomes useful is if





1) the notes you need to play are a higher than the notes you can play in first postion. Then you shift accordingly to adjust to the higher notes.





2) its comfortable to play something up the neck (higher postion) either because its fast (note that in the higher positions the frets are closer together so you dont have to move your fingers as far) or because you dont want to constantly shift up and down to get both low and high notes so you find a comfortable position in the middle where you can access both.





Dont worry about shifting too much if you dont need to. Stick to what you know and dont complicate your life now because shifting is a technique which is supposed to make your life a lot easier and your playing a lot better. Shifting is also a personal thing which depends on the performer. I personally play up the neck a lot because the frets are closer together and I can get a nice beafy bassy tone and still be able to move around all my patterms. Shifting will eventually make your life easier and you'll laugh at all the bassists who dont shift and are just constantly sliding up and down the neck trying to find their notes. If you find a song that needs shifting take it slowly and you'll get it but there are plenty of songs out there that dont require anything like that. Good Luck





tip: Go to the last note of a song and then find that note on the A string. Put your finger on that fret and ';in theory'; thats the best position to play that song in. (if you know music theory, I'm assuming the song ends on the tonic, so if the song is in e minor, it ends on an E and you can try to play it in 7th position (seventh fret of A string which gives you your tonic e and allows you to base any scale or arpeggio off of that tonic root)
(this might not help) I try every combination to figure out what is the easiest to play. I prefer to use tabs, though

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