1971@Truefire
Verified buyer
02/06/26
Great course!
Atomic Bass: Time Continuum
Intensive examination of time signatures for the improvising bass player.
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Kai Eckhardt
Educator
Genres
About this course
How many time signatures can you recognize immediately when you hear them? How many of those time signatures can you count out confidently without hesitation? How many of those can you play in comfortably and on demand? And finally… how many of those can you really groove with?
Survey says that most intermediate players would boil it all down to three time signatures: 4/4, 2/4 and 3/4. Make that four time signatures if you play the blues because you’d also be very comfortable with the 12/8 signature. Five time signatures if you added 6/8 to the list because you play a lot of jigs, polkas, tarantella, marches and some 6/8 rock. And yea, jazzers might be inclined to increase the number to maybe eight time signatures because they’ve been introduced to 5/4, 11/4 and 9/8. Add a few world genres and/or modern jazz signatures and lets move the number all the way to ten time signatures.
It’s not enough.
Chops, technical skills and a solid knowledge base of theory and harmony are very important but most of all, musicians need to master time and rhythm. Its timing and rhythm that hold it ALL together; the band, the arrangement, the performance, the pocket and of course… the groove.
Whatever the time signature, a competent musician should be able to hear it, count it, play it and craft a groove with it. Musicians need to master time to become a master of rhythm and groove. Become a master of groove and your phone will never stop ringing.
Kai Eckhardt’s Atomic Bass: Time Continuum is focused solely on time signatures and the rhythmic possibilities that lie within those time signatures. It’s also the most insightful, most comprehensive and most impactful bass guitar course that has ever been authored and presented on the topic.
Kai demonstrates how to hear, how to count, how to play and how to groove in 36 time signatures — from 2/4 all the way to 13/16. That alone is an extraordinarily valuable learning experience but he also passes on two priceless systems for understanding and navigating the more complex time signatures and rhythms.
“You will see the faster rhythms 2-13/8 and 2-13/16 written in quarter note notation (2/4 - 13/4). This is a special technique that allows players to tap their feet in an even way while the grooves flip over the bar lines. This grounds every groove, odd or even, slow or fast.”
Kai also shows you how to employ Konnakol to count out sophisticated time signatures, “Konnakol is a South Indian rhythm language developed for the Mridangam, a traditional South Indian hand drum. Because of its percussive nature, Konnakol is a far superior counting methodology than anything developed in the West.”
For each time signature, Kai first presents an overview followed by a trainer example to help you get a grip on the basic feel of that time signature. Kai then performs three different grooves in that time signature and then breaks them down in detail. You not only get the nuts and bolts for 36 time signatures, you also get dozens of bass grooves that you can add to your bag and take to the gig. Everything is tabbed and notated, plus you’ll get all of the rhythm tracks to practice with on your own.
A one and a two and a three and a…. click now to enter the Time Continuum.
Survey says that most intermediate players would boil it all down to three time signatures: 4/4, 2/4 and 3/4. Make that four time signatures if you play the blues because you’d also be very comfortable with the 12/8 signature. Five time signatures if you added 6/8 to the list because you play a lot of jigs, polkas, tarantella, marches and some 6/8 rock. And yea, jazzers might be inclined to increase the number to maybe eight time signatures because they’ve been introduced to 5/4, 11/4 and 9/8. Add a few world genres and/or modern jazz signatures and lets move the number all the way to ten time signatures.
It’s not enough.
Chops, technical skills and a solid knowledge base of theory and harmony are very important but most of all, musicians need to master time and rhythm. Its timing and rhythm that hold it ALL together; the band, the arrangement, the performance, the pocket and of course… the groove.
Whatever the time signature, a competent musician should be able to hear it, count it, play it and craft a groove with it. Musicians need to master time to become a master of rhythm and groove. Become a master of groove and your phone will never stop ringing.
Kai Eckhardt’s Atomic Bass: Time Continuum is focused solely on time signatures and the rhythmic possibilities that lie within those time signatures. It’s also the most insightful, most comprehensive and most impactful bass guitar course that has ever been authored and presented on the topic.
Kai demonstrates how to hear, how to count, how to play and how to groove in 36 time signatures — from 2/4 all the way to 13/16. That alone is an extraordinarily valuable learning experience but he also passes on two priceless systems for understanding and navigating the more complex time signatures and rhythms.
“You will see the faster rhythms 2-13/8 and 2-13/16 written in quarter note notation (2/4 - 13/4). This is a special technique that allows players to tap their feet in an even way while the grooves flip over the bar lines. This grounds every groove, odd or even, slow or fast.”
Kai also shows you how to employ Konnakol to count out sophisticated time signatures, “Konnakol is a South Indian rhythm language developed for the Mridangam, a traditional South Indian hand drum. Because of its percussive nature, Konnakol is a far superior counting methodology than anything developed in the West.”
For each time signature, Kai first presents an overview followed by a trainer example to help you get a grip on the basic feel of that time signature. Kai then performs three different grooves in that time signature and then breaks them down in detail. You not only get the nuts and bolts for 36 time signatures, you also get dozens of bass grooves that you can add to your bag and take to the gig. Everything is tabbed and notated, plus you’ll get all of the rhythm tracks to practice with on your own.
A one and a two and a three and a…. click now to enter the Time Continuum.
What you'll learn
- Master the technique of feeling slow while playing fast rhythms
- Apply takademi counting system to odd meters
- Learn how to count different time signatures accurately
- Understand how 5/4 time signature works and feels
- Develop the ability to maintain a steady internal pulse while executing fast subdivisions
Release date: 04/23/2014 • 6h 01m runtime
Sample lessons
Beat Training Explanation
Overview
Groove in 4
Overview
Groove in 4 Trainer
Performance
Groove in 4 Trainer
Breakdown
What's included
118 lessons • 50 charts • 52 Jam Tracks
Atomic Bass: Time Continuum
Welcome to Time Continuum, my second course for the Atomic Bass series. We are now embarking on a journey through the land of time signatures and we will dive into the world of rhythms both common and uncommon. The course covers examples spanning across 36 time signatures from 2/4 all the way to 13/16. After you have studied this rich variety of grooves you will lose your fear of uncommon meters and enjoy playing the common ones with a greater sense of depth and satisfaction. Welcome to Atomic Bass: "Time Continuum". Note: You will see the faster rhythms 2-13/8 and 2-13/16 written in quarter note notation (2/4 - 13/4). This is a special technique I have learned allowing me to tap my foot in an even way while the grooves flip over the bar lines. This allows us to ground every groove, odd or even, slow or fast.
Keeping Time
Keeping time is the process of tracking with your mind and body the particular meter you are in. This video explains the difference between various meters, how to count them and how best to relate them to the physical body. It provides a clear and simple explanation of the numbers above and below the division line by presenting different examples side by side. You will also learn my special simplification technique of consolidating faster time signatures with slow footwork.
Introduction to Konnakol
There is an extremely helpful tool we can borrow from India called "Konnakol". It is the South Indian rhythm language developed for the Mridangam, a traditional South Indian hand drum. Because of its percussive nature, Konnakol is superior to anything developed in the west. Here is a thorough explanation of the system and its basic characters.
Beat Training Explanation
Every time signature explored in Time Continuum begins with a trainer. The purpose of the trainer is to give you the most simple bass line possible mapping out three different subdivisions for each meter: 2/4, 2/8, 2/16. After exploring all lines in 2 we move on to 3 starting with the next trainer which now maps out 3/4, 3/8 and 3/16. This system continues all the way to 13. The trainer always precedes every new meter giving you the necessary time to get to know the new shape before diving into the more complex rhythms developed for you in this course.
Groove in 2
This introduction sets up the framework for all basslines in 2 which are about to follow. The unique properties of playing in 2 are presented here as an outline of different styles which frequently resort to this time signature. Styles most commonly written in 2 include (but are not limited to) Latin music, house beats or African music.
Groove in 2 Trainer
The first trainer is a set of notes mapping out 2/4, 2/8 and 2/16. The notes for all three time signatures remain identical except for the tempo that changes from single to double to quadruple time.
Groove in 2 Trainer
Notes and fingering are explained here after the complete trainer has been presented along with a drum beat tailored to this first exercise. We use the system of assigning numbers to each finger starting with the index being 1 and the pinky being 4.
+ 111 more lessons
Reviews
9 results
aikstudiobass40
Verified buyer
12/02/24
Good value
Very informative
rduda
Verified buyer
04/14/20
Good but sometimes quite tough
Kai Eckardt is such a nice an friendly teacher, he always motivated me, but to be honest - some of the performances are very tough for a beginner like me. I know I'm not talented at all, so I have to heavily slow down the examples to get the syncopations under control - and that takes a while. Beside of that, to get a feeling of rhythms especially the unusual and recipes to use, this course is in my opinion recommendable, especially for the advanced.
msperber
11/30/19
Very inspirational
Being an odd time signature enthusiast, I was super excited to discover this course. Kai's bass lines are extremely cool, and both challenging and very instructional. His insistance on really feeling the groove, no matter how complicated it may appear, has been inspiring and pushed my playing to the next level. Kai is my favorite truefire bass instructor, hope he'll release more courses in the future.
FaustoB
03/09/19
Excellent Course, Stunning bass lines, and Unique Content
This is a great course to help you explore different time signatures, it helps developing your internal rhythm and to become confident in playing and hearing different time signature. Some of the bass lines contained in this course are absolutely stunning; they sound refreshing, inspiring and unique. However, to truly master and internalise odd time signature, alongside working through this course, I'd suggest to hook up with a drummer that is keen to explore similar musical aspects, or write yourself a repertoire of several drum beats using a DAW, a drum machine or similar, to be used as play along. This course is extremely valid, provides solid examples, tools and knowledge, but expect to put additional work if you want to become confident in improvising over unusual time signatures. There are no cliche' bass lines in this course, nor stale blues shuffles or classic rock and roll bass lines.. I'd recommend this course to an intermediate player. 5 stars for the content, the beautiful bass lines contained in the course, and the boldness in offering something that is unique and that is genuinely trying to develop your skills as musician.
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