Accuracy of Attack

So these next couple exercises are focused on the accuracy of the initial attack of every note. In addition, you want to have this nice kind of like echoey, faded, smooth ending every note too, so we're not stopping the note with the tongue, but we're just kind of allowing the note to decay as the wind kind of slowly comes to a stop. Think of every note kind of like a dart being thrown at a target. You want to hit the bullseye on every note. If you get under the bullseye, it will sound a little soggy. If you get too high, you may play the wrong note or crack the note a little bit. You want every note to be real solid. So the way this exercise works, I'll show it to you, is you start on an F as the first of everything and the last note of every example. But in between, we'll have a note that is an increasing distance away from the F. Like this first one, F down a half step to E is as little as we can move and back to F. And then we have F going up a half step to G flat and back. And then next we move a little further. F going down a whole step or two half steps to E flat and back up. Then going up to G and back to F. And you just keep going until you can get all the way to low F an octave away and an F an octave higher. Let's play this one together and see some of the difficulties. Play every note at a good volume. It'll help your confidence at first and keep that nice open relaxed sound at the end of the note to really maximize the benefit. And also move the mouthpiece away from your chops between every three notes and reset. That'll really make you develop those good habits of not putting too much pressure on your top lip and making it feel like you've just picked the tuba up and you're trying to find that note, that first note of the day that can be so challenging sometimes. That first note is troublesome, but just have confidence. Here we go. One, two, three. Now the whole step, the E flat first vowel. Up to G, one and two. Down to D, one and two or three. Up to A flat, one. Up to A natural, two. Down to C, one and three or four. Up to B flat, open. Down to B natural, two. Down to B natural, all three or two and four. Up to B natural, one and two. Down to B flat, open. Up to C, one. Down to A natural, two. Up to D flat, two. Down to A flat, one. Up to D, open. Down to G, one and two or three. Up to E flat, one. Down to G flat with two and three. Up to E natural with two. Down to low F with one and three or four. And up to high F with open. So you can see that will be a very challenging exercise to master. It takes a lot of diligent practice to be able just to grab those notes even with the reference of the F which should be our best note, right? And we want to get every note that we get to besides that F to sound just as good as that F. A couple tips on that. Play with kind of a loud sound on the F and when you go lower, an even louder sound, more energy, kind of pop those notes out. Be sure you drop your jaw though as you get lower than like B flat. Make sure you get your jaw dropped so those notes get really full and stay in tune. They'll get sharper, shrill. And then the other thing is as you go higher, as you get higher and higher in the stack, kind of back off on the notes and let them float a little more. Don't press so hard and you'll get more technique that way and a prettier, more balanced sound. The pyramid of sound is not just for your band balance in terms of effort, right? People talk about, oh, the lows have to put more effort to be heard so the pyramid of sound has them on the bottom where there's more room, more energy. And in the high voices like the sopranos, the clarinets, the trumpets and the flutes, they should be less effort because it's easier to hear them because they're higher. And there's a lot of truth to that. Really what we're going for in like a band sound though, is a sound that is very even, like a column. But the pyramid of sound I think helps us remind us that it takes effort to really produce those low sounds and project and it also takes focus and effort to be able to play high instruments very sensitively and with a lot of light touch and be able to balance that way too. But it works the same way just on your instrument. You want a big fat low range and a very light touch and singing effortless high range. And you want to work until you can really feel that and be comfortable with that. Now the second thing we can learn in this exercise is called intervals. Now, the intervals are defined by how far one note is from another note. So we measure these intervals in terms of what's called a half step. Or, in other words, as little movement as there can be between two different notes, or just one key away on the keyboard. And as we go along we get one half step further from the F every time we go up or down respectively, right? So what we're going to do is I'm going to play these intervals and I'm going to call out their intervallic name and see if you can write them down that way you can practice them. So F to E is just a half step also known as a minor second. F to G flat would also be a half step or a minor second. F to E flat is a whole step, which is the same thing as two half steps apart. These are called major seconds. That means F to G will also be a major second going up. Alright, F down to D is three half steps or a step and a half called a minor third. You can have an ascending minor third going up to A flat. Okay, four half steps or two whole steps down major third, so that F to D flat is a major third. And then F to A is also a major third. Alright, F down to C is called a perfect fourth, that's five half steps. F up to B flat is also a perfect fourth, five half steps. F down to B natural is a thing called a tritone. Three whole steps or six half steps, tritone, three tones, three whole steps, F to B. And if we go up, this is what's interesting, three half steps up is also a tritone going up to B. You get the same notes here, F to B going down and up, because there are twelve half steps in an octave, and we're at the halfway point, six, or six half steps, three whole steps, tritone. Alright, next one, going down to B flat is a perfect fifth, that's seven half steps. Going up seven half steps, we get F to C. Alright, going down eight half steps, this is a minor sixth. That was F down to low A. Going up a minor sixth, we got F to D flat. Alright, going down nine half steps, here's a major sixth. F to A flat. Or going up a major sixth, F to D. Alright, going down ten half steps, a minor seventh, F to low G. Going up a minor seventh, F to E flat. Going down eleven half steps is a major seventh, F to G flat. Up a major seventh is F to E. Going down an octave, F to F, is twelve half steps. And then going up an octave, F to open F. So a difficult exercise, but we have an opportunity to learn simple intervals as we practice this, an opportunity to develop our sound around that perfect F note and spread that tone up and down in our range more. Now, finally, I'm going to look at this last exercise, this chromatic crunch exercise. So we talked about this pyramid of sound idea, how it's not just a band balance issue, but really we can also use it to help our personal volume levels. We want our low notes to be real full and our higher notes to you know, kind of taper out. So we'll start with a pretty strong F, but the goal is every note we want to have a great tone, but just be a little louder than the previous note. Let's give it a shot. One, two, at first to play those notes that are like lower than low B flat a little louder and maybe dwell a little longer so we can really feel the power of those notes. It's a little easier to give yourself a little more time on those low notes, but sometimes they don't respond right away. As you get better, you'll be able to control those notes with a little more space between them, more like just percussive loud sounds, but that's very difficult. But you will get better if you practice these. So, in conclusion, accuracy of attack exercise. Don't put too much pressure on your face. Minimal pressure on the top lip, bottom lip first all the time. So important. Second thing, learn those simple chromatic intervals. Minor 2nd, Major 2nd, Minor 3rd, Major 3rd, Perfect 4th, Tritones, Perfect 5th, Minor 6th, Major 6th, Minor 7th, Major 7th, and then your Perfect Octave. Learn those and then develop some balance with this chromatic crunch exercise at the end. Just let the sound fly off. It's okay to let the tuba honk a little bit. It makes you feel good to kind of just honk it out sometimes. Use that exercise, develop some volume, some projection, and you'll get better.