Woodruff V - Tuba Lesson

I'm starting to speak now. Oh 5 out of the Woodrick book. We're going to break this up into a little section. I'll play the first section for you then we'll talk about it. 1, 2, 3 Okay so, what we have here is this legato, kind of expressive, love song type of melody here. So you have this So, I know normally when we play dotted 16th rhythms we like to keep them kind of stylized but because this is so legato I would try to just keep the wind blowing and the sound moving between all those notes, like those first three notes. Maybe just play the F, the second note, a little more volume so we don't miss it, but make sure that we're really connected all the way through there. Another thing is any time you have a long note you can kind of conserve the wind. Longer notes get heard a little better than shorter notes because they last for longer durations. So we can kind of let them simmer a little bit and as the note lasts longer and longer let it sizzle a bit more and then you can use that extra push at the end of those long notes to help you jump up and grab the higher notes that they rebound off of. Listen to it again and see if you can hear that. 1, 2, 3 Another thing is to make sure that last note lasts all three beats. I would give a little shake, a little diminuendo to it, maybe even some vibrato and just this nice little easy cutoff, very soft handed on your cutoffs and attacks only. Nothing sudden. Very organic. All the sounds are very tapered. Okay, let's look at the next section. Let's play it. 1, 2, 3, 4 All the way to that Bb on the 4th system there. So what we want to do here, we have this thing, we have sequences here. And the same thing up a bit. So notice I'm growing each time I play that. So as the line goes higher, I get louder and more intense in the sound. And as it goes back down, I get less intense. The tone and the wind between the notes never fail. Even when I back the sound off, I'm really thinking extra about blowing in between the notes there. I'm going to play it again and see if you can catch my breaths in between each of the phrases. Notice that I'm not rushing the breath. I'm not really trying to keep the time completely with integrity. I'm trying to do as much as I can, but I'm definitely sure that when I take that breath at the end of each phrase, that I'm really tanking up and make sure I can at least play every little part of this phrase, every gesture of the phrase in one kind of connected way with the wind. 1, 2, 3, 4 Especially those last bits of 8th notes, those can get too choppy sometimes. So really put the legato tone. Doh, doh, doh, doh, doh, really doh, soft sound. Make sure you're playing wind in between the notes so it keeps that legato kind of flavor of the sound. Let's look at this next section. 1, 2, 3, 4 Alright, so you heard there, I made the most common mistake of any technical mistake in this etude is when I get to the gee, dee, dee, dee, dee, dee, part of that, the G. I didn't get high enough for the G so an F came out in that mysterious 7th partial, the wrong note, by chance. So you really want to be sure and get to that G. So what I want to do this time to help work on this because this is probably the hardest spot in the music Those of you really trying to make all state they're gonna pick this part I'm just gonna tell you right now because you're gonna try to find the people who can really play it Way I like to work on this is play those two sets of diminished arpeggios and notice where I breathe in them, too and then When I get to the G on the little turn the G F E F I'm gonna hold the G just for our own confidence Yeah again. One, two, three, four. One. It'll get better if I'm in that G. It's a tough note on that two, but as time goes by. Then the next checkpoint I like to make is the Bb and hold that note. You may just start right there on the G and practice. And then be sure that you get that. So in the last I'm going to play this one more time, this whole section. That thing is this diminished arpeggio that goes up in resolve. Then you have another one like the half step above it. Make sure that it's growing in intensity all the way to that. I really hope you find the volume and the wind and help yourself out killing two birds with one stone and building the excitement with the energy through the phrase. It's also helping you maneuver and move the wind it takes to play that high Bb with confidence. One more time. One, two, three, four. One. One, two, three, four. With this little kind of sequencing thing that goes up and comes back down to end on the A on the five chord, the A major chord there. Setting this back up to go back to B minor. Here it is. One. Two. One, two, three, four. Before that fermata really helps it settle in. It's like a little resting cadential point. Here it is again. One, two, three, four. Then we return to the original material with a little variation. One, two. One, two, three, four. So I'll show you a little trick here. There's a little, a quick little turn, a little ornament there with the 16th notes. So what I do there, it can be really treacherous to go through these notes, especially when you play the F and try to go up to the A. So what I like to do there is I like to play the F there with the 1 and 3 valve combination out of the 4th partial with the B flat and the A and all the G in there. And then I will go up to the A and it makes it clean. The 1 and 3 F is a bit out of tune, but you don't notice it because it moves fast. And what you do notice though is it's clean as can be. Let's hear that again and pay attention to that alternate combination there. 1, 2. And notice the last F I did play open because it lasted, you know, for quite some time. Continuing on. Notice on some of these accidentals, especially these half steps in between notes, I really kind of lean into those, you know. They kind of provide a little stress in the music. And then as I resolve those, you know, I kind of back off and it gives this kind of sigh feeling. It helps the cadential movement of the music. Alright, let's look at the next phrase. 1, 2, 3, 4. So really that's kind of like the real ending of the piece. Those have this kind of nice arc up and down in the dynamic. It's a nice shape and structure that gives it meaning in the music. And let me play it one more time. Listen to the legato-ness and the connection of all that up and down too. Even though the music is going up and down, there's this singular line that's happening. 1, 2, 3, 4. And then in this last bit, where it says freely, it's almost kind of like it's a mini cadenza, you know. So, you know, you're really kind of like winding it up and then slowing it back down. One way I like to think about rubato, just like a dynamic phrase that moves up and down, you can pull ahead towards the middle of the phrase as the energy and the dynamic gets more exaggerated. And then as it goes back down, it slows down gradually with the dynamic getting softer. The way you can think about that is, especially as it goes back down, give it an A in your hand. And you want to place it down carefully on the table, slowly, so you don't crack the A, okay? And then as you get, and I find the students are really good at speeding up. As they get more wind and more energy, that's not the hard part. The other thing too is subdividing those eighth notes. Make sure they get a little quicker towards the peak, and then in the middle, and then at the end, you're slowing down. Here's the little mini cadenza freely at the end one more time. One, two, three. And you know that last note, D, it's kind of a tough note on a beat like too, but it's flat on this one. I think one thing I may try is, I'll try it again. I'm going to play D the third vowel and see if it helps it out. I don't know, let's try it. One, two. I like the intonation a little better. It's really helped me bring it up. So watch out for those fifth partial notes, for those called the D in the staff, D flat, C, and B natural. Make sure you listen and those are in tune, especially on long notes. If they're not in tune, try playing them in a different combination. Like D, you can play the third vowel, the one and two. D flat, you can play the two and three. You might try playing C if it's low, one, three, or four. And B natural can be played with two and four, one, two, and three. Try those combinations and see what works and plays it the most in tune. Use your ears, use your ears when they're white.