Falcone comments

hydeuphonium · Post by **hydeuphonium** » Sat May 20, 2006 1:57 am

regarding the taped round..

Has anyone that requested comments actually received their comments yet??

CrappyEuph · Post by **CrappyEuph** » Sat May 20, 2006 1:23 pm

I haven't. It can take awhile.

hydeuphonium · Post by **hydeuphonium** » Mon May 22, 2006 8:34 pm

fyi for anyone wanting to know about comments:

marty erickson replied to my email about the comments, and said they are in the mail today, so look for them soon.

CrappyEuph · Post by **CrappyEuph** » Wed May 24, 2006 5:39 pm

Hey -

I got my comments. The euphonium judges were Earle Louder, Denis Winter, and Danny Vinson. Apparently there were more entries this year than there have ever been - 71 euphonium entries total (student and artist level).

- Crappy

TexasBassBone · Post by **TexasBassBone** » Fri Jun 16, 2006 12:07 am

I have a tubist friend doing the high school division, in Michigan, when will I know his results?

Casey Tucker · Post by **Casey Tucker** » Fri Jun 16, 2006 7:21 pm

i was accepted and the comments had nothing to say about style or color. it was more directed towards intonation and sound in the upper register. PM me and i'll email you my recording.

-casey

David Zerkel · Post by **David Zerkel** » Fri Jun 16, 2006 9:49 pm

I was a judge for Falcone tapes this year, so I'd be happy to chip in with my criteria for judging. Each judge is left to his or her own devices on how they evaluate the CDs , so, predictably, there might be some differences.

I had six categories that I used to evaluate each audition: Sound, Accuracy, Musicality, Intonation, Rhythm, and (for me, the most telling) Clarity. Clarity of musical thought, clarity of sound and clarity of technique- the whole deal. It was entirely plausible to get a great score in one categry and to get a poor score in another. The players who succeeded scored high across the board.

Players who took musical risks, for me, were rewarded, as long as the risks added positively to the performance. We all know that there are some risks that do not add, but rather detract form a performance. I heard some of these- some related to an overall unevenness to the player's sound. Color changes to me are wonderful- when they are done purposefully and for either a general or specific musical effect. Sometimes color changes occur inadvertently, and when I hear this, I tend to think "The instrument is controlling the player" rather than the other way around.

What is important to realize is that the judges are asked to rank each and every CD. In this case, that meant ranking the tuba artists 1 to 58, so hairs are split in this process. Listening to 58 Gregsons and ranking each of them is less fun than it may sound like!

There were some truly outstanding submissions, so there were some outstanding candidates that did not make the cut. This is the nature of the beast, from Falcone to orchestra auditions to interviews for IBM.

I've scraped more knees on auditions than I care to relate...what is important is that I picked myself up and did it again. I didn't find "my sound" until I was about 32 years old. Everything that led up to that point was instructive and everything that I do today on the instrument will be instructive for what lies ahead in the future. (BTW, "the future" does not imply a change of employment, but refers to my continuing journey as a musician) The goal is continuous improvement. When I was an undergrad , I didn't sound as good as half of the submissions that I listened to. Seriously.

If anyone has any further questions, fire away, either on board or off.