Playing in really unfriendly keys.

tubatooter1940 · Post by **tubatooter1940** » Fri Oct 01, 2004 11:58 pm

You gotta go for it.Sometimes sharp keys will have you holding your
second valve down for so long,you wonder if it will come up when you do
finally release it.I am some times surprised the horn sounds so good with
so many valves down.Keep coming back to the scales and arpeggios that
apply to the chords you are playing in and then,charge right in with a bass
line in that key.It only takes learning a few tunes in these oddball keys to
get a good enough sense of interval to improvise and come up with a hot
bass line.I dreaded having to work in keys like A,D,B,E andG but I was
surprised how quickly I learned them and that some rifs in these sharp
keys lie across the horn pretty good.
Your friendly Fart Man

Dylan King · Post by **Dylan King** » Sat Oct 02, 2004 2:06 pm

Try getting the written scales out of your head completely and practice the scales by ear. Even in sharp-infested keys the scales fall naturally on the fingers if you don't have a "thinking" hold-up on the notes.

Kevin Hendrick · Post by **Kevin Hendrick** » Fri Oct 22, 2004 10:41 am

wnazzaro wrote:Learn your sharps! It's like eating your spinach. It's good for you and if you add enough cheese, you'll enjoy it too.

So, playing cheesy music makes learning your sharps more fun? Makes sense to me ...

Chuck(G) · Post by **Chuck(G)** » Fri Oct 22, 2004 12:04 pm

wnazzaro wrote:. Learn your sharps! It's like eating your spinach. It's good for you and if you add enough cheese, you'll enjoy it too.

It's funny in a way--the string players pitch and moan when a score comes by with lots of flats and the brasses grumble when there are sharps. While one could make an argument of sorts for string players not liking flats (moving the fingers backward toward the nut is more uncomfortable), there's no real reason for brass players to complain.

Kevin Hendrick · Post by **Kevin Hendrick** » Fri Oct 22, 2004 2:34 pm

Tubist of Time wrote:OK, the whole sharp key thing isn't really a problem to me anymore. The problem now is that these notes feel really stuffy on my horn. (and all other rotary BBb horns I've played.) What can be done to open these notes up? A mouthpiece change perhaps?

From your original post:

Tubist of Time wrote:... on a rotary BBb horn, a lot of these sharp notes (middled B natural, high F# on the staff, etc) sound and feel very stuffy.

Just occurred to me that the notes you mention have 2nd valve in common. You might want to look and see if the valve is going past its properly-aligned position when you close it ... doesn't take much to "fuzz" the sound, and (in my experience) 2nd valve gets more use than the others, thus is more likely to have worn stops. If that's OK, then a mouthpiece change (or alteration) might be in order -- perhaps a slightly-larger throat diameter and/or a more open backbore -- there are folks on this board who have more experience and knowledge in this area than I do, and would be better able to advise you in this regard. They probably also know of other things you could do to improve these notes ... I'm looking forward to reading their posts here.

Hope this helps!

Chuck(G) · Post by **Chuck(G)** » Fri Oct 22, 2004 3:02 pm

bloke wrote:
It's good for you and if you add enough cheese, you'll enjoy it too.

My sister says -
You can make almost anything taste good if you add either enough cheese or chocolate.

Ah, now there's the difference between northern and southern cooking. In my worldview of cuisine, it's garlic that makes real food good...

Kevin Hendrick · Post by **Kevin Hendrick** » Sat Oct 23, 2004 12:14 am

Chuck(G) wrote:
bloke wrote:
It's good for you and if you add enough cheese, you'll enjoy it too.

My sister says -
You can make almost anything taste good if you add either enough cheese or chocolate.
Ah, now there's the difference between northern and southern cooking. In my worldview of cuisine, it's garlic that makes real food good...

Hmmm ... chocolate-covered garlic, anyone?