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Hello Tuba Experts,

I'm a tuba beginner. Working with my tuner and my tuba's slides and lipping a little here and there, I'm getting fairly well in tune. However, I haven't played in ensembles. Thinking about how a tuba puts a floor under an ensemble, it seems to me that the tubist has to listen to the sound of the whole ensemble and move his note to tune with the collective pitch standard. So, it isn't the group matching to the tuba, but the tuba matching to the pitch of some part of the ensemble. I'm guessing that one hopes most everybody is in tune with each other and then one matches to that.

Do I have this process wrong? What do you performers do in getting in tune with a group? Is there one group or pitch level you listen to more than others? Or does no one know how it actually works? Could be a Master's thesis, I guess <LOL>.

A big +1 to everything stated above! A big complication, however, is sitting next to another tubist who is doing none of the above.

This is the way I see it. Tuning to the upper instruments makes very little sense to me. Acoustically speaking, sounds work bottom up (the lower pitchs produce harmonics in upper octaves, etc)

When I play tuba, I listen to the bass players and try to match them as best and hope they do the same. That usually produces an alright result. When playing in a quintet, I tend to think of playing it like I was a piano. Ideally, if the tuner is within 5 cents in either direction, your playing is good enough in tune, for any band/quintet you'll ever encounter. (I don't take a tuner to rehearsal, but when I practice I often check) I also try to use drones daily and sometimes combine both drones and tuners at the same time.

Singing helps me the most with intonation and an understanding of how to be in tune and what it sounds like when you are in tune. If you can "sing" in tune against a drone on more than just the tonic note then you are a step ahead. Drones are your friend in all cases, however tuners can have a negative impact in your playing if you use them over religiously in that you are relying on something else other than your ears, but occasional use is never a bad thing.

If only everyone else would play in tune, it would make our job so much easier.

Melody is overrated. It is just a representation of various partials of the bass notes.

That puts a tremendous responsibility on the bass players, who shall understand the tonalities they represent, if they want to play in tune.

An in tune bass player with a rich and full overtone spectrum forces good players to stay in tune with the bass.

Klaus