Playing divisi parts in community band

[Tortuba]

I play in a couple of community bands and the other tuba players all have BBb horns. As often happens, we get tunes that have divisi parts in octaves. The discussion then becomes "Do you want to play up or down?". I usually suggest that we play what ever note works best. However, I suspect that this situation arises from the brass band tradition of Eb and BBb tubas splitting a section, with the Ebs playing the upper octave. So, if that is the case should all the BBb tubas be playing the bottom end when there is not an Eb in the section? Personally, I much prefer that the BBb horns all play the lower octave just because it sounds better.

You can tell it is a slow day in the office when this is the most important item on my to-do list.

Tortuba

[Donn]

My guess is that depends on the piece, how many contrabass tubas you have and the players' skills and preferences (and tubas' preferences if any), but if I had to make a rule, I'd say if there's 2 tubas, and there's 2 parts, it's at least worth a try to play both parts.

[opus37]

I play in 3 different community bands. When there are more than one tuba, the Eb player, plays the upper parts and the BBb player plays the lower part. When there are more than two, we usually put only one on the upper part. This all depends on if there is a bass trombone present. That apart is usually similar to the upper tuba part. When I'm alone, it depends. Most of the time the lower parts, except polkas where the upper part seems to get a better response from the crowd.

[Three Valves]

I would choose the lower part on tuba, and higher part on bass...

With my feet.

That puts the Polka crowd in stitches!!

[bort]

I've been playing tuba for 20 years, and have never played next to an Eb tuba. If waiting for an Eb tuba to show up is the gateway to the upper parts, I think I'm going to be waiting a really long time.

[Billy M.]

I've been playing tuba for 20 years, and have never played next to an Eb tuba. If waiting for an Eb tuba to show up is the gateway to the upper parts, I think I'm going to be waiting a really long time.

Guess if I ever visit, I'll have to bring my Eb and play in your community band for smiles and grins. Then you can say you have played next to an Eb tuba.

[Billy M.]

As often happens, we get tunes that have divisi parts in octaves. The discussion then becomes "Do you want to play up or down?"
Tortuba

I generally go for the rule that if in octaves, just play the lower part. The only time this is disregarded is if the other players have only 3 valve instruments and the register goes below a low F.

[Donn]

baritones/bassoons/bari' sax/etc. tend to be covering the upper 8ve on pieces where tuba pts. are written in 8ve's.

True, though in the type of music I play, it would be 3rd trombone instead of baritone.

It's rare to see an octave divisi part that adds to the music

an exception: first section of "Stars & Stripes Forever" - which cries out for clarity.

I think that exception is fairly common - just going through some random Sousa piece from 100 years ago, you can see some places where the divisi meets practical limitations, but plenty of places where the same notes are handled differently -- because it adds to the music.

Practically any community band contrabass tuba player can play the lower part, but not so many of them can play way down below the bass clef with real good definition. That's the most obvious way the upper part adds to the music, i.e., clarity.

[sousaphonehero]

When I write band music I almost instinctively write the tuba part in octaves whenever the part goes below BBb (below the staff). This is probably from seeing so much older band music as well as, like bloke mentioned, adding clarity in articulation and tone. As a composer, I prefer that if there is one or two tuba players, all of them play the bottom notes, but when there are more tubas about a quarter of the players play the top notes (or, obviously the Eb player).

[opus37]

I've been playing tuba for 20 years, and have never played next to an Eb tuba. If waiting for an Eb tuba to show up is the gateway to the upper parts, I think I'm going to be waiting a really long time.

You played with an Eb on tuba Christmas. I guess that is a special case. Let me know when you want to sit next to one. I only play Eb (OK sometimes F).

[ppalan]

Over the last couple of years, in my community band (Montgomery County Concert Band), we've been doing maybe 6 or 7 works over the course of the season where there are divisi tuba parts not in octaves. Some have been commissioned works others have been by composers such as Alfred Reed, Malcolm Arnold, William Schuman. Most are in P5ths occasionally at the interval of a 10th. Some on sustained chords and some on moderately moving parts. We usually try to divide the parts by stand.
Pete

[hup_d_dup]

My feeling is that larger tubas generally have a more resonant low register, and should therefore play the bottom octave.

Bb's are usually larger than Eb's, but not always.

The low register on a large Eb can be pretty impressive.

Hup

[Michael Bush]

Other things being equal, the player whose sense of rhythm is the most reliable should play the line that stands out most clearly in the ensemble. Other than that, everybody can play whichever line they like.

[Radar]

Being the sole Tuba in our Community band I almost always play the lower part. There are a few exceptions where playing the upper octave seems to blend or carry better with the ensemble so I will on occasion (usually at the directors request) take the upper octave. I've run into a few runs where the phrase appears to be meant to be played entirely in the upper octave put the conductor appears to have added a lower octave for part of the phrase as an alternative for players who struggled with the higher notes.

[Michael Bush]

added a lower octave for part of the phrase as an alternative for players who struggled with the higher notes.

I had an occasion once not long ago to ask a composer I was playing under about whether when he did something similar it was really what he ideally wanted. It was a run going the other direction from what you're describing, where to keep going straight down would clearly have caused problems for 3-valve BBb players. He wasn't admitting to anything, and claimed that the octave switch was how he wanted it.

Okay, fine, I played the ink as he said. It still looked to me like a workaround.

[Mark E. Chachich]

The way that we play divisi parts in the Bel Air Community Band is (unless indicated otherwise by the composer), I play the upper part and the rest of the tubas play the lower part. In my opinion the upper part gives the people on the lower part something to lock on for intonation. The lower parts are (again in my opinion) generally more important. We have been fortunate to have five excellent tuba players in our band and the lower part shakes the rafters (when called for). We just added number six tuba, so now we are now THE MIGHTY SIX PACK and the lower part will be even more impressive.

Years ago when I played in professional concert bands the number of tubas was generally limited to one or two due to funding. With two tubas we would split the divisi parts. With one I would play the octave that made more musical sense.

best,
Mark

[TheGoyWonder]

Octave splits: usually means the arranger didn't know what he was doing and hedged his bets. Play the correct octave, either the lower or the smoother line. Tubas in octaves doesn't really do anything for me, tuba/euph and tuba/trombone octave doubling are both much better sounds. Occasionally the octave tuba sound is mildly effective and you should do it, hard to explain when but doesn't take a musical genius either.

5th splits: One player on the 5th, no matter how large the section is.

non-5th split: almost always a bad idea, unless it's really high.

[Donn]

Octave splits: usually means the arranger didn't know what he was doing and hedged his bets.

Such incompetent losers as, for example John Philip Sousa, Henry Fillmore, Karl King, you're speaking of.

The tuba part is classically called "basses", and that's what it's for - the bass line, wherein is the rhythmic and tonal core. I should look at some more music before making this comment, but it seems to me that the above mentioned American composers tend to employ divisi rather sparingly in the basses part, and when you come to one of those places you can assume that they expect both sub-parts to be played, to most effectively serve those rhythmic and tonal objectives.

I happen to be playing some Italian marches of late, and the divisi tends to be much more extensive there. I haven't really thought about why that would be, but I'm fairly positive that they would sound [even] better if we had two tubas, bass and contrabass. I'm not so sure that another contrabass would work so well on the upper part, in these Italian marches.

[tubeast]

Being the slow and lazy reader that I am, I enjoy divisi parts as a source of convenience:
The lower line tells me where to go and the upper line shows me what to play.
It´s getting kinda hard to count lines in case there are about (!?!) nine of them above the notes. Especially with longer passages that do something more sophisticated than the first half of Hum-Pa.

I like the simple comment "+8vb" or "divisi" for the same reason.

[Phil Dawson]

Back in the day many concert bands had an upright string bass along with the tubas. The parts were often marked basses and notated in octaves. The string bass would play the top line sounding an octave lower and everyone would be playing he same notes. Phil