Merry Christmas! (???)

[rocksanddirt]

Thanks for the work! I'll take a look and hopefully have some kind of intelligent response for you!

[Dan Schultz]

Thanks, Wade! I've printed the tunes out and will give them a toot in the next week or so. At the risk of sounding like the TubeNet 'grammer police'.... did you mean to spell 'NOEL' ... 'Nowell'?

[oldbandnerd]

I can pretty much play all the first parts Wade . I'm a amature in his 4th year of learning how to play again. I consider myself to about on the level of a average high schooler or so. The jumps on No. 12 Jolly Old St. Pachelbel wer a bit tricky for me at first but I was able to get the down after a couple of run throughs . Eveything else was not very difficult.


I do have a side question. I notice the range goes up to at least a high A(nat). Should a good high schooler be expected to be able to play that? Maybe I am just out of touch with the current music programs but I would say most high schoolers can't get past F comfortably. I know most of the euphonium players in my daughters high school can't. I sure as hell couldn't do it in high school.

[Todd S. Malicoate]

Wade, these look fabulous. Nice variety, and some very creative twists!

I'll see if I can't break out the old Tascam 4-track and lay some of these down for you to hear soon...should be some fun reading (and it's nice to diddle around on a euph every once and a while). Congrats!

[eupher61]

very cool, Wade! First glance looks great.

May I suggest "Silent Night" up a half step? Db is AMAZING for tuba/euph groups....I'd suggest it for "O Holy Night" too, but Ab works better for ranges.

"Nowell" is a British spelling, IIRC, to distinguish from "Noel" pronounced "knoll" essentially.

[oldbandnerd]

...... Thanks! At that age, it seems to be easier for a tubist to hit a high Bb than it is for a euphoniumist to hit the equivalent note for them, or so I have hear.

How about at MY age !! I'm 45 and if it hadn't been for the tutoring help from Charley Brighton ( highams ) I doubt I would even consider being able to play up to Bb. It took me about a year of practicing to be able to play that high comfortably. I never had that kind of range when I was in school . Youth is wasted on the young.

[TMurphy]

Wade,

I'll print these out...I work in my district's high school once a week as their low brass guy...this year, I actually have the players to do a tuba quartet, so I'll try a few of them with the kids, and give you some real-world feedback on how they work for high schoolers. (No, I can't really comment on ranges just yet...I'm at work at my summer job at the bank, so haven't looked at them yet).

-Tim

[bearphonium]

Wade,
Just downloaded and printed, and got some friends to come and play with me. I only got 12 measures of "Silent Night" however...am I missing something???

Ally"who loves Christmas music, too, and much prefers the local Tuba Carol Christmas (not (c) ) to the other one"House

[sungfw]

Should a good high schooler be expected to be able to play that?

THAT is the sort of feedback I need. Thanks! At that age, it seems to be easier for a tubist to hit a high Bb than it is for a euphoniumist to hit the equivalent note for them, or so I have heard.

Hmm ... maybe I'm the one who's out of touch with current music programs (quite likely, since I don't have kids), but when I was in HS (late '70s), we euphs were required, as sophomores, to be able to play (not squeak or fart, play) up to Db an octave above the BC staff. (The Andante Sostonuto section of Morceau Symphonique, which goes up to C# an octave above the staff, was one of the mandatory euph audition excerpts for incoming sophs who wanted to be in the band; yes, people did fail the audition.) There were 5 euph my soph year, 3 my jr year, and 3 my sr year, and there were 3 the year after I graduated, so it wasn't like it was an unreasonable or impossible standard—or at least didn't seem like it at the time. I've always thought the standards were pretty average, but perhaps I was mistaken.

[The Jackson]

First off, smashing arrangements! I will see what I can do about getting them played with friends of mine.

Regarding the tuba range, it is definitely a stretch for a high school player. In my experience, that kind of range (from the high Bb and up) is generally in the "squeak" region for most of the high school players I know (myself definitely included). I wouldn't say it's impossible, though, for an advanced HS tubist. It would take good practice, though, and, in my experience, that's not easy to find.

Again, though, I will hold onto these and see if I can set up even a temporary quartet in the orchestras I'm soon going to be a part of and the college band I'm going to be in. I'm sure there will be interested parties there.

[Todd S. Malicoate]

No need to change things up on our account, Wade. They looked pretty good in the original version.

I completely agree...some groups will need to modify some things, anyway. You simply can't satisfy an extremely wide range of talent levels completely. Let the groups who need to "water it down" figure it out on their own. Your Version 1 was very good and entirely appropriate.

[sungfw]

If you have an earlier version, please destroy it and use this version to which I have linked below. THANKS!

WHAT????

You mean it wasn't programmed to self-destruct when a new version came out????

OMG!!!! WHERE ARE ALL MY FILES????

I'VE GOT A VIRUS!!!! AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH ...............

[Nick Pierce]

One rule for all those ranges. Does it sound the way you want it to sound? If you have the answer you want, leave it alone.

[rocksanddirt]

Version 4 is up and a new hosting site being tried out as well. Please let me know if you have problems with the site. I think that this will be my final version, barring any additional tunes. I changed some things and then changed some of those back to what I had before. (This is a little like arranging music by committee!)

We are up to over 100 downloads of this in its three earlier versions. I cannot wait to see the feedback after these get played by a lot of people. If you have an earlier version, please destroy it and use this version to which I have linked below. THANKS!

http://freepdfhosting.com/72c2b08fb6.pdf

the link doesn't seem to be working.....

[Jeffrey Hicks]

link worked fine for me.

[bearphonium]

I had a counting/singing issue with Silent Night. This was coupled with my printer causing hate and discontent, not to mention half printed pages. Did get everything right, however, and am looking forward to trying it out with my buddies.

[MaryAnn]

As usual, I can't get to the link (blocked as "dangerous" here at work.)

These are duets? quartets?

Are there too many for someone to email them to me?

MA