tonguing Stars and Stripes Forever

[vanderbagger]

Coming back after years away, and getting way better, but I'll will be playing in a band over the July 4th playing Stars and Stripes Forever. Last year, I muddled through that da-da-da-da dada, dada, etc., but need some hints on how to get to play that clearly. I'm comfortable with double and triple tonguing, but that doesn't seem to work in that piece. I'm wondering if that part is best worked with single tonguing. If so, how does one work up to doing that at speed? Suggestions apreciated.
vanderbagger

[daytontuba]

For many years, I have always tongued it takataka tiahtaka tiahtaka tak tak - etc. You can always substitute whatever double tonguing sound you want (tuku, tiku, tika, etc.) - but that depends on your particular tongue-mouth and how it best works for you. What works for me might well not work for you, but the method above seems to keep my tongue light and moving freely. One other thing that has worked for me is to try to not over volume the passage. I have heard players try to force it too much, seeing that fortissimo and getting a bit carried away. I would also ask your conductor how he wants it played - the conductor of one of the groups I play in does not want any slurs in the passage at all.

[Ace]

I'm going to suggest to anyone (because I sincerely believe that you can) that mm ♩ = 120 - 126 is not particularly fast to "single-tongue" repeated 16th note pitches.

The key is (just like any other sort of quick repeated movement by humans) to not overdo the movement. Only move the minimum amount (and the minimum muscles) required to do the job. This is the same sort of principle involved in teaching young musicians to not lift their fingers way off the keys of their instruments - hovering closely in order to quickly/easily be able to immediately repeat the required motions.

If I really thought this was difficult to master, I would not have posted. Just start the metronome at an easy tempo (mm ♩ = 80...??) and invent/execute repeated-note single-tongue drills. Concentrate on "not concentrating" (relax and don't over-move).

Perhaps a good drill is to play scales of patterns. Start out with 4 sixteenth notes and a quarter. Progress to 6 sixteenth notes and an eighth...then 7 sixteenths and a (mere sixteenth) rest. Once you can do eight 16ths (infinite 16ths) at a given speed WITHOUT feeling a temptation to struggle or overwork, notch the metronome up a click. This should take most folks a month (less...??) to master.

imo, it's really handy to be able to single-tongue 16th notes up to mm 13X (as fast as possible, obviously) and to be able to double-tongue cleanly as slow as mm 96. The ability to cleanly double-tongue slowly is very handy in accelerando situations.

+10

Ace

[DonShirer]

Bloke wrote:

bloke wrote:
I'm going to suggest to anyone (because I sincerely believe that you can) that mm ♩ = 120 - 126 is not particularly fast to "single-tongue" repeated 16th note pitches.

I agree, but some conductors get carried away and up the tempo at the repeat causing linguaparalysis.

[Highpitch]

It came to me years ago that Sousa timed the march, including that 'dogfight' part we are talking about, to the firing rate of a Browning beltfed 1919A4 machinegun.

Something you never forget hearing is either one.

DG

[David Richoux]

It came to me years ago that Sousa timed the march, including that 'dogfight' part we are talking about, to the firing rate of a Browning beltfed 1919A4 machinegun.

Something you never forget hearing is either one.

DG

Maybe just a coincidence, because the song was composed in 1896 and the Browning was made in 1919 (those pesky military designations actually mean something sometimes!)

[Highpitch]

OK, cart & horse, sorry.

Maybe John Browning liked the cadence of the march...

Still, the rate jibes.

Om-Pah!

DG

[DonShirer]

My previous post on single-tonguing tempo just came back to haunt me.
At rehearsal tonight, the band director hauled out the SASF and went through it once at standard march speed. Then he said, "Now let's do it up to tempo" and proceeded to breeze through it between (I estimated) metronome 140 -150. Needless to say, single-tonguing did not cut the mustard.

[Gilligan]

After 29 years of playing SSFE on BBb or CC in Bass Cleff, I'm playing it on Eb in treble cleff in my Brass Band. Feel like I'm chewing gum backwards everytime we go through it! Sounds the same but the fingers just aren't liking it.

[gwwilk]

My previous post on single-tonguing tempo just came back to haunt me.
At rehearsal tonight, the band director hauled out the SASF and went through it once at standard march speed. Then he said, "Now let's do it up to tempo" and proceeded to breeze through it between (I estimated) metronome 140 -150. Needless to say, single-tonguing did not cut the mustard.

We usually perform SASF as an encore for our last concert of the season. Our conductor sometimes views it as a galop and sometimes as a more stately march. I've just grown accustomed to double-tonguing the 16th notes no matter the tempo just in case he 'takes off' at some point (which fortunately he is much more likely to do during rehearsal than a performance). Where our section usually fails to achieve unison is on the slurred 32nd note embellishments of the first stanza. It always sounds muddy to me there.

[J.c. Sherman]

Bloke's right on the money. Here's another approach to the same end.

I like horn players; they know how to articulate. They share our problems of pointing the wrong way (often) and blowing through a hell of a lot of tubing. I got this from horn players.

Practice playing short quarter notes. DAMN short. Freakishly short. "My teacher told me never to do it that way" short, stopped with the tongue. Do this slowly, and deliberately and with as much economy of motion as possible, with the tongue as close to the vibration as humanly possible. When you feel you are proficient at making notes audible but 128th-note short, move to 8th notes instead of quarters. At some point, from the air flow being learned and from the ease you're learning to do it, you'll almost feel like it's hard to keep it the tempo even... you'll be compelled to speed up. Allow it, but slowly! You'll get to the point where you're using your air to draw the end of the note and the beginning of the next into one motion, one act, and almost a "vibration" in itself. When you struggle to play SSF slow enough, you'll know you got there.

Floyd Cooley taught me that we can get better low-range clarity by learning an efficient single tongue; Ron Munson taught me that there's no such thing as too slow to multiple tongue. [Completely arrogant here] I've got an articulation I'm extremely proud of, and because of the above exercise, I rarely have to multiple tongue, and for some conductors, I can make a very good short note because of it as well.

[Dean E]

After 29 years of playing SSFE on BBb or CC in Bass Cleff, I'm playing it on Eb in treble cleff in my Brass Band. Feel like I'm chewing gum backwards everytime we go through it! Sounds the same but the fingers just aren't liking it.

Same thing here. BBb fingerings from high school jump out of nowhere. Since resuming after my forty year playing layoff, I've used Eb, CC and F. The orchestral edition is almost impossible to sight read.
I imagine that coming from brass band transpositions would be another mind trip.

[sloan]

The vast majority of it (in D major on a C tuba) involves mashing either the 1st button, the 2nd button, or both.

At the same time? Horrors!

[sloan]

If you play the piccolo solo at written pitch, you hardly need any valves at all.

[vanderbagger]

Thank you all, good stuff.
vanderbagger