Endurance

[Bove]

Try playing two phrases at time, then when you get that down... do three, etc. With some good consistent work on this, you should be able to make some nice progress in a couple of weeks.

If all else fails, you can always try this:

Play baroque bassoon sonatas until your chops fall apart. Give 'em a fifteen minute rest, and go again.

[Alex Reeder]

A great way to work on high range endurance is to play Bordogni etudes up an octave (or Rochuts as written). This is in a very similar range to the VW second movement, maybe a bit lower (which is good for building endurance for the higher notes), and will help with the lyrical style playing up there.

[happyroman]

You learn to play high notes by playing high notes and you develop endurance by spending more and more time with the horn on your face. That said, I do have some practical suggestions.

Endurance, especially in the upper register, is something that comes only by putting in the work consistently over a long period of time.

To learn any new task, break it down into manageable sections and perfect them individually. Then, gradually piece them together until you can play the work in it's entirety. You are exactly on the right track with the method you describe.

Start at a level of difficulty where you have success slightly more often than not (i.e., just greater than 50% of the time). Keep the difficulty at that level until you have success a very high percentage of the time (say, greater than 75% or higher).

At that point, you increase the difficulty until you are back at the 50% success level and start the process over, working gradually until you have success playing the work correctly in it's entirety a very high percentage of the time.

The key to this approach is that to learn something, you MUST do it right more times than you do it wrong. Otherwise, you are actually learning it incorrectly. Too often, we play something several times, making mistakes each time, and then finally get it right the last time. We then move on, feeling that we have learned it. In fact, all we have learned is how to play it wrong.

In your circumstance, using my example above, doing it right means playing the short sections well with your best sound, and increasing the difficulty means playing longer and longer sections at one time.

Playing the music on the mouthpiece alone will also help a great deal. Use lots of air, breathe often, and keep the tongue low in the oral cavity by using the low vowels, such as oh, ooh, or ahh (although, you obvoiusly don't vocalize the vowel sounds).

Some other important things to remember are that you must always maintain your best possible sound. In addition, be careful when you get fatigued and don't force things. Too much practice in the extremes, especially when you are tired, can be very detrimental to your playing.

Arnold Jacobs recommended that no more than 10-20% of your total practice time should be spent in the extreme registers. He wanted his students to develop excellence in the "norms." He descrime these as the middle register (the two octave range from low c to c above the staff for a CC tuba) and at a middle dynamic (mf or f). Once excellence was developed there, it could be transferred to the extremes in terms of register and dynamic.

[iiipopes]

And include lip slurs, both up and down, as the down makes you stop your lips at a certain point, which actually makes them contract again, making the entire embouchure stronger, a lot of long tones to control breathing, and playing softly so the embouchure is doing the work, not necessarily the volume of air.

Firm corners, don't "smile" or stretch the embouchure, and keep the air steady and continuous.

[crbarnes]

You do not mention the instrument you are using. This is usually played on an F tuba, rarely on anything else. While it can be played on a larger and lower keyed tuba, it's a stretch. Having said that, I favor a structured approach where you work your way up. find an exercise that contains several instances of a higher register note that you can fairly easily and consistently produce. Work on that for a while, let's say a week. Now transpose (gasp) it up 1/2 step and spend another week, etc. Kind of like what W. Jacobs does in his low register studies. Obviously, the best approach is to have a series of such exercises. I disagree with the approach of just playing until your chops fall off as it encourages bad technique and pressure to develop. A. Jacobs has already been quoted on his thoughts about spending too much time on extremes.

[iiipopes]

I agree with Bloke, but I also agree that extremes are harmful in that bad habits and injury can occur. That's one reason lip precise lip slurs are helpful, as they exercise the embouchure both ways, developing overall flexibility and strength, in addition to the other exercises and practicing the piece you are going to play.

[Mark]

but the guy is trying to play something that is extremely high and extremely long...

Do you consider the 2nd Mvt. of VW to be extremely high?

[MaryAnn]

I hope you haven't programmed something you're unable to learn in time; you can really do a number on your chops by trying to make them go higher than they are able to in the time available. I've done this on horn a couple of times....and it took a while to recover.

So...the advice given is good, to go in stages. Yes, you have to play high Q in order to play high Q, but if your highest note to date is high Q minus a fifth, you have a way to go, timewise, before you should be practicing high Q.

MA

[Ryan_Beucke]

This applies a little more for extending your range, but is still relevant to endurance in high range playing. If you want to extend your range to a certain note, practice up to a 5th higher. When that higher note sounds decent, your goal note will sound great. And I think you do need to spend more time on the horn each day, but remember to give yourself breaks. If you blow your chops out in the first 45 minutes, you won't be able to play for the rest of the day.