Tuba recitals

[BVD Press]

I mean, all twelve people who attended told me afterwards they "liked it." Maybe they were just being polite.

I always felt they were required to go to my recitals and therefore literally captives...

[Ian Stewart]

I always felt they were required to go to my recitals and therefore literally captives...

Makes me think of story I heard in the 1970s. A well known British composer (who also played trombone) was asked to dep in a military band for a concert in an English prison. At the end of the concert the band master said to the inmates, that he and the band had really enjoyed playing for them, "and hoped to see them all again next year!".

[TexTuba]

I don't think it's just tuba recitals. I believe it's music recitals in general. Most schools require X amount of recitals students must attend each semester. If these requirements weren't in place, I wonder how many would have an audience...

[Biggs]

As far as scholastic recitals go, the after-party is key. My senior recital programming was, for a tuba recital, reasonably interesting (quintet, tuba quartet, tuba and 3 trombones, tuba and mixed media piano, C tuba solo, and an obligatory English concerto). I also had a funny, four-page parody playbill (pub design skills courtesy of my journalism degree) and kept the whole shebang to about 70 minutes. I hope that these considerations were appreciated by my large audience, but it was the promise of the most bitchin' after-party in the history of tuba art music that put butts in the seats.

It was a tuba bar mitzvah: boring recitation incomprehensible to most followed by indulgence.

[Ian Stewart]

Sometime ago I was involved in a concert with a saxophone and string quartet. The saxophone played an original work for sax and quartet, and an arrangement - the rest of the recital was string quartet only. The saxophone works went down very well with the audience, and added variety to the concert, without detracting from the quality of the string quartet.

Would this idea work, a similar recital but with tuba instead of saxophone? Most tuba players probably work with orchestras and so would know string players in a quartet. There are quintets with French horn and string quartet, but as yet I have never seen a work using tuba, euphonium, trumpet, trombone, flugelhorn or cornet with string quartet.

[NDSPTuba]

Being a relative new comer to tuba, the biggest problem I have with the repertoire is, well quite honestly, its crap. Not one of the standards would I ever willing make a point to go listen too. If you think about it, how many pieces for all the other instruments have actually stood the test of time and are greats. Very few for each instrument I'd assert. Being an ex-horn player there were less than ten that I'd want to hear performed, Mozart's 4 concerti( but really only 2,3, and 4), Strauss' 1st and 2nd concertos, Beethoven Sonata, Villanelle by Dukas, maybe En Foret' by Bozza. There were other "standards" like Hindemith, Jacobs, etc. But like standards for tuba I find them unlistenable too. They have there nice sections but inevitably go off in some random meandering way that completely puts me off. I still can't for the life of me figure out why seemingly ALL the tuba concertos are high as hell and noodlely. WHY? For me as a former non-tuba player and current tuba player the range I LOVE to hear the tuba in is the bottom part of the staff and lower. But very few concerto spend anytime at all in that range. I love the beginning of the Barnes, nice little playful tune, but quickly goes off into random land and looses me. The second movement at least is in the meaty range allot, but as with seeminly all tuba concerto second movements gets uber noodlely. Even with that I like the Barnes 2nd movement best of all the 2nd movements of Tuba concerti, with the Von Williams second.

I guess what I'm getting at is that very few pieces stand the test of time for each instrument and the Tuba being so young really hasn't landed any yet. And by stand the test of time I mean having an appeal to all music aficionados and not just other tuba players. Of course modern composition seems to be so non-directional and random to me, that I doubt I'll like anything that gets written for tuba. Maybe my musical tastes are too traditional.