Bydlo in auditions

[evan]

What a concert that was. I has the "Tommy Johnson Bydlo horn", my Rudy 6V F, and the Yorkbrunner all lined up on the floor around me. I felt like I was part of a circus act. Two times when I switched around horns or spun the Yorkbrunner I could hear some retard in the audience talking about it. It was quite entertaining from both sides of the stage I figure.

I'm curious (perhaps you or someone else can answer)... I played Pictures with my univeristy's orchestra earlier this semester. I'm not a music major with super powers (just an engineering grad student) so I passed Bydlo on to a euphonium player who played it beautifully. I played the rest of Pictures on my CC horn--I really didn't see any need to pull out my F for anything. Where did you use an F vs. a CC in the rest of the piece? Admitedly my CC is not a BAT, so maybe that's the difference.

Another thing. We all talk about using a euphonium to remaining faithful to Ravel's expectations for Bydlo. If this is the case, then why do we turn around and use a BAT-ish instrument on the big low brass parts in other movements? Using a BAT on these parts must surely yield a completely different color than Ravel was expecting when he wrote the piece for a 6 valved euphonium. I suppose, in the end, it all comes down to choosing the instrument that makes the best sounding music no matter what was around 100 years ago.

Please enlighten the ignorant
-Evan

[Roger Lewis]

A good friend of mine and fellow student at IU in the late 80's, Mr. Koji Suzuki, did All of pictures on a B&S PT10 F tuba and sounded great! It was the only horn he had at the time.

This points again to being able to do everything on any horn and practicing that way. I also practice being able to switch instruments with no notes played between the two, playing the horn "cold", since you won't have the opportunity to warm it up on stage without sounding like an idiot. (This can also set you apart from the competition in an audition, but you have to be VERY confident and have a lot of trust). I also switch clefs, registers and transpositions at will to keep the mind nimble and to be comfortable knowing where I am on any horn at any time.

By the way, I prefer Euph on a Bobo Tenor Tuba mouthpiece for Bydlo but am also comfortable doing it on F and the old Yorkbrunner if some conductor with little on the ball would request it.

Optimize your chances for success. On the euph you still, for the most part, are dealing with whole steps and minor thirds in that register; on the F you're dealing with whole steps and half steps; on the CC you are dealing with, for all intents and purposes, glissandos.

Just my thoughts.

[Chuck(G)]

By the way, I prefer Euph on a Bobo Tenor Tuba mouthpiece for Bydlo but am also comfortable doing it on F and the old Yorkbrunner if some conductor with little on the ball would request it.

Roger, did you have any problem getting your euph to play up to pitch with the TT? I've tried a Bobo TT with my Willson 2975 and it's simply way too flat.

[Rick Denney]

Optimize your chances for success. On the euph you still, for the most part, are dealing with whole steps and minor thirds in that register; on the F you're dealing with whole steps and half steps; on the CC you are dealing with, for all intents and purposes, glissandos.

This is it, period. Missed notes don't sound good on any instrument. And I've heard trouble on those high G#'s from top pros, so let's don't kid ourselves about the treacherousness of the Bydlo.

I would play the whole work on BBb, except for the solo, which I would play on euphonium if there was nobody better to pass it to.

To answer another question, doing the whole work with a euphonium would not, in my opinion, be very true to Ravel's expectations. The tuba has to match the power of the ensemble, and all the other isntruments have grown and are played louder than what Ravel would know. The tuba has to balance that. So, perhaps you could play the whole work on a French C tuba if everyone else switched to the pea-shooter instruments French orchestras of the day used. A euphonium is no replacement for a French C tuba in any case. The latter has six valves to provide the necessary low register, and I think it would be quite a lot of work with a four-valve euph (even if compensating) to play the low passages. The music goes down to a low G# as I recall, which would be well down into the pedal register of a euph.

I have wondered what mouthpiece was typically used in a French C tuba. I have put a small-shank Wick tuba mouthpiece in a euphonium out of curiosity, and found that the resulting tone was much more tuba-like (though stuffy sounding and flat, and with considerably more difficulty in the high range). I suspect the mouthpiece on the French C tuba was larger than the typical euph mouthpiece, but not as large as a tuba mouthpiece. But that's sheer speculation.

In answer to another question, most professionals I've seen who played this work used a C tuba for most of the work, and an F tuba for the Bydlo. The F surely does work better for the low accompanying part in the middle of that movement than a euphonium. But, as Roger wisely advises, optimize for success. What's more important, clean attacks on the piano high G# that is a highly exposed solo, or a bit more weight on the accompanying part that is played with other sections?

Rick "not likely to ever get the change to try his approach outside the practice room" Denney