Author: vboboe
Date: 2007-05-25 07:06
Well, this has been very informative, thanks everybody so far, always good to have a map of where one's supposed to be headed eventually :-)
Now here's a chuckle, or a tsk-tsk, or tears, take your pick
There's this 33 bar stretch in our Sayre band arrangement of Pachelbel canon with several double bar slurs in eighths ranging from p to f more than once pretty much all legato playing at a gentle pace and not a single rest to be seen (deliberately unpunctuated sentence)
No sweat for the experienced capable of the Strauss, or even Handel's G minor, but for this 3-year-old community band oboe it's a marathon
"" So one of the first things i did 'was pencil breath marks at the end of the slurs ' that were also ends of musical phrases ' and that's where i do venting ' (alternate puffs out and whiffs in) ' which is about as close to circular breathing as i can manage " " Fortunately i get 12 bars Intro to hyperventilate ' and 6 bars afterwards to recovery breathe '
(hope d-oboe likes my phrasing of above?) ""
That was OK, we 5 woodwinds (2 flutes yours truly 2 clarinets) had a pretty good blend going there in our section feature of the melody, we got complimented on it
That was before the director brought in 3 temp alto saxes (6 altogether), a trombone and a bari sax to complement our tenor sax, and we're expecting another trumpet for our year-end performance, the treble brass we've got behind me are blowing both my ears off already
Guess who has to push all dynamics up two levels in our woodwind feature melody while all that lot accompany us? Their individual idea of p comes out tutti f. First flute was having a fit. Smug oboe just boosted air pressure, especially top E to top G, and yeah! could hear myself ... GASP!!! couple of bars before the breath mark! ... now, where else can i add more breath marks ... ?
This is our finale number. You can imagine the dynamics of our other numbers not meant to be played quietly, but hey, what else are year-end performances for?!
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