Re: Re: The detriments of playing tuba in HS


[ Follow Ups ] [ Post Followup ] [ TubeNet BBS ] [ FAQ ]

Posted by Greg Crider on August 08, 2001 at 16:54:58:

In Reply to: Re: The detriments of playing tuba in HS posted by Anon on August 08, 2001 at 14:47:30:

"Each note is a pearl" may be a good ideal, but it's not true in practice. You can make the absolute best that you can of every note you play, but tuba parts, particularly in lower-grade literature, are often boring as all get-out. Extended tied whole notes, ostinatos or riffs repeated to death, limited range . . . you know what I mean. You usually don't get into interesting parts until you go into high-grade music. Even then, parts often go from being extremely simple to extremely difficult with little in between. Plus, if you're a really good player in a less-capable band, the parts you're stuck with can drive you up the wall.

More and more current composers seem to be paying attention to writing better parts, but they're still not enough to keep a lot of players' interest. (And of course, there ARE good parts out there, but they're often overshadowed by the excess of dull material).

It must be realized that low frequencies lend themselves to certain types of parts, but some composers are better at writing tuba parts than others. All you can do sometimes is hope.


Follow Ups: