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davewerden

How Do I Improve My Sight-Reading?

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If you are a euphonium player, the first thing I would do is get the Euphonium Excerpt Book from Cimarron Music (you can find a description on the main part of dwerden.com, with a link to the publisher). Learn every one in it. This gives you a musical and technical foundation on typical music for euphonium. There may be comparible compilcations for tuba, but they are probably "private&quots books that you can get from a teacher if you ask around.



But that's not nearly enough. You should practice sight-reading every day, so during each practice session find something you have not played before and go through it. The idea is to take about 10-15 seconds before you start to look it over - get the key and meter, of course, and look for any key changes coming up. Then try to play all the way through without stopping. After you have finished, go back and spend 5 or 10 minutes practicing the parts that gave you trouble, then move on.



The Arban book is a must-have for tuba or euphonium, and there are many etude books that have etudes in many keys and meters. You should own a few, and perhaps you can borrow some others for a brief time. You can also look at your band library. Play through the pieces you don't know. Euphonium players might also try reading the 1st cornet part (if you are comfortable in treble clef). If not, try the bassoon parts, which are in bass clef. Tuba players might try the string bass parts to find some different material. You could also try the bass part of stage/jazz band parts.



Above all, remember that you can't read something that is beyond your technical ability, so try to raise that as much as possible. Every day should include many scales, and challenge yourself each day by playing the scales differently with different rhythms like dotted-eighths/16ths, or by working on your double-tonguing while playing scales - kill two birds with one stone. At first play 2 16ths on each step of the scale. This is good practice because it forces your fingers to switch pitches quickly. Then play with one 16th per step. Also work on arpeggios. If you look at most music, it's pretty much made up of scales and arpeggio fragments!

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