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Thread: Musician's "Mid" Life Crisis

  1. #1

    Musician's "Mid" Life Crisis

    Hey Tuba/Euph Forum! I'm a new member here and I have signed on because I am experiencing a "mid" life crisis regarding being a musician. (Excuse me if the following information seems kinda splattered, just trying to get everything out of my brain and onto the page)

    First issue:
    My sound. I have noticed a change in my sound in the past year, and IT IS NOT A GOOD ONE ):
    Previous to entering college, I played between 6-8 hours a day (during the school year: 3-5 on euphonium, 2-4 on trombone) and I had a certain way of playing. I had my tone and style the way I liked it, it was easy and worked well for me and what I had been doing. My sound was similar to Glenn van Looy in the 2nd half of high school, but now has become a bit too bright and is losing support in notes above G4 (which is down from notes above Eb5, so a m6 of loss). Now as a freshman euphonium performance major in college, I am pretty much limited to an hour or two of euphonium and 2 hours of sousaphone for marching band. Before marching band, the physical act of playing was less strenuous, but playing now causes the muscles in my neck to strain and flex, which I know is not good.
    I am unsure on how to open my sound back up and get it back to the place where I like it.

    Second issue:
    Complete lack of confidence in myself and motivation
    Back in high school, I enjoyed playing. It was one of my favorite things to do. I was filled with passion and had big aspirations for the future, knowing I accomplished a lot in those four years. Ever since hearing the recording of my first performance jury in November (I played Pantomime BTW), I have absolutely hated the way I play. This is strange because I have heard recordings of myself before and had no problems with the sound or style (just the usual blips that come with being a young musician). The recording has entirely demolished my self-confidence and motivation to improve, and I am not sure how to get my musical drive back.

    If anyone could offer me methods of getting my desired sound, ease of playing, and motivation back, I would greatly appreciate it. Thanks!!!

    I play on a Besson Prestige 2052 with the following mouthpieces: SM3U, Alliance DC3 (my go-to), and the AC66
    My trombone is a Bach Strad 42T with a Dennis Wick 4.5AL Heritage Series
    c:

  2. #2
    Welcome to the forum!

    I'm sorry to hear of your struggles. Strength in the high register requires substantial practice, but you should be able to maintain your range in an hour or two of daily practice. But efficiency of practice is an important concept. During your daily warm up, you want to gradually move from simply getting quality tone working, to incorporating tonguing, to adding more complex fingering patterns, to working on range at top AND bottom. As you move through each step, don't lose the preceding concept (i.e. don't lose tone as you start to work on fingerings).

    You need to have a solid concept in your head. Do you want to sound like David Childs? Make sure you listen to him enough to know what makes his sound attractive and work to emulate it in all you do. NOTE: anyone's "sound" is more than raw tone quality. It includes how they connect notes, how they phrase, etc.

    To properly build high range, you need to balance reliance on lip strength AND air. In my early professional days I relied more on lip strength, but your lips aren't nearly as strong as you air strength, and you benefit from making them both work for you. Check this out: http://www.dwerden.com/forum/showthr...and-High-Range

    I tell my students that they need double-action ears. They have to hear their faults so they know what to work on, and they have to appreciate their own good results so they feel good about playing and understand what is working for their success. That's a balance that needs to be maintained. We've all known players who are very aware of what they do well, very unaware of what they don't do well, and only seem to practice what they already do well. You describe being on the opposite side of that balance!

    Recording quality can have a huge effect on how we think we sound. Poor mics make us sound bad. But the sneakier problem is recordings that use automatic level control. Because no one is running the volume of recording, the recorder adjust up when you play soft and down when you play loud. It saps the musicality right out of your sound. Bad acoustics will also make a recording depressingly bad.

    But above all, remember you are a musician. That is, you are a person who makes music. Making notes is not making music. I suspect you know this from what you say above. Your goal is to present the music in a way the composer would appreciate, in a way that helps the audience know what the composer had in mind. And you need to add your own touch to the music. Soooooooo, when you practice and when you perform: feel the music; enjoy the music; enjoy adding your own touch to the music; communicate with the audience by projecting rather than just playing (don't have the conversation with yourself, but share it with the audience - even the imaginary audience as you practice).

    Regarding the previous paragraph, think of music similarly to reading words in front of an audience. First, if you read good words you are already on the road to success (so choose good music). In church every week I hear layman readers presenting parts of the Bible. So they have pretty good words to start with! But not all of them read with projection; not all speak clearly with good articulation; and not all seem to understand the meaning of what they are reading. But some speakers show projection, good articulation, and deliver the words with emphasis that brings out certain thoughts, and which might be different from another of the good readers. I'm hoping that description is easy to relate to. All of that applies to presenting music. Actually, I should not use the word "presenting." I suppose "sharing" or "enjoying" or "revelling in" are more what I feel when I'm in the groove.

    If you enjoy the music, and make it your intent to show the audience how neat it is, and add your own ideas to make it a bit more special, then you have some strong partners to contribute to your success.
    Dave Werden (ASCAP)
    Euphonium Soloist, U.S. Coast Guard Band, retired
    Adams Artist (Adams E3)
    Alliance Mouthpiece (DC3)
    YouTube: dwerden
    Facebook: davewerden
    Twitter: davewerden
    Instagram: davewerdeneuphonium

  3. #3
    Join Date
    Apr 2014
    Location
    Summerfield, Florida Sturgis, SD (summers)
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    1,870
    Very nicely said, Dave. I admire your consideration and helpfulness to others.
    John Morgan
    The U.S. Army Band (Pershing's Own) 1971-1976
    Adams E3 Custom Series Euphonium, 1956 B&H Imperial Euphonium,
    1973 F. E. Olds & Son Studio Model T-31 Baritone
    Adams TB1 Tenor Trombone, Yamaha YBL-822G Bass Trombone
    Year Round Except Summer:
    Kingdom of the Sun (KOS) Concert Band, Ocala, FL (Euphonium)
    KOS Brass Quintet (Trombone, Euphonium)
    Summer Only:
    Rapid City Municipal Band, Rapid City, SD (Euphonium)
    Rapid City New Horizons Band (Euphonium)

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Central North Carolina
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    I think that "presenting" is actually a good term in this context. And there's a strong analogy here with (as you mention) presenting "the written word" or presenting "ideas". This is particularly evident when you watch someone giving a Powerpoint presentation. Most of us have seen many more of these than we care to remember. And how many of them were ANY good?

    The use of Powerpoint in modern business (and yes, particularly "education" as well) has virtually ruined both communication and presentation. Take a look at what Edward Tufte has said about this. People are supposed to be presenting ideas, thoughts, techniques, relationships, etc. to their audience, and yet at least 80% of these "presentations" are just reading what's on the Powerpoint slides. The audience is bored to tears, and what's really important -- what the whole point of the presentation is -- is never presented.

    Music is the same way. If you just croak out the notes on the page -- without any consideration to how it SOUNDS, and without any expression (dynamics, changes in timbre and tone quality, changes in tempo as appropriate), then you're not really playing music or performing it. Just like in the case of Powerpoint, it's not about the marks on the page. The marks on the page represent something (and they don't represent it completely). If you leave it at that, then you're not correctly and completely presenting what those marks incompletely represent -- and the result is a waste of time. Of course, it's not really Powerpoint's fault. Powerpoint presentations don't numb people; people numb people. I've seen some masterful Powerpoint presentations, but the mastery is in the presenter and not what's on the slides.

    Too often in discussions like this one tends to wax poetic about how important things like feeling and emotion and "art" are in presenting a musical piece. But as a practical matter this tends to go in an unhelpful (because it becomes a subjective) direction. For me, it's more helpful to think of it as "communication" rather than "art" -- or perhaps that the art is in the communication. Dave's use of "sharing" is apt. This isn't a purely subjective exercise (which has been tried by some composers/artists and is wretched to listen to or to see). There are guidelines and shared expectations and experiences. That's the presentation.
    Gary Merrill
    Wessex EEb Bass tuba (DW 3XL or 2XL)
    Mack Brass Compensating Euph (DE N106, Euph J, J9 euph)
    Amati Oval Euph (DE 104, Euph J, J6 euph)
    1924 Buescher 3-valve Eb tuba (with std US receiver), Kelly 25
    Schiller American Heritage 7B clone bass trombone (DE LB K/K10/112/14 Lexan, Brass Ark MV50R)
    1947 Olds "Standard" trombone (Olds #3)

  5. #5
    Join Date
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    Indianapolis area
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    Messrs. Werden and Merrill have waxed eloquent on the artistic dimension of your dilemma...I will address another.
    To at least some extent, ART IS CRAFT, and my conjecture is that the craft element of your music is in play here.
    The symptoms you describe are perhaps typical of "RDS"--Random Doubler Syndrome. The fact that you are spending
    more time on tuba than euphonium is affecting your euph playing negatively, and the situation is exacerbated by the
    fact that you are playing marching band sousaphone rather than wind ensemble tuba. Dave mentioned lips and air above; use of those two
    tools can differ greatly from euphonium to tuba.
    If you want to regain your euphonium high range, you have to practice it. Is there any way you can rebalance your practice time
    more in favor of euph than sousaphone?
    As most people know here, I spend much of my euphonium time way above the staff, and there is no magic bullet for developing that
    range. I play tuba for an hour every Wednesday when I teach sixth graders...I make sure I get to the school 20 minutes early to adjust
    my lips and air to the tuba, then when I return to euphonium later in the day, I make sure to re-acclimate and go through my entire range
    up to my super-B Flat and down to the lowest B natural.
    I also find some need for re-acclimation when moving from trombone to euph, but not nearly as much as I do from tuba to euph.
    In both cases, the acclimation and re-acclimation is both PHYSICAL and (perhaps more) MENTAL. Dave mentioned ears--that's also part of
    the necessary adjustment when doubling.

    As to self-confidence, I believe strongly that much of your confidence will return when you again prove to yourself that you are in PHYSICAL
    CONTROL of the euphonium. Once you cross that barrier, you will regain confidence. Even at age 65, my self-confidence wavers. I have a few
    things that I need to practice and execute well to regain it. Is that process physical or mental? Yes.
    Dave speaks of scripture readers in church PROCLAIMING rather than reading. If I'm going to be a reader, I practice the verse(s) at home and
    do some research about the passage. For you, Chase, that's spending more time on EUPH than sousaphone. I firmly believe that if you can
    master the PHYSICAL aspects of your doubling, your euph confidence will return.

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Central North Carolina
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    2,369
    Quote Originally Posted by Snorlax View Post
    To at least some extent, ART IS CRAFT, ...
    YES, and to more than merely "some".

    The symptoms you describe are perhaps typical of "RDS"--Random Doubler Syndrome.
    !! I always have some trouble and lag in switching from one to the other (and it's worse with bass trombone). When I decided at the beginning of July that I would really learn how to play the bass trombone, I just put the tuba AWAY. The only deviation has been in the past couple of weeks when I've used the euph for some holiday stuff. And the euph/trombone switches aren't nearly as problematic as the euph/tuba/trombone switches. The differences in timbre and "feel" and "feedback" are quite different.
    Gary Merrill
    Wessex EEb Bass tuba (DW 3XL or 2XL)
    Mack Brass Compensating Euph (DE N106, Euph J, J9 euph)
    Amati Oval Euph (DE 104, Euph J, J6 euph)
    1924 Buescher 3-valve Eb tuba (with std US receiver), Kelly 25
    Schiller American Heritage 7B clone bass trombone (DE LB K/K10/112/14 Lexan, Brass Ark MV50R)
    1947 Olds "Standard" trombone (Olds #3)

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