Cross Training

The busy holiday season has struck once again.  Between all of the gigs, the baking, the ugly sweater parties, and the traveling, we still somehow have to find time to practice.  The gigs will certainly help keep us in shape, but since it is rare that those are our only obligations, we are forced to find creative ways to squeeze productive practicing into our busy schedules.  Whether it be from lack of endurance, lack of time, or neighbors who do not appreciate you playing through Mahler 3 at 11:00 at night, there are any number of reasons why we may not be able to practice according to our usual routines.  And let's face it, sometimes we just need a day off from playing to let our bodies rest.  It is times like these that I am a particular fan of productive practicing without playing the instrument itself.

Finger/Air the Music
Much of the time that we spend cleaning technical passages is devoted to coordinating our fingers with our tongues.  Finger through these passages without playing in order to listen for your coordination.  Listen for clean valve changes without being distracted by your sound from the bell.  Finger through while airing the part to improve coordination between fingers and tongue.  There is no need to waste precious endurance when much of your work can be done silently.

Sing/Buzz
Sing or buzz through your parts to ensure that you are hearing the correct pitches and intervals.  Many times when we miss something it is a result of not being able to hear the pitch properly in relation to the surrounding pitches.  If you can sing and/or buzz it (and you're using the correct fingerings/technique), you should have little trouble playing it.

Listen
Take the time to listen to recordings.  Turn on your favorite recordings when you're driving from one party to another and sing along with them (yes, without words).  Familiarity with a work can remove much of the frustration associated with learning something new.  Even if you cannot listen to a specific piece on which you are working, listen to other works by the same composer or another composer of similar compositional style.  Combine listening with a little score study to really maximize your productivity (not while driving, of course).

Practicing tonguing
Practice your multiple tonguing as you walk around.  Many of our coordination issues without "t's" and "k's" are best improved upon away from the instrument anyway.  If your tongue gets tied in knots while double tongue a string of 8th notes on a single pitch, go back to the basics.  Take things slowly and work with just your tongue and a metronome without complicating things by adding an instrument into the mix.

Do nothing
Give your ears, mind, fingers, and body a break.  Instead, read a book, watch a movie, learn to knit, pet a kitty, do yoga, meditate, take a nap, meet a friend for coffee, go for a drive.  Do ANYTHING but think about playing.  We can be so busy and driven that it's easy for us to forget to chill every now and then.  If you don't have time to practice, maybe it's a good time to take a break anyway.  Warm up as you need to in the morning, play your jobs as required, and put the instrument away long enough to recharge your batteries a little.

Read
Take a few minutes to catch up on the latest Horn Call, or another music journal, to see what you've been missing in the horn world.  You may learn something new, or at the very least be reminded of a technique or exercise that you can use in your own playing.

Blog
Writing here is one of the ways that keep myself honest with my playing.  If I have the audacity to advise others to do something, it would be awfully hypocritical of me to not follow my own advice.  Sometimes I realize that I need a little reminder myself and writing it down makes it seem as though the words are coming from an external source.  It's harder to ignore your nagging shoulder angel when anyone can read about it.

Victory

When, in one practice session, you conquer both Beethoven 7 and the Long Call in one shot:

Remembering to Sing

The last few months I've been spending a rather extensive amount of time working on solos and excerpts for upcoming DMA auditions.  Most of the works (all but 1 excerpt to be exact) are from principal parts, directed toward principal players.  This has been mildly problematic for me over the last few weeks considering the fact that I am primarily a low horn specialist.  Yes, we all have to be able to play the full range of the instrument, and yes, I do still need to be able to play all of the excerpts, but some players are built to be principal players full time whereas I most definitely am not.  I am happy to play Don Quixote or Shostakovich 5 all day, every day with no complaints whatsoever.  To give a running comparison, some players are meant to be sprinters (high hornists) and others are meant to run marathons (low hornists).  Sprinters still have to work on their endurance and marathoners have to run sprints to maintain balance in their training.  However, both types of runners still manage to maintain their focus on their individual strengths instead of trying to fit into the mold of being something that they are not.  I had somehow allowed myself to fall into the trap of being a marathoner who was working on her sprints 100% of the time. 

It was actually a colleague of mine who pointed this out to me after I had broached the subject of the frustration that has been building since starting my full-time work on my audition music.  Remembering where your strengths lie is such a simple idea and I had allowed my focus and drive to blind me from it.  The need for technical and mechanical perfection had completely over-ridden the ability to hear and cultivate a beautiful, characteristic, horn sound.  Basically, I had forgotten how to sing.

I mean this in both the literal sense of using my voice to sing as well as the figurative voice that we use to sing through our instruments.  As I drove home after the aforementioned conversation, I realized that I could not remember the last time that I sang along with the radio at the top of my lungs.  My primary source of inspiration for playing a beautiful melody is opera, especially arias in the bel canto style.  While I am certainly not an opera singer myself, I can belt out show tunes with the best of them.  I used to always be singing along with Beauty and the Beast, The Phantom of the Opera, Wicked, or Ragtime, to name a few.  I started singing along with Phantom and was quickly reminded of just how much singing can help your breath support, phrasing, style, vibrato, and so on.  It felt fantastic and it was extremely liberating to rediscover this part of my voice.

The focus on principal solos and excerpts had consumed my practice sessions to the point where I would literally play nothing else outside of my warm-up routine.  It was a much needed reminder that the ultimate reason why we play this instrument is the beautiful sound, not the technical aspects of performance.  I needed to rediscover the sound that I loved.  It was time to slow down on the long tone exercises and use them to perfect my tone rather than as a launch pad to more technical exercises.  Milk the Arnold Jacob "Beautiful Music" exercise for all that it is worth (many thanks, my tuba playing friends).  Play through some of the big movie themes (i.e. Star Wars, Star Trek - new one, Star Trek: First Contact, Jurassic Park, etc.).  I had a particularly splendid time reading through the Rochut trombone Melodious Etudes books as well as the Shoemaker Legato Etudes based on Concone's Vocalises and the back section of the Arban's book for trumpet.  It was an extremely pleasant way to remember why I love to play in the first play.  Air was moving, my sound was returning, and both physical and mental stiffness finally relaxed.

The ultimate lesson that I received from all of this was to remember that there is always time to remember why you play.  No matter how soon or how far away an audition may be, you cannot forget to work on your sound.  The required music will always work as long as you love what you do.  Stiffness, anger, and frustration are some of the biggest barriers that you can face on the road to an audition and you have the power to do something about them.  Trust yourself.  Trust your horn.  Trust your heart.  There is always the time to play something simply for the sake of making music.

Transposition

When you get a part for horn in E, and someone penciled in the wrong transposition through the entire piece...

Opera for the Average Idiot #3 - Siegfried

After extensive inbreeding...

the saga continues....

Siegfried, part III of Wagner's "Ring Cycle"

Act I
Scene I
The scene opens with the dwarf Mime attempting to forge a new sword for his foster son, Siegfried (the son of the brother/sister pair Siegmund and Sieglinde from Die Walkure).  Being the sneaky little bastard that he is, Mime took in Siegfried after Sieglinde's death in order to train him to defeat the dragon Fafnir and win back the Ring.  Siegfried barges in with a live bear that he just defeated.

Siegfried:  "Look at me!  I'm awesome!  I cannot be beaten!  Mime, where is my new sword?"
Mime:  "Here it is.  I've been working on it all day."
Siegfried: *breaks sword*  "This is shit."

Siegfried knows that the only reason he sticks around with Mime is because he wants to know about his parentage.  He forces Mime to tell him all that he knows about his parents, which also leads Mime to show him the broken pieces of his father's sword, Nothung.

Siegfried:  "Fix it for me!"
Mime:  "I am too weak!"
Siegfried:  "Definitely not news to me..." *stomps out of the cave with his temper tantrum*

Scene II
Wotan comes to visit in his guise of the Wanderer.  In exchange for the traditional hospitality that is due to all guests, he challenges Mime to a riddle contest.  Wotan answers correctly all 3 of the questions that Mime asks him ("What is your name?...What is your quest?...What is the capital of Wiseria?"), but Mime still refuses him hospitality.

For the insult, Wotan makes him answer 3 riddles as well:  What is the name of Wotan's favorite race? (the Wolsungs)  What is the name of the sword that can destroy Fafnir? (Nothung)  Who is the person who can reforge the sword?  Mime correctly answers the first 2 questions but misses the third.  Wotan reveals that the sword can only be reforged by "he who must not be named" "he who knows no fear."  He also reveals that this is the same person who will kill Mime.

Scene III
Siegfried returns from his pouting and throws another hissy fit when he learns that Mime has made no progress on reforging Nothung.  Mime realizes that "he who knows no fear" is Siegfried and he scrambles to convince him that he should be afraid of something.  Siegfried decides that he wants to know what fear is about and Mime agrees to take him to see the dragon Fafnir so he can learn.  Siggy gets all excited and decides to repair Nothung on his own.

*insert forging song here* *P.S. it's AWESOME*

 (photo courtesy of Wikipedia)
 While Siegfried belts out his forging song, Mime prepares to poison him once he has the ring in his possession.  Siegfried finishes Nothung and demonstrates the strength of the new blade by slicing an anvil in half.

Act II
Scene I
Both Wotan and the dwarf Alberich show up at Fafnir's cave, Alberich to try to get the ring back, and Wotan wants to observe the shenanigans that are about to ensue.  Wotan wakes up Fafnir from his hibernation for Alberich so he can try to bargain for the ring.

Alberich: "I want the ring back."
Fafnir: "You didn't say the magic word."
Alberich: "Please?"
Fafnir: "Nope."
Alberich: "But someone is coming to kill you for it."
Fafnir: "Bring it on."

And Fafnir goes back to sleep.

Scene II
Siegfried and Mime arrive at the cave and Mime immediately shows his cowardice by leaving Siegfried to face Fafnir alone.  Siegfried decides to befriend a little woodbird sitting in a nearby tree and makes several attempts at carving a reed flute to communicate with her.

*insert the most glorious bassoon/English horn/oboe/clarinet solos EVER*



Failing to produce a reasonable sound, he gives up and switches to playing his horn (The Long Call) to communicate with her. In doing so, he wakes up Fafnir. They argue, they fight, and Siegfried kills the dragon.  With his dying breath, Fafnir warns him to beware of treachery.  Siggy retrieves his sword and accidentally gets some of the dragon's blood on his hand.  He brings his hands to his mouth out of reflex and tastes some of the blood, giving him the ability to understand the speech of animals.  Per the woodbird's instructions, he pulls the ring and the Tarnhelm from the dragon's horde (see: Opera for the Average Idiot #1: Das Rehingold).  Mime reappears and tries to poison our hero, to no avail.  His new-found ability to understand animals helps him understand that he has been betrayed and he kills Mime.  His little bird friend starts singing about a sleeping woman, surrounded by fire, who would make a perfect wife for him, and they head off into the sunset to find her.

Act III
Scene I
The Wanderer wakes up a very confused Erda and proceeds to tell her:

Wanderer:  "I no longer wants to prevent the end of the Gods.  I'm cool with it.  We can leave the world to Siegfried and Brunnhilde."
Erda: "oh...um...sure...whatever you say..."

Erda is dismissed.

Siegfried arrives and unknowingly sasses his grandfather when he is blocked from reaching Brunnhilde.  He breaks Wotan's spear with Nothung and continues on.

Scene II
Siegfried finds the ring of fire and enters to find a figure dressed in armor who he thinks is a man.  He removes the armor and is very surprised to find a woman instead. 

Keep in mind that up to this point in his life, Siegfried has never actually seen a woman.  He chooses this moment to finally be afraid of something (i.e. someone with breasts).  He kisses her out of desperation and wakes her up.




Brunnhilde:  "I love you!"
Siegfried:  "I love you too!  Even though I'm your nephew!"
Brunnhilde:  "Whatever!"

They renounce the world of the gods, and The End.

Bowing and Breathing

Last week I was fortunate enough to be in San Francisco when the SFSO was playing Mahler's Ninth Symphony under Michael Tilson Thomas.  Over the last decade the SFSO has very much made a name for themselves with their release of all of the Mahler symphonies with Tilson Thomas conducting.  I've been a fan of those recordings for some time now thanks to the fact that not only are their performances superb but I feel his Mahler interpretation is impeccable.  I was particularly excited to hear the ninth symphony live since it spans the whole gamut of dramatic emotions (anger, excitement, joy, peace, etc).  That kind of work is best experienced in the live setting where the visible energy and intensity of the musicians can greatly influence your perception of the piece.

My seat was in the terrace, right behind the orchestra, less than 10 feet behind the bells of the horns.  As far as I was concerned, there was no better seat in the house.  It was as close as I could get to sitting with the horn section without actually being on stage.  Within the first bar of the 2nd Horn solo at the beginning of the first movement it was painfully obvious to me that it had been several years now since the last time I was able to hear an orchestra of this caliber in person.  It made me long for the time that I lived in Cincinnati a few years ago, when we would go down to Symphony Hall on a weekly basis to hear the CSO for the affordable cost of a student ticket.

Throughout the concert, there were two things that were particularly enrapturing from a visual standpoint:  the bowing of the strings and the breathing of the brass.  Playing as an ensemble is a skill that is often overlooked in our musical training.  So much of our time in school is spent learning how to be a soloist.  Yes, we learn excerpts, and yes, we spend time playing in ensembles, but how much of that time is completely devoted to learning to perform as a cohesive unit?  I feel like the woodwinds and brass have a slight advantage over the rest of the orchestra simply because of the increased emphasis on involvement in multiple ensembles in universities.  Many of your wind instrumentalists are members of both the bands/wind ensembles and orchestras at the same time in addition to any chamber music opportunities.  We also have the tendency to spend drastically more time on excerpts as a required part of our lesson repertoire.  It was an incredible experience to have my breath taken away by the purely visual aspect of watching the strings perform.   Each of the individual string sections were moving in complete synchronization.  Every performer used the bow to its fullest extent.  Down bows.  Up bows.  Every movement happened in exact unison.  All of the string players were playing their individual parts at the top of their individual abilities, and then threw all sense of individual identity out of the proverbial window.  It didn't matter that they were a group of individuals from all different backgrounds and schools of music.  The only thing that was important was to think, move, and perform as a single unit.  It was so enchanting to watch that you could have completely muted every sound coming from the stage and the performance would have been just as enthralling to observe.

The breathing of the brass section was just as mesmerizing, but more from an aural standpoint than visual.  Every attack was precisely together using the same style and articulation.  As impressive as that was, I was moved even more by the precision of their releases.  Every performer played the end of every statement and phrase the exact same way as the rest of their compatriots.  There was not a single release where someone would breathe out of sync with the rest of the section.  Every phrase was seemingly approached with the idea that the end is always the goal and is therefore the most important part.  The releases became the most awe inspiring aspect of the entire concert.  Individual identities were gone and nothing was more important than sharing and utilizing a single musical mind.  The communication that can occur silently in the span of a single breath was mind boggling to observe.  It was as if I had been specially invited to observe a sacred ritual.  This kind of performance cannot be captured in a "canned" recording.  The amount of editing that occurs on modern albums completely eliminates these magical moments that can only be observed and felt during a live performance.

My re-inspiration.  That's what I'm calling this concert.  This performance gave me back some of the spark that had been missing from my own playing for quite a while now.  I had forgotten what it really felt like to be a part of a larger whole, the bigger picture, or whatever you want to call it.  We get stuck in our practice rooms playing the same music the same ways over and over again and it is too easy to lose sight of the amazing things that can be accomplished when we belong to an ensemble.  I am not trying to belittle soloist or solo work at all.  There is simply a level of enlightenment that can be attained when you give up your individual musical self in order to achieve the musical and mental harmony that can only be found when truly playing as an ensemble.

Finding your Focus

We often forget just how much of the quality of a performance is based on our ability to maintain focus.  Music is a mental game.  Just like a chess champion trains to out maneuver their opponent, we must train to out maneuver our minds.  The mind is a fickle thing.  If we are constantly concerned about our "shoulder angels" telling us what to do or think, we can easily be distracted from maintaining our focus on what we are physically doing here and now.  I've always found Yoda from the Star Wars franchise to be a particularly apt music teacher.  Before agreeing to train Luke in "The Empire Strikes Back," he comments on how "All his life has he looked away...to the future, to the horizon.  Never his mind on where he was.  Hmm?  What he was doing."  This is a perfect example of how our minds are prone to wandering.  We worry incessantly about superfluous things instead of focusing on what we are playing this moment.  Our shoulder angels are constantly whispering to us as we perform: Damn! I missed that again!, I always have trouble with that passage, Don't screw up!, and so on.  This stream of discouragements force us to avert our concentration away from what we are actually doing in each moment of a performance. 

I am the last person to advise any kind of micro management of muscles as we play because it will only lead to getting so tangled up in ourselves that we cannot move.  Analysis paralysis can be fatal to any performance when too much  thinking occurs.  The kind of focus that I am referring to  pertains to concentrating on only one thing at a time, such as: allowing your body to stay relaxed, concentrating solely on what your air is doing, ensuring that your fingers are moving at the appropriate speed, etc.  The busy society in which we live has convinced us that we must multi-task in order to be considered successful.  Smart phones, tablets, and other electronic devices are supposedly designed to streamline our lives so we have more time for other pursuits.  Unfortunately, they also have taught us to depend on a constant stimulus.  It seems to be increasingly more difficult for people to be comfortable with concentrating on only one thing at a time.  Instead we listen to music, while using an e-reader, while talking on the phone, all while we drive from one life event to another.  We are determined to find success by our ability to check things off of our to-do lists, regardless of the quality of the work we perform.  Focusing on one thing at a time, and being comfortable with focusing on only one thing, is a skill that requires us to work our mental muscles in the same way we work our embouchures, arms, fingers, and voices when we perform.  Focus must be practiced daily in order to stay in shape.


Tips for finding your ability to focus

1. Turn off the TV/Phone/Computer/Tablet/E-reader.
Yes.  All of those little (or not so little) devices have an on/off switch.  Use it.  Many of us fall into the comfortable trap of watching TV while we practice.  Warm up routines are almost perfectly built for distraction, especially if it is a routine that one has used for years.  We get to a point where we go through the motions simply because that's the way we've always done things.  It's so easy to turn on the baseball game, the DVR, or Netflix to help pass the time while we go through those motions.  Then we finish our warm up and we're in the middle of a movie or TV show.  Rather than turn off the TV we decide to leave it running while we "practice" our solos, etudes, or excerpts.  Instantly, our attention is divided.  How are you supposed to actually pay attention to your breathing when you're more concerned with how the Cardinals/Pirates game is going (go Cards!)?  The answer is, you can't.  Our minds are not designed to be able to concentrate fully on two different activities at once.  The moment you try to multi-task, your attention is divided in half for each activity.  Not only did you just play through a piece without actually fixing anything, but you still have no idea what is going on in the game anyway.  Turn off the electronics and give your practicing a fighting chance.

2.  Set immediate and attainable goals.
There was a spectacular article written for The Bulletproof Musician last month here: http://www.bulletproofmusician.com/two-things-experts-do-differently-than-non-experts-when-practicing/

The article discusses two things that experts do differently than non-experts while practicing.  The author cited a study done by two researchers at the City University of New York that compared basketball players, specifically the best free throw shooters to the worst.  The study found that the top free throw shooters set specific goals for everything they practiced, such as keeping their elbows tucked in while shooting, instead of their weaker counterparts who set much broader goals along the lines of simply making the shot.  We can and should do the same thing in our own practice.  Rather than telling yourself, "Don't mess up," decide how you are actually going to not "mess up."  Set the goal of cleaning the movement of your valves.  Work on the the coordination between your tongue and your air so they work together.  Play with a drone pitch to concentrate on improving your intonation.  There are countless goals that you can set to improve your ability to perform any piece of music.  Choose one at a time and clean, clean, clean.  If you continually miss something, determine the specific reason why you miss.  If your answer is just that you suck, you'll always be stuck playing the same thing the exact same way, always missing.  Break things down and use the process of elimination.  Was my tongue getting in the way?  Were my fingers coordinated?  Did I choke off my air supply?  How was my air speed?  Find the specific source of the problem and set about fixing it.

3.  Leave yourself reminders.
The sticky note.  My favorite practice tool.  Sometimes I'm convinced that I single-handedly keep the Post-It company in business.  Pick your favorite color of sticky note and be prepared to use them.  You may laugh at yourself when you open a book to find your lime green sticky note reminding you to breathe, but I can guarantee that you will definitely be focused on your breathing when you work on that etude.  Sometimes we just need that external prodding to do something, even if we have to do it ourselves.

4.  Get physical.
Start running.  Do yoga.  Take up Tai Chi.  Sign up for a Zumba class.  Physical activity is a fantastic way to teach yourself to focus on one thing at a time.  I do actually recommend against the gym setting for achieving this.  Most of your gyms have televisions all over the place and are designed to entertain the gym users who are easily bored by working out.  Running outside or taking a group class gets you away from the TVs and does not give you a choice but to focus on what you are doing at that moment.  Leave the phone at home and find an activity that clears your mind and doesn't allow for the multi-tasking that leads to distraction.

These are only a few suggestions of things you can use to rediscover your ability to focus, or help you find it in the first place.  Don't be afraid to try new exercises, techniques, or activities to find what works for you.  While I am a runner who loves to do yoga every morning, I know plenty of people who cannot stand doing either activity because they get frustrated and angry instead of clearing their minds.  The biggest thing to remember is that we perform how we practice, so we must practice how we wish to perform.  If you allow yourself to be distracted while you practice on your own, you will never be able to achieve the level of focus required to attain perfection in a performance.

Opera for the Average Idiot #2 - "Die Walküre"

Since I seem to possess the inability to function like a normal human being and according to a normal sleep schedule, we're just going to continue on our little journey through the Ring Cycle without being forced to use too many brain cells.

(Just wait until I get to "La Boheme."  I do a mean rendition in 5 minutes or less using sock puppets.)

Without further ado, "Die Walküre."

Act I
We meet Siegmund, a warrior of the Volsung race who is currently on the run after causing a bit of mayhem and destruction.  He seeks shelter for the night at a cottage and is greeted by Sieglinde (and no, the names do not get any easier to remember...).  Conveniently enough, they fall in love shortly before her husband, Hunding, gets home (surprise, surprise).  Siegmund tells his story:

"I killed some folks at a wedding.  Possibly the bride.  Whoops."

Hunding reveals that he's part of the mob hunting him down a la "Kill the Beast," however, he's bound by custom to provide him with shelter for the night.  They agree to duke it out in the morning, much in the style of the Dread Pirate Roberts:

"Good night, Westley. Good work. Sleep well. I'll most likely kill you in the morning."

Sieglinde drugs Hunding, Siegmund pulls a magic (sort of) sword from a tree, and realizing that they are twin brother and sister AND are in love, Siegmund and Sieglinde run away together.

Let the inbreeding begin!

Act II
We finally meet the Valkyrie Brünnhilde, otherwise known as the character solely responsible for the idea that all operas involve large women wearing breast plates and horns whilst holding a spear.  See Exhibit A below:


Wotan to Brünnhilde:  "Protect Siegmund."
Fricka to Wotan: "Siegmund's gotta go.  Nice try, using him to get your stupid ring back.  This is not the hero you're looking for.  He's your bastard son, so deal with it."
Wotan to Brünnhilde:  "Well, shit."

Wotan needs the ring back supposedly to prevent the downfall of the gods.  The problem is that Fafnir stills has it (as we learned in "Das Rheingold") and he's still in the form of a big-ass dragon.  Hence, Wotan has started listening to the familiar tune, "I need a hero!  I'm holding out for a hero 'til the end of the night!..."  Since his wife is the one who really wears the pants in their relationship, he tells Brünnhilde that Siegmund must die.

Siegmund and Sieglinde appear (have I lost anyone on the character names yet?).

Brünnhilde to Siegmund:  "Sorry little brother, but you're going to die."
S to B: "Can I take my lover who is also my sister with me?"
B to S: "Nope."
S to B: "I don't wanna!!!"

Brünnhilde turns out to be quite the sucker for a romance and agrees to help him win.  Fighting begins between Hunding and Siegmund and when Siegmund seems to be winning, Wotan finally grows a pair and takes care of his own dirty business by shattering Siegmund's sword and allowing Hunding to kill him.  Brünnhilde takes the broken sword and Sieglinde away with her.  Wotan takes off after her to mete out punishment for her disobedience.

Act III
**Please do me a favor and take a moment to revel in the sheer awesomeness of one of the greatest (in my opinion) bass trombone parts ever written.  When performed well, the opening of this act can be a life altering experience.  Now, back to our regularly scheduled program.

The rest of the Valkyries make their appearance on a mountain top.  We now have 8 beefy women in armor on stage causing a cliche overload.  Everyone is thoroughly alarmed when Brünnhilde shows up with Sieglinde, who is alive (they only hang with dead people) and we find out is also pregnant with her twin brother's child (Ewwwwwwww......).  Brünnhilde decides to stay behind to distract Wotan so Sieglinde can get away.  She also names the unborn child Siegfried (Now have I lost anyone on the names??).

Wotan to Brünnhilde:  "You have betrayed the express command of your king. Through your arrogance and stupidity, you've opened these peaceful realms and innocent lives to the horror and desolation of war! You are unworthy of these realms, you're unworthy of your title, you're unworthy... of the loved ones you have betrayed! I now take from you your power! In the name of my father and his father before, I, Odin Allfather, cast you out!"


**Sorry...I just made a slight detour into Marvel's "Thor" with my best Anthony Hopkins impression and I just couldn't resist a little Chris Hemsworth here.

Despite my detour, the same thing conveniently happens in the opera.  Wotan strips Brünnhilde of her powers, leaving her as a mortal.  He's going to just leave her in a magic induced sleep to fall prey to any man who may find her, but she gets rather weepy and convinces him to give her the protection of a ring of magic fire that only a fearless hero may cross.  Wotan agrees, puts her to sleep, and calls Loge to create the ring of fire to protect her.  Note: We begin to hear Siegfried's leitmotif when they speak of the unnamed fearless hero.  Don't worry, you'll hear this theme a LOT in "Siegfried" and "Götterdämmerung."

Love!  Incest! Adultery!  Murder!  Mayhem!  Magic!

How can you go wrong?!

End note:  I have to make the recommendation that everyone watches the production at the Metropolitan Opera starring James Morris as my favorite Wotan and Jessye Norman as Sieglinde.  She is AMAZING in that role.  I'm pretty sure that her jaw comes completely unhinged in Act III.  Seriously, she could swallow your head in one bite.  It's scary and impressive all at the same time.

Opera for the Average Idiot #1 - Das Rheingold

Once again you all are subjected to the ravings that result from my sleep-deprived mind.  For the uninitiated, I love opera.  I love it far more than any sane person should.  A series of health problems a couple of years ago led to me not being able to play for more than a year.  In order to keep my mental musical skills sharp, I started watching operas.  One a day, to be exact (occasionally extending the longer ones over multiple days if needed for sanity's sake).  By a happy accident I had discovered that my county library system owns a ridiculous collection of all of the Met HD broadcasts as well as countless other older productions.  I was on a mission and I'm rather proud of the fact that I started this project thinking that it would be difficult and quickly learned the error of my ways.  It's kind of killing me right now that it's still the off-season for the Met.  I always have the alarm set on my phone to alert me when they do their weekly live stream broadcasts so I don't miss one (Rigoletto was ridonkulous last season).

I digress.

I am fully aware that opera is not for everyone and it pains me greatly that so many people refuse to give it a shot.  You'd be surprised how similar most opera plots are to the movies that are the most popular nowadays.  Sorry, Peter Jackson, but Wagner did it first (just without hobbits).  So, in an effort to expose some of you to the more standard operatic repertoire, I've decided to summarize their plots in as concise of a manner as possible while keeping the emphasis on the most important/exciting/entertaining/amusing parts. Cliff notes has nothing on me.

Since I'm a bit of a masochist we're just going to start things out with Wagner's Ring Cycle.  Go big or go home, really.  In an effort to be kind, I will at least break it down into the 4 separate operas that comprise the whole shebang.  Without further ado, I give you "Das Rheingold," the very much abridged version.

Scene I
Scene begins under water, accompanied by the longest E-flat major chord ever written.  And it's to die for. We are introduced to 3 Rhine maidens and a dwarf named Alberich.  The Rhine maidens have been charged by the king of the gods (Wotan) to guard the Rhine gold (a lump of gold that came from the Rhine river).  The scene progresses as follows:

Rhine maidens to Alberich:  You're ugly and we're pretty and could use some help learning some manners. Btw, father told us not to tell you that you can take the gold only if you renounce love.  And you can use that gold to make a ring that will make you all-powerful (one ring to rule them all...familiar, no?).  Oh, and we're dumb. 

Alberich to Rhine maidens:  Jerkfaces!  I will totally renounce love and it just so happens that I work part-time as a jewelry maker.  Neener neener neener!

Alberich takes the gold and the Rhine maidens get all upset.  End of Scene I. 

Scene II (30 minutes later)
The sun rises on the newly constructed Valhalla.  The action quickly proceeds to Wotan being busted by his wife for trying to sell her sister to the Frost Giants in exchange for them building Valhalla.

Wotan: What a lovely morning! Look at my shiny new castle!  Oh, btw, I had to sell your sister for it, but no worries!  We've got these awesome new digs that I can fill up with dead heroes now!  You'll never miss her!

Fricka:  Nice try.  Your ass is grass.

Her brothers appear and king of the gods or not, Wotan knows that he's screwed.  He calls on Loge (Loki), the god of mischief and fire to help him blunder his way out of this one.  They bargain with the giants who agree to let Freia go in exchange for a pile of gold the same size as she is (they really wish right about now that they had gone for one of the Valkyries.  Much beefier in stature).  Loge and Wotan head underground to rob the dwarves. End of Scene II.

Scene III
While shit is going down in Scene II, Alberich has created the ring and also made his brother, Mime, make a helmet called the Tarnhelm (magic helmet = invisibility, etc) from the Rheingold.

Wotan and Loge arrive in the caves of the Niebelungs (dwarf-type folks).  While the Niebelungs start carrying gold up to the surface for the gods, they find out about the ring and the helmet.  Wotan refuses to leave without them since he's a greedy little bastard.  He and Loge are just as nasty as the Rhine maidens and trick Alberich into getting himself trapped.  They take the helmet but can't manage to get the ring from him.  Apparently being a god doesn't mean a whole lot in the power department....

Scene IV
Back in the land of sunshine and daisies...
Wotan finally yanks the ring off of Alberich's finger leading Alberich to curse the ring (duh duh duuuuuuhhhh!  The moment we've all been waiting for!).  The gold is piled up in front of Freia (the sister-in-law) and now the giants decide to get greedy.  The Tarnhelm is thrown on the pile and the giants demand the ring as well because somehow they can still see Freia through a massive pile of gold.  Fricka demands that Wotan give up the ring to save her sister:

Fricka: Give it up or you're never getting laid again.  Also, gold is soooo not your color.

Wotan's mommy (Erda) even gets in on the action and shames him into giving up the ring.

Erda:  You never did listen to me.  How many times have I told you to play fair with the other kids?!  

Wotan gives up the ring, the giants let Freia go, and the curse strikes for the first time.  The giant Fafnir kills his brother right away so he can posses the ring before he runs off with the ring, the gold, and the Tarnhelm to turn himself into a dragon and be all menacing and stuff (he'll be back, no worries).  The gods then cross their fancy-pants bridge made from a rainbow to move into their new digs at Valhalla while accompanied by the Valhalla motive which is freaking gorgeous.  Loge tells the audience that everyone is doomed (as if we didn't already figure this out), and we're left with a cliffhanger, forcing everyone to return the next night for the sequel.

Well, that's the story of "Das Rheingold" in a nutshell!  Now that you know what's going on while they sing gloriously in German, watch it!  I always recommend watching the full spectacle of a performance rather than just listening to it.  Especially if you've never seen/heard it before.  After a while you can even start keeping a tally of the deaths (this can easily be turned into a drinking game, and a dangerous one, if you aren't careful).  James Morris will always be my favorite Wotan.  Find him and love it.

Scales, again?

So why, exactly, should we practice our scales?

We all do it.  Run through our scales as fast as we possibly can so we can check them off of our list of things to do, like a household chore.  We play them because our teachers tell us to.  We play them out of a sick sense of guilt that occurs if we don't. We play them because that's the way we have always warmed up.  It's a shame, really, because our scales provide us with the ideal vessel for perfecting so many different aspects of performance.

Probably the most obvious thing to work on is tone.  Take time with your scales.  Play them as long tones and never move on to the next note before achieving the most perfect, pure tone imaginable.  Keep in mind that practicing your scales does not mean that you have to play all of them.  Just accounting for majors and all 3 forms of minors you have 48 to choose from.  Select a handful to focus on each day.  If you have trouble keeping your tone consistent between the low, mid, and high registers, slowly play them the full range of the instrument, making each note tonally perfect through the entire range before moving on.

Practice them in different rhythmic patterns and at different speeds.  When you have your scales memorized, and I mean truly memorized, you can focus entirely on your rhythm without the notes themselves getting in the way.  Note accuracy should not be an issue, so do more than just play them as straight eighth notes.  Throw in varying articulations while you're at it.  Staccato, accents, marcato, slurs, legato, and so on.  Use this as an opportunity to practice making a distinct difference between the different articulations we are required to use.  Practice your multiple tonguing.  Work them faster and faster until you can no longer control the rhythm precisely.  Switch things up by playing a jazz rhythm/style.  We horn players are notoriously "square," so take the time to work on your swing patterns every now and again.  You may surprise your fellow orchestra members at your next Pops concert.

Dynamics.  Oh how easily we forget to actually practice these.  Start soft and crescendo as you ascend.  Start loud and decrescendo as you descend.  Start loud, decrescendo halfway through, and crescendo again as you reach the top of the scale.  Start soft, crescendo halfway through, and decrescendo as you reach the top.  Play all of them as soft and controlled as humanly possible.  Play them all as big (with focused and controlled tone of course) as possible, pushing your dynamic limits to their max.

Use them as part of your warm-down routine at the end of the day.  Soft, slow, descending scales are a perfect way to pull an abused embouchure back into the proper shape again.  Keep your focus on controlling your corners and bring the very center of your embouchure back into control.  Get rid of any gravel that may have appeared in your sound and eliminate any occurrence of a double buzz that can appear when we've played heavily.

We seem to always be looking for that perfect exercise or etude to fix all of our playing problems.  You already have the perfect tool that you can modify in any way you want to fix any problem you may have.  Never forget how to effectively use them.

Lessons I Wish I had Learned (and Listened to) Earlier in My Career

I think every time I practice, I come up with something that I wish I had known sooner in my playing career.  Sometimes it's as straight forward as wishing I had known a particular piece.  Others, it's a lesson I wish someone would have taught me sooner.  We learn from our mistakes, no matter the situation.  There are simply a few mistakes I wish I had made much earlier. 

1. Never go into a rehearsal without knowing a piece, no matter how obscure.
    Never, EVER do this.  I will never forget my way around Beethoven's 5th Piano Concerto as a result of this particular lesson.  There are few times in my life where I have been this mortified.  I learned the hard way that this particular piano concerto has several large and well know second horn solos.  I had no idea, and mutilated the part.  Luckily I had time to rectify the situation before the first performance, never again have I ever gone to a rehearsal unprepared.

2.  Get along with people, even if you don't like them.
     You don't have to be everyone's best friend, but you never know who may be able to get you a job.

3.  Don't piss off the wrong people.
     Just as some people may get you a job, others can just as easily prevent you from getting one, just because you have proven to be difficult to work with.

4.  Always know the back story of a piece you are playing.
     Mozart will never be played the same way as Strauss.  I cringe to think of a Bach work performed in the style of Stravinsky.  Know the differences between your composers.  Each of them has a distinct style that gives them their identity.  This is particularly important if you are playing a piece that is actually intended to tell a story.  For example: Strauss' "Don Quixote" is broken into an introduction, theme, maggiore, 10 variations, and a finale.  Each section of the piece depicts a different part of Don Quixote's life/story with each character represented by a different motive.  If Variation VI (Meeting with Dulcinea) was performed the same way as Variation VII (The Ride Through the Air), Don Quixote's first meeting with his love, Dulcinea, would come across as drastically more violent than it is intended to be.

5.  There is always someone else out there who is practicing more, and is practicing more effectively, than you are.
      There really isn't a whole lot of explanation needed on this one.  If you aren't practicing, someone else is.  The only way to do something about it is to practice, and practice effectively, every chance you get.

6.  Don't settle for an instrument just because it's cheaper.  Save up and just buy the one you really want.
     Buying a cheaper instrument just to save a little money was one of the biggest mistakes I ever made.  I ended up selling it in less than 3 years because it was a terrible fit for me.  Be patient.  Save everything you can and keep your eyes open.  It will be worth all of the waiting when you're playing the instrument you really want.

7.  Take chances.
     You never know what kind of opportunities may come your way, simply because you took a chance on something.  Some of the most incredible performing experiences I've had came along simply because I allowed myself to take a chance on something new.

Inspiration

While motivation is certainly an important part of performance, this post is actually centered on another definition of the word 'inspiration.'  According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, inspiration can also be defined as "the act of drawing in; specifically : the drawing of air into the lungs" (www.merriam-webster.com).  I was rudely reminded this week of the multitude of things that can interfere with a practice routine.  A change in work or rehearsal schedule can eliminate the the time you would normally devote to a full warm-up routine. A tough day at work or being stuck in traffic can throw us off of our mental game just as easily as (sometimes more easily than) a bad run through an etude or excerpt.  Our physical state can provide plenty of interference when our bodies are worn down or injured.  We certainly never want to force ourselves to play through true injury in an effort to avoid permanent damage (both physical and mental), but we can still be productive with our limited time by focusing on one aspect of our playing.

Inspiration and respiration. Breathing in and breathing out. There are so many things involved in brass playing, but as I frequently remind my students, air is crucial to producing any kind of sound (good or bad).  Without air, we have nothing.  Condensed practice sessions provide the perfect opportunity to focus on our air production. Mindful breathing can improve our tone, articulation, dynamics, flexibility, endurance, accuracy, and so on.  Some suggestions for a mindful approach to breathing in a reduced practice session:

1. Breathing exercises. I am personally a big proponent of the "Breathing Gym" and "Brass Gym" methods. Spending 5 minutes going through 2-3 of the exercises (or go through the full routine if you like) can quickly refocus your mind and body to only thinking about producing the most beautiful, characteristic sound possible on your instrument.

2. Turn off your ears. I know, this sounds counter-productive, but sometimes we have to temporarily turn off our ears in order to focus on only one thing at a time. If you're having a rough time producing the sound that you want, find a way to stop listening to yourself and play everything based solely on how it feels. You may be mentally flexible enough to just stop listening, but I also like to use a practice mute in these situations. The moment you insert the mute into your bell, you automatically know that your sound is going to be condensed, whiney, and very uncharacteristic of your playing. I find that this makes it easier to disregard it for a time because you can blame it all on the mute. Practice mutes provide unusual resistance that forces us to reduce our playing to the simplest elements because there are so many things we cannot hear when we use them. Your thoughts can easily revolve around producing a smooth, consistent, and controlled air stream without getting frustrated over a poor sound. Play with the mute for a while. Then remove it and play the exact same way using the same air stream. See how much your tone, control, slurs, etc. improve without the added resistance of the mute

3. Remind yourself that the quality of our breathing directly impacts the quality of our sound. Leave yourself sticky notes all over your music and practice space so that your #1 thought is "Great air in = great sound out."  Then let this be your only thought as you practice. 

4. Buzz. Get rid of the instrument and let your air do the work for you on your mouthpiece. Concentrate on producing a clean and controlled buzz while using a big, fat, continuous air stream. Do not allow a breaks in your sound. Slur everything to ensure that the tongue does not get in the way of producing a clear buzz. 

5. Lip slurs. Find a set of lip slurs that you love. Make up your own. Play them with a friend. Whatever you do, the big idea here is to get the tongue out of the picture. Your air stream should be doing 100% of the work here so that your embouchure can take a little breather while you work on a smooth air stream and flexibility. If your chops are stiff and tired, start in the low to mid range and work your way upward. Let your air and body be your guide. As soon as you reach the point where you are no longer thinking only about your air, or the quality of your sound becomes compromised, move on to a new slur rather than beating it to death in frustration.

Brass players are always on a mission to find the perfect warm-up, the perfect exercises, the perfect method to fix all of our playing problems. You have to remember that no matter what you are playing, you have to work with your body instead if against it.  Focus on mindful breathing as you inhale to fill your lungs and exhale through the instrument as you play. Breath is life, both for our bodies and our horns.

The music in our minds

This week I finally had the chance to finish a book entitled, "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat," by Dr. Oliver Sacks. Dr. Sacks is a neurologist from London who has a particular fascination for the connections between music and the mind. He has written several books relating some of the more unusual cases and conditions that he has come across in his career and I've now read both "The Man Who Mistook..." as well as his "Musicophilia." I found both books to be enlightening, entertaining, and informative, without overwhelming the reader with loads of confusing medical jargon. It was refreshing to read between the written lines of both books to see the passion that he has, not only for his chosen profession, but also as a lover of music. 

The mind is incredibly powerful. It can be a source of incredible intelligence and can simultaneously entrap a person in an inescapable prison. While most mathematicians and scientists would love to insist that math is the universal language, Dr. Sacks fills his books with examples of how music has the power to influence regardless of intelligence level. It can provide an organized outlet for minds that are overwhelmed by the fierce passions and outbursts associated with Tourette's syndrome. It can provide peace for those who deal with the sensory overload that can be associated with autism. I was also intrigued by the cases where people were suddenly afflicted by music constantly playing inside their heads (and not music of their choosing), as if there were a radio that only they could hear, yet could not turn off. Their lives were completely disrupted by the inability to "turn off" the music in their minds due to seizures in a particular part of the brain. On a more personal level, I am slightly mystified by the fact that when I am hit with a migraine one of the few things that will actually help with the pain is for me to play. It's not always the solution, and can sometimes make things worse, but there have been countless times when I had no choice but to attend a rehearsal or lesson and was migraine-free by the end of it. Is this a result of mental immersion in what I'm playing, allowing me to simply "forget" the migraine? or is it instead a result of the back pressure from the physical act of playing putting pressure on the right parts of my brain, effectively cutting off the migraines where they start?  I am certainly not a neurologist, but I can say that music has the power to influence our thoughts and emotions in a way that few other things can. Any child can listen to a piece of music and tell you if it made them feel happy, or sad, or scared. 

Our society focuses so much on our physical appearance that the power of the mind is overlooked far too often. Music can exercise the brain more completely than almost anything else. Music is language (both reading foreign languages as well as reading the music itself), math, physics, anatomy, physical exercise, communication, self expression, creativity, and so on.  And it encompasses all of these things at the same time. I am unaware of anything else that has this kind of power to engage so many different parts of the brain simultaneously. Music can teach, heal, calm, excite, engage, inspire happiness, and be a catalyst for peace. 

Now if only I could find a musical cure for insomnia...

Author's note: I do apologize for the somewhat spastic nature of this post. The distinct lack of transitional material probably made it a more difficult read, but I hope that my passion for and interest in the subject matter was clear. I highly recommend reading both of the aforementioned books. I also hope that my next insomnia-induced post is a bit more coherent. Ciao!

Why Music?

It's odd, really, why this question is asked so frequently of musicians and in turn, other artists about their individual arts.  We are constantly told throughout our lives that we should follow our dreams.  Let your dreams be your guide.  Go with your heart.  And so on.  Yet people are always surprised when they are confronted with someone who actually did follow their dreams, or are at least on the path headed in that direction.  The level of surprise can be rather disheartening to observe from the perspective of someone who is holding on to their dreams as though their very life depends on it.  The world is full of people in all walks of life who are haunted by their broken dreams that never came to fruition, whether by their own choices or a forced departure from their plans by external means.

I think that this is the primary reason why I stubbornly hold on to my music for dear life.  All too often, I see friends give up and move on to another field simply because they have to pay the rent.  It was one of the most heartbreaking decisions I myself had to make when student loan payments came knocking at the door.  I work for a wonderful company with fantastic co-workers and supervisors, but I am fully aware that it is simply a means to an end.  I recently went through a series of graduate school auditions for DMA programs, and each audition panel asked the same question, "Why do you want to pursue a DMA?"  Out of all of the questions that I was asked in my interviews, this was by far the easiest to answer.  It required absolutely no contemplation on my part to answer truthfully, "I have a great job that pays well, and I can easily get up every morning and go to work.  But I will never be able to move on, I will never be able to settle for something else, until I know that I have done absolutely everything in my power to get where I truly want to be with my playing.  As of right now, I haven't even come close."

Music is a beautiful, emotional, moving, heartbreaking, frustrating, time consuming,  wonderful field.  Yes, money is what pays the bills, and no, you will not be swimming in cash pursuing a career as a musician.  It's hard to explain why we put up with incredible physical and mental pain caused directly by an inanimate object (i.e. instrument) and why we actually love spending every free second we have closeted in a tiny practice room with that same inanimate object.  For me, there is nothing in this world that can possibly top the feeling of pure bliss that results from knowing that you have not given up on yourself.  The rest of the world may think you're insane for pursuing an art that will rarely make you rich and famous.  Your non-musician friends and family may rarely understand your motives or your drive.  These opinions will never matter.  The only thing that matters is that you know that you did not compromise your dreams and your soul will never have to feel as though a piece of it is missing.