A reader emailed me to ask this question (edited):

I was wondering if you could give me some information on what kind of opportunities being a doubler has opened up for you. I am beginning to consider options for graduate school and am looking into multiple woodwinds degrees. Thanks!

I do consider myself to be at the beginning of a hopefully long career, but doubling has already given me some opportunities that I surely wouldn’t have had otherwise.

Doubling isn’t a career that typically leads to fame outside the music business, but within the industry many of the best and best-known doublers are working in Broadway pit orchestras, in the Los Angeles recording studios, or on the road with touring jazz or pop acts.

I haven’t had any of those jobs, nor do I anticipate pursuing any of them at this point. But here are a few things doubling has done for me:

Doubling gigs. These are gigs where I am actually hired to perform on multiple instruments. Most reasonably large cities in the US seem to have at least a few community or school musical theater productions with large enough budgets to pay a professional or semi-pro orchestra, and woodwind doublers are generally in demand (bonus points for double reed players or “low reeds” players). Doubling gigs can also include being hired as a local to play behind a touring show or artist who is passing through town, or being a sort of utility woodwind player for local orchestras, churches, and so forth. Often for me these have been sort of write-your-own-job-description situations, where I’m hired to play one instrument, and later re-hired because I’m able and willing to cover some other parts, too.

Non-doubling gigs. The best way to get gigs is by building a network of musicians who know and trust you. Doing doubling gigs has gotten me access to lots of different musical circles: classical, jazz, rock and pop, folk, and more. I always pass out business cards on a gig, listing the things that I can do. If a local rock band decides they need an oboist on their new track, they probably don’t know the principal oboist of the local symphony, but they do know me.

Private teaching. If you are looking to build a private studio, or to get a job teaching at a music store or private music school, versatility multiplies the number of potential students. To do this well, you will have to really know your stuff on each instrument (how well do you know the beginning method books? good solo competition pieces for high school students? etc.). I’ve had a number of jobs teaching at summer music camps and such. The camps often book me first, and then let me know which instrument I’m teaching once they have made some more phone calls and determined who else is available.

Academia. My main gig now is as a university music professor, at a smallish school where I was hired to handle all of the reed studios (oboe, clarinet, bassoon, saxophone). In many similar cases, a single-instrument player is hired, who does their best to teach the other instruments (sometimes very successfully, I should add). But my background on multiple instruments was a major advantage in getting noticed by the search committee. Some of my single-instrument-playing friends from graduate school, who were at least my equals in education and musicianship, weren’t fortunate enough to get hired right out of school. I believe that my doubling ability made me more attractive to potential employers.

General personal and musical enrichment. Not to get too warm and fuzzy, but some of the very real benefits of doubling haven’t been monetary in nature. As an undergraduate saxophone major, I rarely got to play Bach, Beethoven, or Mozart. And the bassoon majors rarely got to play jazz or rock. If you play both, the possibilities start to open up.

If you’re interested in multiple woodwinds degrees, be sure to check out my list of degree programs and my previous blog posts.

Related posts:

1. Reader email: multiple woodwinds degree or single-instrument degree?
2. University/conservatory degree programs in woodwind doubling
3. Brass doubling?

He’s hoping his skills on multiple instruments will eventually land him commercial gigs or even a position playing in a pit for musical theater performances.

…

“The most important thing now is to find something unique about my playing that I can market in a positive way.”

Related posts:

1. Doublers in the news: Douglas Owens
2. Conrad Asklund on finding woodwind doublers
3. Peter Hilliard on contracting woodwind doublers

I can’t imagine being in a marriage with anyone other than a musician. Everyone makes sacrifices for what they value in life, but the time and commitment involved in becoming, and being, a professional musician…it’s so time consuming, and emotionally challenging – I imagine it’s like being married to an athlete. That being said, given that we are both woodwind doublers, with different “primary” instruments, our marriage is perfect (in so many ways!!!) in the sense that we are able to advise and support each other to a greater degree than almost any situation would allow.

Check it out at Flute Pro Shop on the Road.

Related posts:

1. Interview: Ryan Lillywhite of Cannonball Musical Instruments
2. Interview: Gene Scholtens, Broadway woodwind doubler
3. Mario Rivera (1939-2007): Latin saxophone and flute

• Students take 6 credit hours of study on a “primary” instrument, and 4 hours on a “secondary” instrument, and must “demonstrate proficiency” on a third. Presumably the third instrument must either be at a suitable proficiency level upon entering the program, or the student must study the instrument without the additional credit hours counting toward degree completion.
• Students using oboe or bassoon as one of their three instruments must take an appropriate reedmaking course. This, I guess, means that students choosing both oboe and bassoon must take both reedmaking courses. And the reedmaking course must be completed even for the “demonstrate proficiency” instrument, which might not be part of the student’s coursework.
• Students choosing flute or clarinet as primary or secondary instruments must take an instrument-specific pedagogy course, or presumably both if flute and clarinet are the primary and secondary (or vice versa).
• There does not appear to be any special requirement (such as pedagogy or reedmaking) if saxophone is chosen as one of the three instruments.
• The degree recital must include performances on at least two “of the five” woodwinds. Oddly, it is not specified that these must be the primary and secondary instruments.
• Audition information from elsewhere on the UNI Music website does not make clear what is required for admission to the program.

See my hopefully-comprehensive list for more North American university/conservatory degree programs in multiple woodwind performance. (And please contact me if you see anything that needs to be added, removed, or updated!)

Related posts:

1. Auditioning for a multiple woodwinds degree program
2. Reader email: multiple woodwinds degree or single-instrument degree?
3. More thoughts on multiple woodwinds degrees

At some point, you end up in a mush of mediocrity.

Go read it

Related posts:

1. David Liebman on not doubling
2. Common doubling combinations from the Broadway doubling list
3. From The Savvy Musician: military gigs and the saxophonist

I got an interesting email recently. I’ve edited it heavily and fictionalized almost all the details, since I’m using it here without permission, but you’ll get the idea:

Dear Bret,

I found your web page through a Google search. My company is presenting a themed cruise for classical music lovers departing from Seattle in February, featuring performances by a full symphony orchestra.

I am looking to hire a woodwind doubler to serve as a sort of human insurance policy, should something happen to one of our woodwind players while we are out to sea. I’m wondering if you know anyone in the area who would be interested. We will rehearse in Seattle before departure. Compensation is room and board on the ship and travel to the Hawaiian islands, plus $50 per service to attend all rehearsals, and $100 per concert if called upon to perform. I need someone who can play flute, oboe, clarinet, and bassoon, and the repertoire is standard symphonic fare: Mozart, Schubert, Brahms, etc.

Let me know if there’s anyone you could recommend for this. There’s a nearby university with a degree program in multiple woodwinds, so I figure there must be a number of students or graduates who are available. I would like to hire someone in the area, since unfortunately we can’t pay for travel to Seattle.

Thanks!

Eddie Skousen, President

Classical Cruises, Inc.

I’ll confess to being sort of fascinated by the idea of being hired as a kind of utility backup for an orchestral woodwind section. And I did put out a call for some potential hires, but didn’t get any nibbles. It’s a creative idea, but there are a number of practical obstacles:

• Only a small subset of doublers can cover all of those instruments at even semi-professional level. It seems that many doublers are primarily saxophonists, so even if you can find someone with good flute, clarinet, and double reeds skills, there’s a good possibility that you’re hiring someone to play everything but their strongest instrument!
• The pay scale indicated above hasn’t been altered from the original email. Though musicians’ fees vary widely based on location and a number of other factors, these numbers look quite low to me, especially considering there are no guaranteed performances. “Eddie” was looking for a relatively rare and highly skilled musician, but offering compensation that seemed rather amateurish. I expressed this opinion in a return email, and Eddie did indicate some willingness to work with a potential hire on this, since even substantially higher pay would be cheaper than bringing along a separate sub for each instrument.
• I also mentioned to Eddie that this seemed like potentially a very high-pressure gig, with the doubler needing to be prepared to cover any of four principal spots or four second parts at a moment’s notice. Playing one principal woodwind chair is pressure enough! Eddie clarified that the doubler would most likely cover second parts, and the regular second players would be prepared to take over the principal parts if needed. Still, it’s hard for me to imagine a satisfactory rehearsal situation: I would definitely want to rehearse each part I would be expected to cover, but would the regular orchestra members be willing to hand over their own rehearsal time?
• Even for departing from a fairly major city (not actually Seattle), I fear that Eddie may not be casting a wide enough net to find someone willing and able. The existence of a nearby multiple woodwinds degree program probably doesn’t guarantee as many local doublers as he is thinking. I graduated from two such programs; each of those programs reached a peak enrollment of two students while I was there, and each had had zero enrolled for several years within recent memory.

Related posts:

1. Review: The Woodwind Player’s Cookbook
2. Eddie Daniels is not a doubler
3. Woodwind Doubler Census results, part 6: benefits

The Colorado Symphony Orchestra, like so many others, is facing a financial crisis that threatens its ability to continue making music. An opinion piece in Sunday’s Denver Post criticizes the Denver Musicians’ Association (AFM Local 20-623) for its unwillingness to budge on certain elements of its agreement with the orchestra.

The issues here are complex, and I hope that the DMA and the CSO will be able to come to a solution that is fair to all involved and that keeps the music alive. But this point in the authors’ list of complaints caught my eye:

Musicians performing on more than one instrument receive “doubling pay.”

I don’t have the full details of the doubling pay currently available to CSO members (though the amount doesn’t appear to be the issue here—it’s the fact that any doubling pay is offered that seems to offend). But a slightly-outdated agreement between the DMA and the Boulder Philharmonic, summarized below, shows a typical doubling pay structure, and it’s a reasonable guess that the CSO’s is identical or very similar:

• 25% bonus for first double
• 10% for each additional double
• B-flat and A clarinets count as one instrument
• Alto and tenor saxophones count as one instrument
• Alto and bass clarinets count as one instrument
• Piccolo, larger flutes, English horn, E-flat clarinet, contrabassoon, soprano saxophone, and saxophones larger than tenor each count as a double, even when used in common combinations (like flute plus piccolo)

What are the best instruments, mouthpieces, reeds, headjoints, method books, and other products for woodwind doublers?

I often see this question asked on online message boards (“I’m a saxophone player, so which clarinet mouthpiece should I buy?”) or answered in advertising copy (“The perfect flute headjoint for the woodwind doubler”).

When aspiring doublers ask this question, I think often what they are really asking is, “What product can I purchase that will save me having to really learn a new instrument?” If you’re serious about playing the flute, you’ll want to use the kind of flute that a good flutist would use. If you’re serious about the clarinet, you’ll seek out the kinds of reeds, mouthpieces, and instruments favored by fine clarinetists. In other words, the best clarinet for a woodwind doubler is… the best clarinet.

To double successfully, you have to abandon the idea that you can double on flute and clarinet (and so forth) without having to commit to being a flutist and a clarinetist. There are no shortcuts!

Check them out in this video:

For more about the Doublers Collective:

• visit their website
• follow them on Twitter
• “like” them on Facebook
• hear Monica talk about the group in a TWiP podcast interview
• donate to their commissioning/recording/performing project on IndieGoGo

Related posts:

1. Follow the woodwind doublers list on Twitter
2. Joe the Musician: the first rule of woodwind doubling
3. Jazz opportunities for woodwind players: learn the saxophone

I’m pleased to share some audio from my Delta State University faculty recital a few weeks ago.The big event of the evening was the premiere of Sy Brandon’s Divertissement for multiple woodwinds and piano, which seemed to be well received. It’s gratifying to be involved in the creation of a piece that fills a gap in the small multiple woodwinds repertoire—something than can be played by a woodwind doubler, without having to bring in a concert band, a truckload of electronics, or obscure instruments. The audience seemed to enjoy the derring-do of the final movement, which involves six instruments.

I’ve studied the Bonneau Caprice en forme de valse in the past and have had students perform it, but this was the first time I played it in public myself. Since I’m trying to balance a half-dozen or more instruments, I tend to shy away from pieces that seem too technical, and, in that respect, this was the riskiest piece on the program. I was mostly pleased with how it turned out.

All of Poulenc’s woodwind sonatas are on my short list of favorites. I learned the oboe sonata from scratch for this recital. The clarinet sonata I have performed in bits and pieces, and, having spent a good part of the summer focused on the clarinet, I wanted the clarinet sonata to be essentially the finale of the program (the Ray Pizzi piece being a sort of programmed encore). The clarinet sonata ended up being the performance that I was least satisfied with—there were a number of mistakes, several of which were total surprises, and my sound on that instrument still isn’t what I want it to be.

Ray Pizzi’s Ode to a Toad has been on my to-do list for a while now, and it was a hit with the audience. Finishing the program with an unaccompanied piece, and on the bassoon to boot—an instrument that is still in many ways outside my comfort zone—wasn’t a choice I made lightly. But after the recital I could hear people humming it in the lobby, so I’m calling it a success.

Time to starting thinking about next year’s program!