Saxophone, flute, oboe, clarinet, bassoon, and world and electronic woodwinds
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My approach to practicing has to adapt to deadlines. Sometimes the deadlines come up fast, and there isn’t time to make everything as perfect as I would like. Other times I have plenty of preparation time and want to make the best use of it. Suppose the music I’m working on has one or two … Read more
An important part of interpreting music is figuring out how to use dynamic markings. They aren’t as simple as just playing louder or softer. It helps a lot to understand the difference between what I call local dynamics and big-picture dynamics. Unfortunately, they are marked in sheet music using the same symbols, so it’s not … Read more
Sometimes when I struggle with a musical passage it’s because I can’t quite play it—maybe my fingers or tongue won’t move quite fast enough yet, or there’s a difficult slur or interval leap that I’m still mastering. The solution is methodical practice, which of course takes significant time and effort. But there’s an additional set … Read more
Jennifer Stucki, oboist: Why is my Reed Playing Sharp and Flat? Rachel Yoder, clarinet: Objective Language in Applied Music Instruction Just Flutes Blog (Roderick Seed): Tips on Andersen Etudes: Op15, No. 3 Sam Newsome’s Blogsite: Soprano Sax Talk: Acute and Chronic Practicing Bassoon Blog (Betsy Sturdevant): Contrabassoon for Dummies The Flute Examiner (Kelly Wilson): 11 … Read more
Looking back now, having those particular chairs in those particular semesters seems very unimportant, but my growth during those years laid the groundwork for two graduate degrees and a life in playing and teaching music.
Just about every day I have a student show up for a lesson with an etude or repertoire movement they have been working on for a week or more, and there are little, silly problems that haven’t been fixed: A spot where a fingering choice needs to be made, but hasn’t. A page turn in … Read more
When performing a musical work, a performer interprets the piece to help the audience understand what’s happening.
Hand-picked high-quality woodwind-related blog posts from around the web, March 2019 edition.
My university woodwind students have to pass a scale exam as one of the requirements to progress in their degree program. They have to be able to play major scales and three forms of minor scales, plus arpeggios, through the “full range” of the instrument, from memory. Many of my students learned their major scales … Read more