Q&A: The big picture

ByBret Pimentel

Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, at no cost to you.

Here are some of the questions readers sent me in celebration of this blog’s 10-year anniversary. I have edited, combined, and otherwise adapted some of them but hopefully there are answers here for those of you who were kind enough to inquire.

Why does music move humanity so profoundly?

My personal belief is that music is divine in origin, and that there is something inherent to humankind that responds to music. Since I believe that everyone is a child of God, I suppose the love of music is a divinely-inherited trait. Leaders in my faith have said, for example, that “Music is given of God to further his purposes,” and observed “Music is truly the universal language, and when it is excellently expressed how deeply it moves our souls.”

If that’s not your style, you may prefer Darwin’s speculation that the earliest attempts at human language were more like musical gestures than like words. An ability to relate to these sounds is at the foundation of language in the more modern sense, and thus underlies virtually all human experience and culture.

In any case, even as a faith-plus-science kind of guy, I’m definitely out of my depth here, so feel free to share your theories in the comments.

Are applied music studios in higher education sustainable considering the supply of music graduates exceeds available employment?

There are issues here for sure. I can only vouch for my own approach:

Most of my university students are music education majors, and where I live this does seem to be sustainable. My graduates for the most part are able to land and keep jobs doing what they are trained for: directing middle school and high school bands.

Many of my students at some point inquire about the degree in performance. If they are interested in that route and have the skill to pursue it, we have a long talk about the career path of a performance major. Essentially, a bachelors degree in performance qualifies you for one thing, entry into an masters program. The masters qualifies you for a doctoral program, and that qualifies you to teach in higher education and perpetuate the cycle. We talk seriously about the prospects for employment in higher ed (slim).

On the other hand, a college or university education isn’t a trade school certificate—it is meant to produce a well-rounded citizen of the world, with literacy in key fields of human thought and skills in areas like communication and critical thinking. If a prospective student wishes to study the art of musical performance for reasons that are not necessarily 100% practical, then I would like to see that opportunity available to them. Schools and students should be clear with each other about their goals, so there isn’t any confusion about, for example, guarantees of employment.

Some of my students have leveraged some of the more general skills developed in their musical education to pursue careers in other fields, which I find to be a perfectly good outcome. There is also at least some anecdotal evidence that college music majors are welcomed by challenging, high-status programs like law and medical schools.

When will woodwind makers deplete resources of grenadilla/mpingo wood?

I don’t know the answer. My understanding is that these woods are not in danger of extinction, exactly. But the culling of the tallest, straightest specimens for products like oboes and clarinets has potential to cause an evolutionary bottleneck, since only trees that are unsuitable for instruments (because they are curvy, for example) are left alone to reproduce.

I think that the inevitable conclusion to this is alternative materials for instruments. This will be a tough sell for some musicians, but will ultimately be for the better. If modern science can develop amazing new materials for everything from mobile phone technology to medicine to space travel, why not for music? I’m confident that the “wood”-wind instruments will continue to exist in materials that are more sustainable, stable, affordable, crack-free, ergonomic, and beautiful-sounding.

Why does the principal oboist tune the orchestra?

Tradition. We have methods of providing a reference pitch that are far more accurate and reliable than even the best oboist. But the ritual is a comfortable one.

There are lots of additional theories. I’ve written previously about why a bunch of these don’t make sense, and that post continues to draw comments largely based on questionable understanding of “overtones.”

Thanks for your questions! These are some tough ones.

More 10-year anniversary Q&A

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  • Triplets don’t swing

    ByBret Pimentel

    It’s common among non-jazz musicians to think of “swing” rhythms as having a triplet-like feel, and it’s equally common among jazz players to regard that as hopelessly incorrect. That conflict over swing style has been widely discussed elsewhere, so I won’t rehash it here.

    But there’s another layer to the swing/triplets issue: It’s important to understand that real swing rhythms are essentially duple. The primary subdivision of the beat is into two parts, even though those parts aren’t equal in length.

    So, writing or playing lots of triplets is a common mistake that non-jazz musicians make when they are trying to imitate a swing sound. That’s not to say that triplets can’t or don’t exist in swing rhythms, but they aren’t the underlying subdivision, and in most cases are best used sparingly.

    For example, this can be played to sound like an authentic swing/jazz line:

    And even this notation, while problematic, can be translated into something authentic-sounding:

    But, to someone who knows jazz style well, this one never quite sounds like swing:

    It might pass for a shuffle or something else, but it’s hard to make it swing.

    When a well-written swing line does include a triplet, a fluent jazz player might play it to sound distinctly un-triplety:

    That approach (one of several possibilities) might make sense to a jazz player because they are stretching the downbeat note, and letting the subsequent notes fall later in the beat—a very similar approach to playing a pair of swung eighth notes.

    Written or improvised melodies, background figures, drum fills, and other things that are supposed to swing in an authentic way should avoid excessive triplets. Extensive listening and study of great jazz writing, interpretation, and improvisation are crucial to understanding real jazz swing style.

  • Making every marking audible

    ByBret Pimentel

    Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, at no cost to you.

    When my students work on études (musical pieces intended for study but not performance) I stress with them the idea of making everything on the page audible. That means that if I were unfamiliar with the étude but a skilled transcriber, I could listen to my student play, and write down with confidence every:

    • Pitch
    • Rhythm
    • Articulation
    • Dynamic marking
    • Tempo change
    • Breath mark
    • Expressive marking, like “dolce” or “pesante” or “broadly”
    • Title or form indication, like “Aria” or “Folk Dance” or “Rondo”
    • And any/all other words or symbols left by the composer/editor

    Sometimes it’s easy to get wrapped up in the pitches and rhythms and ignore or gloss over some of the other markings. But all of them have to be executed in a clearly audible way (otherwise, what are they there for?). If a performer technically tongues some notes but they sound slurred, then they weren’t tongued right. If some notes are marked with horizontal accents (like >), and some are marked with vertical ones (like ^), then they have to sound audibly different from each other. If the composer indicates that a certain passage should be played “dolce,” then it needs to sound audibly different from passages that don’t have that marking.

    In performance repertoire, I do think there are (rare) cases when it makes sense to ignore or alter the composer or editor’s markings. But well-edited études (my students most commonly play Ferling or Rose) are an excellent opportunity to practice making each and every marking meet the ear with clarity and precision.

  • Please lose the music binder

    ByBret Pimentel

    For some reason a high percentage of my incoming students each year like to make a 3-ring binder for their sheet music and lesson materials. I don’t know why.

    They apparently put a fair amount of time and money into this project, which often involves custom cover artwork, dividers, and plastic sheet protectors. As the semesters go by, the binder fills up with every bit of sheet music they have used, until the binder is so heavy that a music stand won’t support its weight.

    I applaud and relate to their interest in keeping things organized and their enthusiasm for the course. But the big music binder just doesn’t work very well. Here are my complaints: Read More “Please lose the music binder”

  • Use your metronome most of the time

    ByBret Pimentel

    Why should you use a metronome when you practice?

    • Music is about organizing sounds in time. Often my students are so focused on playing the “sounds” (pitches) that they forget about the time part. They learn to play the right sounds in the right order, but not precisely in time.
    • The metronome helps reveal problem areas. Without a metronome, it’s easy to conveniently slow down or hesitate over a challenging spot. The metronome annoyingly reminds you that something went wrong.
    • Working with an audible steady pulse helps develop your inner sense of time, so you’ll play more accurately even after you turn the metronome off.

    How much should you use a metronome?

    • Probably most of the time. I use a metronome for at least 80% of the time I spend practicing.

    But doesn’t playing with a metronome make your playing sound too mechanical?

    • I know very few musicians who have the problem that their tempos are too steady. It’s important to practice the tempo nuances too, but if you can’t play the line in perfect time then you probably can’t do a convincing accelerando/ritardando.

    What about when you’re practicing something that doesn’t fit well with a metronome, such as changing time signatures?

    • Smartphone metronome apps have pretty amazing features these days. And music notation or audio editing software can create anything you can imagine. (For examples, see Adam Ballif’s “Ballif Beats” for clarinet repertoire, or James Barger’s classical saxophone accompaniment track videos.) Time invested creating practice tools like these can pay off in a big way. And in many cases you don’t have to create a metronome track for the whole piece, just for the spots that don’t work well with a standard metronome.

    What if you’re “not good” at playing with a metronome?

    • Practicing with a metronome is a crucial and mandatory skill for a developing or advancing musician. It’s time to learn.
    • Start slowly, maybe very slowly, and work in small chunks.
    • Learn to use your metronome’s features, including subdivisions and time signatures.
    • Make sure the metronome is loud enough. If feasible, consider using an earphone, an external/Bluetooth speaker, or metronome features like flashing lights or vibrations you can feel.

    But what if you heard a big-shot musician say you shouldn’t practice with a metronome?

    • In my experience, there are two kinds of musicians who think they don’t need a metronome. One is the top 1%, who have spent a lifetime developing world-class musical abilities. The other is beginning and intermediate musicians, who haven’t learned the value of metronome work because they haven’t done it enough. Don’t mistake a top-level musician’s musings for good beginner advice.

    Fire up the metronome and go practice!

  • Practicing, boredom, and guilt

    ByBret Pimentel

    In my first semester as an undergraduate music major, I struggled with practicing. I felt guilty about not putting in as many hours as I knew I should, but more than that I felt guilty about the reason: I was bored and frustrated in the practice room. I loved playing music, but going into the practice rooms felt like serving time: counting down the minutes until my hours were done, or sneaking out early with a pang of shame, while my playing more or less failed to improve. I didn’t talk to my teacher or my classmates about it because I thought my lack of enthusiasm for practicing was a sign of some kind of personal weakness.

    But things got better. I gradually developed better ideas how to practice, and started to see results from it. My progress motivated me to get back into the practice rooms even more, and over the next few years practicing became my favorite part of the day.

    photo, mandykoh
    photo, mandykoh

    As a teacher, I have tried to be sensitive to this problem. I find that my students who struggle with practicing are sometimes afraid to talk to me about it, and want to brush aside talk of their declining practice hours with thin excuses about having a “busy week.” But if we can address the problem honestly and openly, I can offer some suggestions to help them enjoy their practice time more and get more out of it.

    I don’t think that there is a one-size-fits-all solution for practice room boredom, but in general I think these are some good starting points:

    • Put practicing on your daily schedule, and stick to the plan. It’s tough to scrape up enough enthusiasm for practicing when it’s the thing you have been putting off all day, and now it’s the only thing standing between you and some much-needed sleep.
    • Be goal-oriented in your practicing. Make a list of things that need improvement about your playing, and tackle a few things during each practice session. If you’re not sure what needs improvement, be sure to take good notes in your next lesson—as a teacher, I consider it my primary responsibility to help students hear what they really sound like, and what they could sound like. Or, don’t wait: make a recording of yourself (a smartphone makes this super easy), listen back, and jot down a few things that need work.
    • Don’t just try to improve your playing, work on improving your practicing, too. It’s an art form of its own. Soak up new practice ideas from your teacher, your classmates, and anywhere else you can find them. (Here are some of mine.) And, of course, invent your own.
    • Know your limits. Personally, I find that I can give about ten minutes of good, focused attention to a practice task before my productivity starts to decline, so I switch tasks at least that often. If I haven’t perfected something within ten minutes (and usually I haven’t), I’ll come back to it later with fresh energy. Figure out your own attention span and work with it, rather than against it.
    • Be honest with yourself and with your teacher about how your practicing is going. I guarantee your teacher can relate. She or he will probably have some great new ideas you can try, but might not know yet that you are in need of them.
    • Ride out the tough patches. Even once I started to get better at practicing, there still were (and still are) days when I just don’t feel like it. But there are lots of things in my life that need to be done that I don’t always feel like doing, and I still seem to manage. Sometimes the hardest, most tedious practicing seems to happen right before a breakthrough.
    • Start. I asked one of my students once what he found to be the hardest thing about practicing. He looked me in the eye and said, “Getting it out of the case.” Once he had his instrument assembled, he explained, it wasn’t so hard to just start practicing.

    You know practicing is important, and you love to make music. If your practicing is making you miserable, don’t give up on it! Make it fun and productive.

  • Make a better marking

    ByBret Pimentel

    In lessons and ensemble rehearsals, I frequently ask students to mark in something they missed—an accidental, a stylistic nuance, a breath.

    Sometimes they tell me they already marked it. They assure me they will get it right the next time.

    As you might guess, I am less than convinced. The marking didn’t do the trick this time, so why should it work next time? Or next week? Or in the performance, when you’re playing under pressure and with distractions?

    If the marking you made didn’t work, do a better one. Can you make it…

    • …more visible? Maybe beefing up that faint little pencil stroke will help. If you’re concerned about marks you might want to undo later, make photocopies and mark those (or go digital).
    • …clearer in meaning? Circling a note you got wrong doesn’t add any information to the page. Instead write in the sharp you missed, or a reminder of what key you’re in, or even the note name if that helps. You can use symbols if you will be 100% clear on what they mean (even under pressure), but don’t be afraid to use words.
    • …earlier? If you keep forgetting to do the crescendo in measure 32, consider putting a reminder in bar 28 that it’s coming up. That gives you an extra moment to process it mentally and be prepared before the crucial moment arrives.

    Every marking should make your playing better. If it doesn’t, change it!

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