Low Brass, and other shiny things

Following on from my last post about brass, I wanted to point out that I actually do have a euphonium hero:  this guy.

Who is he?  Well, he's just some guy, you know?

(Please excuse the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy quote, sometimes I just can't resist).

 Peter Opaskar is an arranger and a music teacher who gets around the Internet under the name Tuba Peter - and in addition to playing and teaching tubas, euphoniums and baritone horns he also arranges music specifically for low brass instruments.

Euphoniums and tubas are kind of like the double bases and cellos of the brass world.  But, while cellos frequently get to play centre stage, low brass tends to get stuck with the supporting roles.  The really interesting music is usually given to trumpets, cornets and trombones (which are actually in the same range as baritone horns and euphoniums, but for some reason get to come out and play more often).

Tuba Peter arranges music for solos, duets, trios and quartets consisting almost entirely of lower brass.  Imagine a brass quartet consisting of two tubas and two euphoniums.  If you are wondering what that sounds like, the answer is "awesome".

So, he arranges the music for low brass, and then plays all of the parts of an ensemble himself, which admittedly treads a fine line between "that takes a lot of talent" and "don't you have any friends?"

But, yeah, I like what he does and I like the fact that he does it.

Sousaphone by Tyler CC BY SA

I'm still thinking deep thoughts about euphoniums (I've been doing it for years, and will probably do it for years to come).  But I've also been thinking of late about a sousaphone.

This isn't exactly new, either.  I've often looked at sousaphones and though "man, I'd love to play with one of those..."  I just love the look of them.  They are basically tubas, though.  And oddly, I've never really been interested in a tuba.

Show me a tuba, and I'm all like "okay, so that's a tuba."  Wrap it around your body so that it's part instrument and part wearable art, and suddenly I'm all "Ooooh!  Can I have one?"

General dissatisfaction is my special skill

A new(ish) colleague from another town is coming to visit in a few days, and we've been tasked with chatting to her about what we do and what sort of things we're particularly suited to helping with.

The person coordinating this visit said something along the lines of "just tell her what you're good at."

She then paused for a moment, looked up with a gleam in her eye, and asked, "What *are* you good at?"

It's a surprisingly hard question to answer.  Just stop for a moment, and imagine someone turned around and asked you that question.  What's one of the first things that pops into your mind?

If you could set aside any and all social conventions concerning modesty and what you think people expect of/from you, and you had the opportunity to stand up and declare to the world something you honestly believe to be a special skill that you have (whether you utilise it or not), what would you say your "special skill" is?

Being "churched", I often come across references to the parable of the talents.  Jesus tells a story about three servants who are given talents (coins) by their master while he's away on business.  The first servant is given ten talents, and he invests the money and earns ten more.  The second servant is given five talents, and he also invests it and doubles the amount.  The third servant, given only one talent, is too afraid of stuffing up - so he buries the talent in order to give back exactly what was given to him.  Not a penny less, but also not a penny more.

The master comes back and rewards the two profitable servants, but throws the cowardly one out onto the streets, then gives his talent to the servant who had the ten talents to begin with.

The "moral" of this story is what has become distilled into the saying "the rich get richer and the poor get poorer" (although I can't say that's what Jesus actually meant).

This parable might very well have been an economic treatise, but if you give a Christian a parable, they're going to find something warm-and fuzzy buried inside it.  This is why we tend to latch onto the word "talents" and talk about how, when it comes to the metaphysical gifts we've been given, we need to use them or lose them.

Whenever I come across this parable I find myself wondering "What *is* my talent?  What can I do well that I could be putting to good use?"

It's sometimes not the best trail of thought to follow, because there's a fine line between "what am I good at?" and "what am I good for?"

Depending on my level of general dissatisfaction with my life at that point, the answer I often come back to is "nothing".

I do a lot of things, and I have a lot of interests, and I'm not particularly bad at anything (except, maybe, fencing, time management and anything to do with remembering what I'm supposed to be doing), so I usually get by without noticing I'm not particularly good at anything.

Jack of all trades, master of none.

When my colleague asked the question "What *are* you good at?", my first instinct was to hang my head and say "nothing", but then something else popped into my mind.  A different answer to what I would have expected:

"General dissatisfaction."

And I realised it was entirely true.  This is my special skill - this is what I'm particularly good at:  Finding things that need to be improved.

Now, you could argue that that's not really a skill, it's just whinging.  You'd be right.

But I take some comfort in the fact that I don't just find faults - I also think of solutions.  I'm an ideas person, as lame as that sounds.  I keep nutting over "problems" until I work out what I might do if I was in a position to fix it, or produce something better.

My biggest problem is that I don't know what to do with those ideas.  I'm usually not in a position to fix it or produce something better.  Nine times out of ten, I don't even know who is in a position to do anything about it.

I offer suggestions when I can (and I can tell you from experience that most people actually aren't interested in being offered suggestions), but usually I'm just standing at my desk thinking "you know what would be really great...?"

If I was a proper inventor, engineer or developer, I'd probably be able to turn a lot of my ideas into something real, tangible and worthwhile.  Unfortunately I'm a person who writes FaceBook posts for a living (okay, that's not my whole job, but it's part of my job, so it's still true).

However, I feel a strange sense of hope, now that I've finally identified my "special skill".  The first step to putting your talents to good use is figuring out what they are.

And, if "general dissatisfaction" sounds like a pretty lame talent, allow me to rephrase it:

"I want to change the world."

It means more or less the same thing.

Things that should exist: Horn Mufflers and Practice Closets.

So, here are a couple of things I want to exist, but I don't have the wherewithal to make them myself, so I'm giving the ideas to the world for free:  Music "Mufflers" and Practice Closets.

One of the main reasons why I don't practise any brass instruments on a regular basis is that I'm usually home at night, my walls are thin, and my neighbours don't need a reason to hate me.

When I mentioned to my mother that I was thinking of getting either a horn or a euphonium she practically threw something at me, before saying the immortal words:

"Must you?  You're terrible."

Now, I can't take offence at that, because I *am* terrible.  It's a known side effect of a) inexperience, and b) lack of practice.

To sound less terrible I would have to play more often.  I don't play very often because I sound terrible.

I don't, in theory, mind sounding terrible while I work on getting better.  It's what you're supposed to do.  Everyone sounds like crap playing every instrument, at first.  It takes time to get good at these things.

The trouble with brass, though, is that it's REALLY LOUD.

I mean, REALLY LOUD.

If, like me, you're nervous about ticking off the neighbours too much, then you feel reluctant to practise properly or often, because the sound carries sooooo darn far, and it sounds quite awful.

You can use a mute, sure, but they don't really lessen the sound as much as you may think.  And they make it hard to play.  You don't sound quite right.  You're not breathing the way you would without the mute.

The best thing to do would find yourself one of those sound-proof rehearsal rooms they have in music schools.  But what if you don't have a handy music school?

This is where the Practice Closet comes in.  Imagine a cupboard, just big enough to fit a person with a chair and a music stand in it (tall enough to stand in, wide enough to move your elbows - maybe different sizes depending on the instrument), that's got sound-proof padding on the walls.  Also air-holes, at least one window and a light, so you don't suffocate or freak out from the sensory deprivation.

This would take up about as much space in your house as a regular closet (a bit shorter in one dimension, and a bit bigger in another), and would give you a space to play as loudly as you need to without too much noise getting out to affect the rest of your household/neighbourhood.

I expect the people in your house would still cop a bit of noise, but hopefully it wouldn't be too obnoxious.

This is something that could work for all musicians.  You'd need a pretty big closet for the pianists and drummers, though.

The Muffler idea is more specifically for brass, and it's an evolution of the mute.  It doesn't wedge into the instrument, but rather boxes around the bell.  There's the same sound-proofing in the box, and some material to wrap around the rest of the horn to dampen the sound coming through the tubing.

It would allow the air to move more freely, so you'd still be playing it more or less like you would au naturel, but the sound would be caught to an extent by the box, rather than squeaking through a mute.

If you decide to make either of these things, please offer me a prototype to test.

“There’s Always Bird Watching”

I thought I’d already written a post with this title a few years back (I hadn't), but the phrase has been ticking over in my mind these past few days.

I’ve recently acquired a cat.  The family cat died just over a year ago and we’d been trucking along quite happily with just a dog, who died at Easter time this year. 

To be honest, it was far too soon to get another pet, but we wanted to get another dog around Christmas time, when people would be home with it for a few solid weeks, and I felt that, if we didn’t get a cat first we probably wouldn’t get one at all.  We’ve successfully integrated a dog into a pre-existing cat’s house-hold, but not the other way around.

Ideally, I would have waited until September to do this, but I thought we were going away at that time, so it was kind of “June-July or never”.  Now it seems we won’t be going away in September, so that would have been a possibility after all.

The plan was to get a kitten.  Preferably grey.  A few weeks ago I came very close to adopting someone’s black-and-white cat when they were in a bind, but by the time I talked the family around to it the cat had been rehomed.

So it was back to the grey kitten plan.  Instead, I came home with a 15 month old cat that is pretty much every colour except grey (well, okay, there's grey in there, too).  She’s a lovely cat – friendly, spunky, takes things in her stride and easy to get along with.  She eats simply (only cat biscuits) and uses a dirt box with aplomb.

But I’m slightly concerned that I’ve jumped too soon.  We really could have (should have?) spent the rest of this year pet free to give ourselves a break from “all that”.  I’m feeling anxious about having her in the house, rather than joyful that there’s a cat around the place again.

I’m also concerned that I’ve doomed her to a life of extreme boredom. 

At the moment, we’re got our leave worked out so that she’s got company for the first three weeks of her time here.  After that, she’s on her own for most of the day.  Every day. 

Granted, she sleeps half the day anyway (she’s a cat, after all) – but when she’s awake she likes company.  When we go back to work, there will be no one for her to talk to, and nothing for her to do.

I’ve starting to really notice how boring life must be for a pet.  I keep thinking of Rapunzel, cooped up all day in her tower, only seeing the one person – and only for a few hours every day, if that.

In Tangled, Rapunzel spends most of her time cooking, cleaning, reading and painting.  Cats don’t do any of that.  When human beings are cooped up in a confined space, we can usually occupy ourselves with something – books, puzzles, needlepoint…  What do you give to a cat?

Is it any wonder some of them just start taking apart the furnishings?

In Rapunzel’s Revenge (still one of my favourite books of all time), Rapunzel is locked up with exactly three books – one of which is titled “There’s Always Bird Watching”.  My last cat took up bird watching.  And car spotting, I expect.  She took turns staring out of every window in the house.

The current cat is starting to spend some quality time staring out of windows as well.  On the one hand, I’m hoping bird watching will be enough to keep her from going completely bonkers.  On the other hand, I wonder if we’re really doing animals any favours by giving them a life that’s safe and comfortable, but so very, very boring.

Or is bird/street watching actually more fulfilling than I’m giving it credit for?  My grandmother used to spend time sitting on her veranda just watching the world go by (and this was back when she could have gone somewhere more interesting if she wanted to), and you often see images of old people just sitting on a porch outside their house or a shop and “taking it slow”.

Just how interesting is the world outside your window, if you give it time to grow on you?

Come, blow your horn

I'm in Melbourne at the moment, for a conference, and the hotel in which I'm staying is located above one of those trendy Lane way cafés they always talk about. 

And a construction site. 

And just a few steps away from a police station. 

And near a tram stop. 

You could call it "central". 

I call it "not particularly quiet". 

Anyway, as I write this, there is jazz and trumpets (actually, I think it's just one trumpet) which would be kind of cool if it was live, but I think it's just a recording. I didn't see any space in the lane where one could fit a piano. 

I've been thinking about trumpets lately. Well, not trumpets, specifically, but brass. 

Regular readers will know I briefly joined a brass band for the cheap lessons and free instrument hire a few years ago, but it didn't stick. I found the timing of both the lessons and the band practice awkward, and I never stick with awkward things for long. 

A decade or so ago, I wanted to learn the French Horn. I have no idea why. It's not like I was a huge fan of horn music. I still can't tell you the name of any great horn pieces. Or composers. Or players. I enjoyed listening to it when I heard it, and I liked the look of it. 

Hardly a consuming passion, in other words. 

Over the years I acquired a third-hand cornet and a cheap pocket trumpet, because that's just what I do, but I'm no more up to date with the cornet than I am with the French Horn. At least I do know some famous trumpet players. I don't really play either of those instruments anyway. 

I still want to learn how to play the French Horn, and for some years now I've wanted to play the euphonium (because it's beautiful, that's why), but I've never mustered up the wherewithal to do something about it. It's not like I have a great love of concert or brass bands (although I do love a good old fashioned dance band), I just want to play with those toys. 

I've been listening to Emma Eyres read her autobiography, Cadence, and she talks about how much she loved playing the viola, and how much she always wanted to play the cello. How she used to listen to cello music, and how she had cello playing heroes, and how she used to get cello sheet music and play it on the viola, but wish she could pluck up the courage to play the cello for real (without worrying about losing her skill with the viola). 

I have a lot of musical instruments - mostly because I'm a musical bower bird, not because I passionately love any of them. I can honestly say I hardly touch most of them. I can't think of any instrument that I've bought because I loved it so much I had to make it a deep and abiding part of my life. 

I really wanted the concertina, but I hardly ever play it. Same with the banjo. I used to play the recorders quite a bit back in the day, but I haven't played those for a while, either. 

The instrument I play most often is the ukulele, and I didn't even buy that on purpose. I wondered into a music shop one day, being someone who had no interest in the uke (and, to be honest, little respect for it) and walked out with a ukulele and a chord book. I never intended to become a ukulele player. It just sort of happened. 

I still wouldn't really regard myself as a ukulele player, anyway. Just a dabbler. In spite of all the instruments and all of the years I've been playing around with music, I don't really regard myself as a musician. Just a dabbler. 

Take the euphonium, for example. I'd like to own and play a euphonium, but I don't have a vision of myself as someone who is going to practice for a few hours every day, and play in a band, orchestra or quintet. I don't see myself as a euphoniumist, in other words. Heck, I don't even know if that* is* the right word. 

I don't rightly know if this bothers me or not. When I was studying piano back in the last century I think I always expected to become a "real" musician at some point, even if I never thought the piano was going to be my eventual instrument of choice. Since then I've enjoyed dabbling, and acquiring random instruments. 

I wouldn't want to be so hung up on playing well that I'd stop mucking about for fun. But, still, it would be kind of nice to have an instrument that I had that kind of passion for. To think of myself as a real musician, like a violinist or a flautist. 

I wonder if I will ever be that passionate about anything.