I once had to play the cymbal in an orchestra, for a Shostakovich piece, but there was no sheet music for it. The piece only had like four or five crashes but they were like ten years apart. The conductor told me that he would just cue me for each crash. I didn't miss a single one! He was so impressed that he had me demonstrate that for his college students.
I had that same problem with Bolero. I had to play crashes one time when we lost the mallet part, which I was supposed to play. Except, I only crashed 3 times, exempting the finale. So, I had to memorize my part.
Visual loudness is actually a thing in auxiliary percussion. It just adds to the performance when you can see the small percussion parts being played. And is it just me or is the percussion section the most visually interesting section of an orchestra to watch?
I had a fairly simple part on claves for a performance. It repeated for a while, and the sheet said “Joyous Energy”. I pretty much just danced and jumped around with my claves for most of a piece.
@@rawhidelamp literally the same thing can be said for percussion then, they're doing the same thing in different ways. I think the only really interesting one is timpani, just cause rolls are cool.
Don't forget about mallet changes! When the composer gives you 1 beat to throw down your mallets and pick up different ones, or when the expect you to somehow play a bunch of different instruments all at the same time that each require different sticks/mallets. We only have two hands!
Dude I have this problem all the time in jazz band. I would just be playing my part and suddenly see “switch to brushes”, but I can’t because I’m busy drumming. And then the brush part comes up and I frantically try to switch in a picosecond. Really annoying
I decided for the concert band's end-of-the-year talent show, in my senior year of high school, to set up a foot pedal and used it with the medium marching bass we had. Then I set up the high-hat and its pedal on the other side of my glock. The first Halo game had come out the previous year, so I planned a really funny one-man-band routine for it... But I don't think I could manage those, a triangle, blocks, or anything else in that setup. lol
Similar to how you can't make a marimba loud, you can't make a xylophone quiet. You could use yarn mallets and then not be able to hear it unless you're literally playing by yourself, or you play at its one-and-only volume: fortisimo.
Lol I’m no olympic gymnast, but I can confirm you can tune Timpani 1 and Timpani 4 at the same time(both balanced action and clutch), all though it can be very challenging - highly recommend getting a Roc-N-Soc Bicycle throne for this as your legs have the best mobility for this type of throne.
Hahaha I came here to say this, glad you’re already here Kyle. Here’s an example of me doing a simultaneous drum 1-4 pedal change (both went from E to E-flat): th-cam.com/video/x1oxR_xvoIM/w-d-xo.html (1 minute, 5 seconds in) Also want to add that Eric, you sound about 30 years older than you are when you talk about timpani tuning changes. I love the challenge of a good pedaling timpani part. I haven’t encountered anything unplayable with enough practice. Then again, I think a lot of 4-mallet marimba solos are virtually unplayable, but I know that I don’t put enough time on my 4-mallet chops.
Recently we were reading through an arrangement for West Side Story for our wind ensemble. The percussion part was all the percussion in a score, so we would have to page turn while playing. They also wrote the drum set part separated, so individual bass drum staff, individual snare drum staff, individual ride cymbal staff, etc. Needless to say we’re rewriting the parts.
as a brass player whos looking to get into composition in the future, this was really helpful as I have no idea how to write/notate percussion parts, and it gave me lots of tips on what to avoid. In return please stop giving us massive jumps and awkward fingerings.
I played viola in an orchestra.....all I have to say, if it didn't have a cue, I wrote my own after counting it out once. The librarian knee which music was mine and kept it labeled for the future for me. We did the nutcracker every year with the local ballet. I am with you my friend on it.
This is a good story that if you want more context for, let me know. Essentially there were 13 percussionists and only like 10 parts. 1 person sat on the floor, one person was standing by another’s marimba, and my friend was walking around aimlessly. Eventually, my friend gets bored, puts his hand on his head, and proceeds to do the Michael Jackson lean. My band director saw this, and got so offended that she stopped conducting and threw him out of class, only to begin scream crying at him in her office.
Yeah, I feel the pain of timpani tuning. I remember modern/contemporary pieces that involve rolling on one pitch and ending on another, because I didn’t have five drums to work with. My high school doing Armenian Dances had two of my peers switching a tambourine mid roll. But by far the most ridiculous thing I saw was a crescendo for a ratchet. That instrument is incapable of any dynamic range besides forte, it’s just frickin’ loud
10:30 Yeah not gonna lie, ive always been my ensembles "Percussion II" guy, so I usually end up with a pile of stuff in front of me lol. it gets stressful really quickly, but like a fun stressful. Thankfully we only ever have to switch intruments inbetween songs, so what we do is we actually just pick up some things and move the stuff around inbetween songs. So for example right now for one song im on the Timpani, one song im on the triangle, and another I have all the symbol parts (yes all of them) I keep the timpanis the whole concert. The triangle starts with the girl next to me, who is giving me a break from P2 parts for a song. While I focous on my Timapani. The second song the triangle moves to me, and I keep it. Then for the 3rd song every single cymbol has to move from literally one side of the stage to another. Every. Single. One.
I couldn’t agree more with the marimba and vibe dynamics. I’m playing Music for Prague on the vibraphone and the conductor wanted me to play as loud as humanly possible that I broke my mallets on the first rehearsal. And they were rocks
My sophomore year of highschool, my friend and I were brand new tenor players. (I had switched over from snare and he had switched over from bass) Our band was playing Thanks for the Memories by Fallout Boy for the halftime show. When we got the music, we were blown away at how difficult it was! For a song that is fairly straight forward and easy on drum set, this score was wild! It overwhelmed both of us since we were brand new to tenors and we had to dumb some parts down a little. Man do I wish I still had that sheet music so I could assess whether it really was super hard or if our inexperience on tenors made it hard
I see you, The Licc Music companies don't care about saving paper. I just played a bari sax part that had a page 2 that was TOTALLY BLANK. Like, huh, everybody else is unfolding their part but I see a double bar, though I have a second page, maybe I need to uh nope. Love the running around in the percussion section. I got asked to sit in with a community orchestra so they would have three, and the main guy was locked to the timpani, so here's me (a SAXOPHONIST, remember) figuring out how to do polyrhythms on bass drum and tambourine. (And also learning you can't just drop the tambourine when the part is over. Whoops.)
My school has it where drum line is cut, basses start on the 45 of side one and go out towards the end zone, and then the snares and tenors on side two, on the 40, and it causes a lot of confusion until the blocks condense
When I was in 7th grade, we played a Shadow of the Colossus piece and I had to play bass drum and sus cymbal at the same time because of a lack of percussionists; I was literally holding 3 mallets because I was required to do cymbal rolls in between bass drum notes.
My first or second year of percussion we had like 3 percussionist and I had to change 6 instrument changes, they were mostly small instruments like the tambourine or cymbals, but it was fun and I think it definitely helped expanded the range of instruments I could play somewhat well
This was my experience all through middle and high school bands. By junior year I was first chair and there was only one or two other full time percussionists depending on the time of year, and we never had more than 4. Wasn't uncommon to go from snare to traps to marimba to concert toms to sus cymbal to timpani over the course of three pieces, often multiple in one piece. Perc 1 parts were split between bass and snare drum, usually me and 2nd chair, and then we all filled in parts 2 and 3 (or 4) as much as we could. Sometimes it was just me on all of perc 2/3/4 which was mostly toms, traps and various cymbal parts - one piece in middle school had a trashcan solo which was really fun - or back and forth between glock/marimba/vibe and timpani since I was the only one who could read pitched music. It was actually a fun challenge. Getting the hang of timpani (especially retuning the base note between pieces in concert, quickly and quietly) really enhanced my ear for harmonics, which is constantly useful from drum tuning to synthesis and sound design.
When I was doing my undergrad my scoring and arranging professor had me take everyone on a field trip to the percussion suite and show them all the toys and let me talk about everything I hate when people who don’t know how to write for percussion write for percussion. Told them I didn’t want to see any parts with 150 measures of rest and a single crash cymbal hit or triangle ding or whatever. Talked about how to write for marimba and what the easiest intervals to write are, why we have so many mallets, and what a wing span is, lol. Using 8va if everything is in the ledger lines. We wanted everything to be basically sight-readable. Talked about our basic set up a little bit, and running around. I read one difficult piece where I had to do a one handed cymbal roll, hit a gong then play a slide whistle consecutively. And it was written by a percussionist! I was like, Dude! Marching band’s different though, love to see the rack kids run around. Keeps them entertained.
"Told them I didn’t want to see any parts with 150 measures of rest and a single crash cymbal hit or triangle ding or whatever." - what do you suggest?? sometimes i think it's nice to have "that moment" in a piece, what is the way to preserve that and not annoy a percussionist? write more parts? (it's a honest question)
@@Chronosrlz Yes, you can write more using different instrumentation. If you want to save the triangle for “that moment” at the end, that’s great but put in some glock or suspended cymbal rolls, or get to know what other interesting colors you can find in the percussion section. If it’s sparse and there’s enough time in between for the percussionist to switch then you can write it all on one part.
@@Chronosrlz that’s great, another thing to consider is that in a professional setting you’re paying for the percussionist for their time. Whether they play for one measure or twenty, you’re going to be paying them the same amount. We’d gladly take the money either way, but ya know, make it worth your dime.
Yes as a sophomore in high school, our school marching band was completely awesome and had an invitation for some of us to come to the college to see if any of us were what they were looking for. This was concert band obviously, I had a triangle part that was only hit a few times in what felt like an eternity. Me being a nervous high schooler with these college kids had me so nervous!!! I missed it! I was early!!! He stopped!!! Said,”Triangle!! Can’t you count to 250?!” I wanted to say,”NO!! But..I can count to 249!!!😂 No I was terrified actually.
I know Maslanka Symphony no. 7 has a dobachi sound written at the very beginning of Movement 3, and I actually remember playing it too, so I can relate LOL
Thank you. I hate the way many of the parts for percussion are written. Especially the dang grace notes after a roll! Hopefully many more composers will take note!
Oh! This is definitely a video I need to see. I always try to at least make page turns not awful, but learning other things to make playing my music less painful is very good.
11:12 SO much yes to this point! I remember running to this problem quite a bit in brass bands (I'm from the UK). We ended up sometimes having to completely rearrange the percussion parts to just get all the timpani on one part, as originally they were spread across 2 or 3 for no good reason whatsoever. There's definitely a special place in hell for composers and arrangers who do this, especially when it's timpani!
i once heard an arrangement of the piece 5 on 5 for marimba, it was called 6 on 5 and th4 6 percussionists were constantly changing positions on a 5 octave marimba
I have this vibraphone part and it's somewhat difficult but it's at a part where the rest of the band is very loud. It's so frustrating because it feels like there no point in putting time and effort into learning it because it's not going to be heard anyway.
I literally have a Snare part this semester that has several rolls that lead into flams/grace notes. It's so annoying! It's even by Sousa! Also, I played a piece last semester that was written by a flautist, but the piece was supposed to feature a huge tenor part... the rhythms were so annoying, janky, an unnecessary.
The timpani section was so relatable but as someone who has perfect pitch, it was tolerable. Except Havendance by David Holsinger, that was a nightmare I'll never forget
@@Oracleswrath9999 especially when it's clearly designed for 5 timpani and my high school had 4 timpani, it was a agonizing process to covert to my playing standards but it was worth it
Hello! I am a Middle School percussionist. Last night I had a concert, and there were judges. I keep tempo in all songs, and have the main percussion part. I got sick, and I couldn’t go, i’m still sick, but i really wanted to perform. I don’t know how the band did, but at least we had our conductor help with tempo. We have a UIL competition with those same songs, but I cant have my family come watch, so we missed the opportunity to listen. We also had sight reading, so I’m not sure what score we got. I’m sure I will be better by the competition, but I hope all goes well, and I can make it.
@@steeno861 we did pretty good! i wish we got all ones, but we won’t 1 2 1 on our songs, and 1 in Sight reading. (BTW, most band people would know 1 in UIL is the best rating. On Wednesday, we have Sunfest, and are play ping pirates of the carribean, and fireball!
When I did my masters in composition one of the things that was drilled into me was the fact that if you want people to play your music, you have to write for PEOPLE. That means avoiding stuff that is impossible or very, very, difficult unless you can justify it as an effect or something. There is no reason to write a part that is unreadable if what you're going for is actually simple. Also, if you don't know if something is possible, have somebody who plays that instrument try to play it, or ask them... Nobody is going to program your piece if it is literally impossible to play.
That flute cue is definitely something you communicate to your conductor about from the 1st rehearsal. It's quite normal to listen for cues. Symphonic gig approach is different than dutdutdutdut.
I like to tell people how many instruments I switch from I'll tell them "so straight after this song I run over to the xylo to the snare then after that I have to step to the bass drum..."
Weird percussion? I got ya, fam. Some setup is needed for this, and it took me down memory lanes that were thirty years forgotten. Thanks, EMC. These are pretty good memories. My high school band director was really something else (in awesome ways IMO). He was in his second or maybe third year in our district when I started my freshman year and he had a whole bunch of ideas, some of which were actually pretty good. For marching band (we were a competitive district), he always seemed to prefer to hire as instructors former members of World Champion corps; while I was in high school we had at one point or another a total of three from Scouts 1988, two from Star 1991 and IIRC two from Cavaliers 1992. It might sound a little weird for a high school band of not more than seventy members on the field (I know it was less at its most but I can't recall how much less) to have what amounted to caption heads with staffs of their own, but we had a hell of a booster program at the time and that let us do a lot. Concert band was just as unconventional at time. Alongside the high school band standard rep- Second Suite in F, Irish Tune from County Derry, Mars from The Planets, Armenian Dances (the fun, more frequently performed one), Cake Walk by Robert Russell Bennett, Sleigh Ride (God yes THAT one), The Stars and Stripes Forever, etc., etc. ad nauseam- he would also have us rehearse some really interesting modern pieces for each concert. Sometimes they worked, sometimes they didn't, but we had fun regardless. Some of it was pretty out there and wouldn't often be found even in university ensemble rehearsals and concerts, let alone concerts given by a "class B" high school program. We had Eliot del Borgo in for one or two rehearsals when we performed his *Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night,* (*) which was super cool for us all to experience (he did attend the performance), we did Russell Peck's *Cave of the Winds*- yes, in the dark, with a lighting "part" and the whole nine other flamboyant yards... and we did some stuff that was really *really* out there, such as John Paulson's *Epinicion* which you can hear here: link: th-cam.com/video/LWlGvuXfKK8/w-d-xo.html IIRC the percussion score in that fun little ditty calls for a water gong. Ours was nowhere near this elaborate but here's what that is: th-cam.com/video/ZctqhSMuA60/w-d-xo.html I know it's not the weirdest thing ever, but for a high school it was definitely something new. --------------------------------------------------------- (*) We were performing del Borgo's piece in memory of a member of our student body who died just down the street from where I lived in a violent and fiery drunk driving accident coming home on prom night. He got behind the wheel completely sloshed, didn't wear his seat belt, put his foot on the gas on a country road, and hit a telephone pole head-on at over 50mph less than a half mile from his own front door. del Borgo's piece, a tone poem reflecting the poem of the same name by Dylan Thomas, was written in 1978 following the exact same kind of incident involving two other students. Kids, DON'T DRIVE DRUNK OR EVEN A TIT BIPSY- call an Uber or a cab or yes even your parents! Call a friend's parents! Adults remember being stupid! ASK FOR HELP! We're much, MUCH happier screaming at living children than sobbing over the graves of dead ones! Link to the original poem by Dylan Thomas: poets.org/poem/do-not-go-gentle-good-night
I remember when I did LGPE my sophomore year and played this piece on a crappy vibraphone. During my vibraphone solo, the pedal snapped off, and I’m not sure if anyone heard it. But I literally had to get down on my knees and readjust the pedal, as I had a bunch of rests. I was then sweating like crazy. Another complaint is how the school maintains the instruments, especially if a vibraphone has a loose pedal
I remember when I did all district we had a piece that had instrument changes every few measures for all parts, so we carefully planned out and choreographed the handing of instruments and others in a big collection of various instruments with tray tables in the middle for everyone's sticks and mallets. fun times.
We had one fantastic piece I remember playing my Junior year of high school. It had 4 percussion parts. My percussion part covered marimba, bass drum, crash cymbals, suspended cymbal, and bass drum. Another part was timpani and triangle. Another part included vibraphone, suspended cymbal, wind chimes, gong, and bass drum. Another part featured chimes, marimba, crash cymbals, slap stick, glockenspiel, and wind chimes. So the bass drum, marimba, suspended cymbal and wind chimes repeated. No part had more than a 2 bar transition between instruments, so what our percussion section did after hours of trying to figure out ways to share instruments, we decided that each of the 4 parts would have all we needed in a little cage/area. My school was fortunate enough to have so many percussion instruments that we could set up these 4 sections that took up most of the stage, and then still have a few other setups made for the 2 other pieces we had for the concert without having the majorly rearrange the stage during the concert. Fun times!
my band instructor told me to play the vibraslap part louder (aux. percussion instrument that you slap against your hand, and it makes a rattle noise) 💀 i had a literal bruise on my hand for a few days from trying to play it louder and you still couldn't even hear it soo 🤷♀
The switching instruments is particularly real for me. I was playing a piece several years ago and had a switch from bass drum on one side of the stage to tubular bells on the opposite in the space of 2 bars. This was one hell of a sprint down the narrow percussion riser dodging the cymbal stands and other percussionists. Come performance day some of the other percussionist decided to pull out chairs for their rest parts of the concert. Turned my sprint into hurdles on the spot. Felt damn sure I could compete with some olympians after that concert.
Awesome video, I gotta bookmark this. Explains all the little unseen difficulties so well. I'll pull this out the next time I get pulled into one of _those_ arguments
I currently have a part in wind ensemble where I switch from one snare stick in each hand playing on concert snare to one stick in my right hand and two brushes in my left hand using Stevens grip, where the left hand plays a little piccolo snare drum lick and the right hand plays a field drum note two counts later. Granted the part is meant for multiple people, but I have to make it work on my own.
The last one- we played Selections from the Music Man and I played bells. I later found out that the chimes part was written on the timpani part, and it had some similar parts to the bells part. So I’m like, well why didn’t the composer just write the bells part AND chimes part together? 😑
For percussion (I always run it by my band director for playability and being not painful to play) I try to implement them a lot and give them similar parts for bass lines
In a song that my concert band is playing right now, I have play four different mallet instruments. The switching can be difficult in some spots, but most of the time I’ve got it under control.
I Had a Concertpiece, where i had 13 different Instruments and they we're all over the Place, because other People Had to play them at some Part It was like a Marathon everytime we played that
Bro I HAAAATE this. Back in band I had a tendency to lose track during long rests. Had a cowbell feature in the middle of a song, was two measures short, screwed the entire piece up, and got read the riot act from everyone after the show. Never again lol
Omg I'm so glad I presented visual loudness during festival last week! I had this roll on triangle during a piece called 'raptor rides the whale', (I was on auxiliary) and my director told me to hold the triangle up while I was playing. I thought it looked really goofy at the time but I understand now! Thanks emc!
I was asked to play drums for a show - The Sound of Music - and it was only the second time I'd done a show, but ok, no prob - except we were playing in a smallish space, and the director said can I use rods. Fine, no prob - except there's one spot where I have a snare roll. I can't do a closed roll with rods !! So - I had time to switch to sticks just for the roll, then I continued the beat for 2 bars (fast tempo) just on bass & hi-hat while I dropped the sticks and picked up the rods. Also, there was a cymbal roll and a timpani roll wanted (no timpani, so floor tom) - I said which one do you want, I can't do both - she said But I want Both !! So I did both. It was fine :o)
I appreciate this video. I’m a composer, and learning to write for percussion has been the trickiest for me. I’m definitely someone who is prone to making these types of mistakes, so it’s good to hear someone call us out on it.
7:22 It's happening! You're FINALLY talking about MY percussion instrument! 8:10 YES!!! THANK YOU!!! I had to play some Japanese piece that wanted 5 timpani heads (4 is normal, and my band only has 3 so I ALREADY have to double up on one...) and it had me changing THREE OF THEM (which in my case was ALL) at a time...with a few second before the next runs of notes...of which there were 5 so I had to modify the run because it was SIXTEENTH NOTES. REALLY? SIXTEEN NOTES??? ON A TIMPANI?? AT AN ALREADY BREAKNECK SPEED???
In a percussion ensemble piece I have gong, temple block, triangle, suspended cymbal, crash cymbal, claves, and tambourine... i have 3 pairs of mallets to switch between, 1 pair of sticks, and that many instruments to move around between.
Our small school ended up with four drummers on-field for my jr and sr years. Our instructor was inventive, and likely a bit mad, so we used plastic frames to mount a pair of 6" drums to the front gaps of the quads and a 4" pop drum in the inside frame, making Septs. We also managed the 4-drum tones by mounting a second drum on the basses. 1+4, 2+3. We did fairly well in the competitions, edging out quite a few A and AA drumlines, though missed best overall by a few tenths every time. And yes, we all have back problems now.
Last year for marching band I was playing timpani and I had every single problem the players can have as you listed, there was even a part where it wanted me to play 6 different notes in under 2 measures. I could never go more than like 8 measures before running into a problem, it took an extremely long time to work out the logistics for which drums to tune and when
Not percussion related, but similar topics 1) mute charges. PLEASE just put it right after the section not at the beginning of the next. Also, don't have trumpet taking out a harmon mute during a quite section, there's bound to be a cork squeak. 2) different keyed instruments. Unless you're going for a very specific sound, have multiple parts with different instruments that could be used. A piece I'm playing right now came with 5 different trumpet parts (Bb, C, Eb, A picc, and Picc in F). Was great getting to pick which one I wanted. 3) cues (for non-concert pitched instruments). Make cues in my pitch, not concert pitch... If I see a written Bb in the flute cue before I'm about to play a written Bb, I really hope they're going to be the same note. Rant over
One of my biggest gripes is district auditions requiring that students not use tuning gauges on timpani AT ALL. I thoroughly understand the importance of tuning without them, but with certain pieces of music it's like telling a wind player they aren't allowed to know note fingerings and to just play a different instrument tuned to a different note. Especially with the quality of instrument that students are forced to practice and audition on. They must exist somewhere, but I've never been to a high school with fully functional, well-maintained timpani where the pedals don't play pong with you.
There was this one song where I had to play toms, triangle, and crash cymbals, all in the same beat. Obviously I don’t have 5 arms so I had to get two people from out other band to cover for me.
I've noticed that when composers write in the tuning changes for timpani they often get it wrong, in terms of which notes sound good on which drum. Usually the mid and high ranges of each drum sound good, and the low ranges are less articulate and muddier sounding. Yet composers will think that because a D is technically in the range of a 23, they can write that into their tuning guide. I always scrap the written tuning guide and put the notes on drums where they will sound the best, like a D on the 26, a C on the 29, etc. It usually results in more tuning changes, but sounds a lot better!
Big agree on all this except for the timpani part. Lots of tuning and even simultaneous tuning is fine, but the composer has to have an Idea about how to actually play it so theyre sure its possible before putting it to print. (This critique is only for concert writing. For marching band/drum corps timpani, write whatever you want to hear and the player will figure it out or change the parts)
Yes, I had logistics and instrument problems in high school concert band. We were entered into the Music Festival, sometimes called Solos and Ensembles, and sometimes called Contest. I couldn't play trombone due to a facial accident and broken teeth, so I played the keyboard instruments: chimes, marimba, triangle, and glockenspiel. Glockenspiel was mercifully short for our piece ( _Novena_ by I don't know who), and so was the marimba-whose part was played at a mostly bare part of the piece. What my favorite part was the chimes. We had a beautiful set of chimes that would ring forever! The notes had a wonderful crescendo like ring ring ring RING!!! and the chimes would ring forever, filling the transition part of the piece, I think a dal signa. It was a glorious sound. We went to Solos and Ensembles and played our piece. I wondered where our chimes were. There was one on stage. I inspected it: it was old brass with the damper dropped, which meant every note was going to be very short. I hated it. Instead of ring ring ring RING!! It went clunk clunk clunk CLUNK. I was mortified! How did people use this in concerts?! I was devastated. I thought for sure that would lower our evaluation. I was wrong: our rating was "Superior," The highest rating possible. Still, to me, my memory of that day will always be as tarnished as the stage chimes.
In my schools show this year, there were multiple points in the show where the trombones (me) were within reaching distance of the bass drums and the first time that I put my horn up at the first spot punctured a bass drum.
It's like when someone ask you to come in for a drum audition playing drum set and they hand you a triangle a pair of maracas or wood block. And want you to play on 1 of each measure. And ONLY that for an hour.
I had a concert piece where I had the bass drum. I only had one note out of the 100 measures. Thankfully I had other parts written in the music paper. And now I can read 3/4 rests better
Cues are usually written in by the orchestra members themselves but in a school setting, that is not usually going to happen. I stopped playing in our local orchestra years ago for the same reason-nothing much to play but you still had to attend the rehearsals to play your "one note". Such a boring endeavor.
One of my favorite musical theatre pit experiences was playing aux percussion for Les Miserables. I didn't have a lot of space, but I did have bells, a small xylophone mounted underneath, a single timpani, and a dozen smaller instruments either mounted or set up on trays. I was regularly using 4 mallet grips but with 2 or 3 different types of mallets. And then, of course, there was the "rest page." It was actually 1 1/2 pages filled with rests and rehearsal marks. 16 bars of rest then letter A. 8 bars of rest. Letter B, 16 bars rest. Letter C, 15 bars of rest, whole rest with fermata. On and on. Rest rest rest ritardando... rest rest cessura... rest rest rest over a vamp... Good times.
This is happening to me. In a concert band piece called Legend of Knife River I have to Switch instruments from Glockenspiel to Suspended Cymbal to Xylophone and back and forth
I have to preform the drum part for my class, i play piano and not drums.. but the drum is particularly easy since my teacher introduced me to one of the cymbal and the snare drum first
i'm actually so glad that our school's techs write all of our parts out. yes, the arrangers for our band pieces suck really bad, but for our drumline shows, our techs are working hard at it. appreciative of our techs, they're the best!
I once had to play the cymbal in an orchestra, for a Shostakovich piece, but there was no sheet music for it. The piece only had like four or five crashes but they were like ten years apart. The conductor told me that he would just cue me for each crash. I didn't miss a single one! He was so impressed that he had me demonstrate that for his college students.
I had that same problem with Bolero. I had to play crashes one time when we lost the mallet part, which I was supposed to play. Except, I only crashed 3 times, exempting the finale. So, I had to memorize my part.
W percussionist
Hey we’re playing… that guy… for marching band! :D
Same, my teacher never gave me aheet music, he also told me I was doing cymbals the day of the performance lmao.
I’m a classical violinist and I feel so bad for yet so jealous of the percussionists sometimes lol
Visual loudness is actually a thing in auxiliary percussion. It just adds to the performance when you can see the small percussion parts being played. And is it just me or is the percussion section the most visually interesting section of an orchestra to watch?
as an aux member i agree like our techs get on us if we dont have enough so i usually just try to really get into the music lol
Watching the string section during a particularly intense part of music is an absolute blast.
@@bluejay9638 💀 same can be said about any wind instrument.
Percussion is unique in that you are smacking things together
I had a fairly simple part on claves for a performance. It repeated for a while, and the sheet said “Joyous Energy”. I pretty much just danced and jumped around with my claves for most of a piece.
@@rawhidelamp literally the same thing can be said for percussion then, they're doing the same thing in different ways. I think the only really interesting one is timpani, just cause rolls are cool.
Don't forget about mallet changes! When the composer gives you 1 beat to throw down your mallets and pick up different ones, or when the expect you to somehow play a bunch of different instruments all at the same time that each require different sticks/mallets. We only have two hands!
I have definitely been in that position more than once lol
Dude I have this problem all the time in jazz band. I would just be playing my part and suddenly see “switch to brushes”, but I can’t because I’m busy drumming. And then the brush part comes up and I frantically try to switch in a picosecond. Really annoying
I decided for the concert band's end-of-the-year talent show, in my senior year of high school, to set up a foot pedal and used it with the medium marching bass we had. Then I set up the high-hat and its pedal on the other side of my glock. The first Halo game had come out the previous year, so I planned a really funny one-man-band routine for it... But I don't think I could manage those, a triangle, blocks, or anything else in that setup. lol
Tip: Store mallets/sticks under your arms.
@@karlwilker579 i just got a special bag that attaches to my drum that holds all the sticks I could ever want, and its absolutely amazing.
Similar to how you can't make a marimba loud, you can't make a xylophone quiet. You could use yarn mallets and then not be able to hear it unless you're literally playing by yourself, or you play at its one-and-only volume: fortisimo.
You very much can make a marimba loud, just not enough to compete with an entire ensemble
I mean, rubber mallets aren't too obnoxious on a xylophone.
@@ErikratKhandnalie Wood keys -> hard rubber, metal keys -> Brass mallets!
Lol I’m no olympic gymnast, but I can confirm you can tune Timpani 1 and Timpani 4 at the same time(both balanced action and clutch), all though it can be very challenging - highly recommend getting a Roc-N-Soc Bicycle throne for this as your legs have the best mobility for this type of throne.
I expected a comment from you on the timpani part of this video!
Hahaha I came here to say this, glad you’re already here Kyle. Here’s an example of me doing a simultaneous drum 1-4 pedal change (both went from E to E-flat): th-cam.com/video/x1oxR_xvoIM/w-d-xo.html (1 minute, 5 seconds in)
Also want to add that Eric, you sound about 30 years older than you are when you talk about timpani tuning changes. I love the challenge of a good pedaling timpani part. I haven’t encountered anything unplayable with enough practice. Then again, I think a lot of 4-mallet marimba solos are virtually unplayable, but I know that I don’t put enough time on my 4-mallet chops.
It would also be very innovative to have a timpani tuning contraption that you would use 2 feet to tune 4 drums, per se.
@@nmpercussion2 hey Lucas! Good to see you around here! 😄
I got long limbs which helps with a lot of playing
Recently we were reading through an arrangement for West Side Story for our wind ensemble. The percussion part was all the percussion in a score, so we would have to page turn while playing. They also wrote the drum set part separated, so individual bass drum staff, individual snare drum staff, individual ride cymbal staff, etc. Needless to say we’re rewriting the parts.
Omg we are too! We’re playing mambo!
Oh there is a video on youtube, where someone is playing that and it is absolutly insane.
th-cam.com/video/XckuLi5cqd4/w-d-xo.html
Yeah we had a very similar thing last semester, not a score, but everyone played virtually every instrument
Omg who wrote the arrangement? I had something exactly like that last semester!
I think we had the same arrangement, conductor made us switch parts between movements too. It was frantic
as a brass player whos looking to get into composition in the future, this was really helpful as I have no idea how to write/notate percussion parts, and it gave me lots of tips on what to avoid. In return please stop giving us massive jumps and awkward fingerings.
2+3 to 1 in 16th notes at 164 bpm
@@NotPsyduckc lord have mercy please
as an aspiring arranger, this is incredibly helpful!!
I played viola in an orchestra.....all I have to say, if it didn't have a cue, I wrote my own after counting it out once. The librarian knee which music was mine and kept it labeled for the future for me. We did the nutcracker every year with the local ballet. I am with you my friend on it.
Trombones know this pain too
This is a good story that if you want more context for, let me know.
Essentially there were 13 percussionists and only like 10 parts. 1 person sat on the floor, one person was standing by another’s marimba, and my friend was walking around aimlessly. Eventually, my friend gets bored, puts his hand on his head, and proceeds to do the Michael Jackson lean. My band director saw this, and got so offended that she stopped conducting and threw him out of class, only to begin scream crying at him in her office.
…How does that cause that much outrage
@@grovetender4713 maybe someone she loved was struck by a smooth criminal
@@lamp1585 God tier comment!! X,D
@@lamp1585 WHAT 😭😭😭😭
ITS BEEN A YEAR BUT I NEED MORE CONTEXT
Yeah, I feel the pain of timpani tuning. I remember modern/contemporary pieces that involve rolling on one pitch and ending on another, because I didn’t have five drums to work with. My high school doing Armenian Dances had two of my peers switching a tambourine mid roll. But by far the most ridiculous thing I saw was a crescendo for a ratchet. That instrument is incapable of any dynamic range besides forte, it’s just frickin’ loud
Did the director just make you deal with it, or did you guys figure out something else (couldn't really think of what else to do)?
10:30 Yeah not gonna lie, ive always been my ensembles "Percussion II" guy, so I usually end up with a pile of stuff in front of me lol. it gets stressful really quickly, but like a fun stressful. Thankfully we only ever have to switch intruments inbetween songs, so what we do is we actually just pick up some things and move the stuff around inbetween songs. So for example right now for one song im on the Timpani, one song im on the triangle, and another I have all the symbol parts (yes all of them) I keep the timpanis the whole concert. The triangle starts with the girl next to me, who is giving me a break from P2 parts for a song. While I focous on my Timapani. The second song the triangle moves to me, and I keep it. Then for the 3rd song every single cymbol has to move from literally one side of the stage to another. Every. Single. One.
I couldn’t agree more with the marimba and vibe dynamics. I’m playing Music for Prague on the vibraphone and the conductor wanted me to play as loud as humanly possible that I broke my mallets on the first rehearsal. And they were rocks
My sophomore year of highschool, my friend and I were brand new tenor players. (I had switched over from snare and he had switched over from bass) Our band was playing Thanks for the Memories by Fallout Boy for the halftime show. When we got the music, we were blown away at how difficult it was! For a song that is fairly straight forward and easy on drum set, this score was wild! It overwhelmed both of us since we were brand new to tenors and we had to dumb some parts down a little. Man do I wish I still had that sheet music so I could assess whether it really was super hard or if our inexperience on tenors made it hard
199!!!!! So close to 200k!!!!!
I see you, The Licc
Music companies don't care about saving paper. I just played a bari sax part that had a page 2 that was TOTALLY BLANK. Like, huh, everybody else is unfolding their part but I see a double bar, though I have a second page, maybe I need to uh nope.
Love the running around in the percussion section. I got asked to sit in with a community orchestra so they would have three, and the main guy was locked to the timpani, so here's me (a SAXOPHONIST, remember) figuring out how to do polyrhythms on bass drum and tambourine. (And also learning you can't just drop the tambourine when the part is over. Whoops.)
My school has it where drum line is cut, basses start on the 45 of side one and go out towards the end zone, and then the snares and tenors on side two, on the 40, and it causes a lot of confusion until the blocks condense
When I was in 7th grade, we played a Shadow of the Colossus piece and I had to play bass drum and sus cymbal at the same time because of a lack of percussionists; I was literally holding 3 mallets because I was required to do cymbal rolls in between bass drum notes.
During a choir concert I played glock and sus cymbal at the same time and two different shaker parts at the same time.
@@cashmcelz sus..
@@jackthecommenter2768a suspended cymbal
My first or second year of percussion we had like 3 percussionist and I had to change 6 instrument changes, they were mostly small instruments like the tambourine or cymbals, but it was fun and I think it definitely helped expanded the range of instruments I could play somewhat well
This was my experience all through middle and high school bands. By junior year I was first chair and there was only one or two other full time percussionists depending on the time of year, and we never had more than 4. Wasn't uncommon to go from snare to traps to marimba to concert toms to sus cymbal to timpani over the course of three pieces, often multiple in one piece. Perc 1 parts were split between bass and snare drum, usually me and 2nd chair, and then we all filled in parts 2 and 3 (or 4) as much as we could. Sometimes it was just me on all of perc 2/3/4 which was mostly toms, traps and various cymbal parts - one piece in middle school had a trashcan solo which was really fun - or back and forth between glock/marimba/vibe and timpani since I was the only one who could read pitched music. It was actually a fun challenge. Getting the hang of timpani (especially retuning the base note between pieces in concert, quickly and quietly) really enhanced my ear for harmonics, which is constantly useful from drum tuning to synthesis and sound design.
It’s probably why directors should buy duplicate instruments, like 3 or 4 of the same triangle or something
When I was doing my undergrad my scoring and arranging professor had me take everyone on a field trip to the percussion suite and show them all the toys and let me talk about everything I hate when people who don’t know how to write for percussion write for percussion.
Told them I didn’t want to see any parts with 150 measures of rest and a single crash cymbal hit or triangle ding or whatever.
Talked about how to write for marimba and what the easiest intervals to write are, why we have so many mallets, and what a wing span is, lol. Using 8va if everything is in the ledger lines. We wanted everything to be basically sight-readable.
Talked about our basic set up a little bit, and running around. I read one difficult piece where I had to do a one handed cymbal roll, hit a gong then play a slide whistle consecutively. And it was written by a percussionist! I was like, Dude!
Marching band’s different though, love to see the rack kids run around. Keeps them entertained.
"Told them I didn’t want to see any parts with 150 measures of rest and a single crash cymbal hit or triangle ding or whatever." - what do you suggest??
sometimes i think it's nice to have "that moment" in a piece, what is the way to preserve that and not annoy a percussionist? write more parts? (it's a honest question)
@@Chronosrlz Yes, you can write more using different instrumentation. If you want to save the triangle for “that moment” at the end, that’s great but put in some glock or suspended cymbal rolls, or get to know what other interesting colors you can find in the percussion section. If it’s sparse and there’s enough time in between for the percussionist to switch then you can write it all on one part.
@@AnDream109 ok thx for your answer. I'm learning orchestration and i'll consider this aspect from now on
@@Chronosrlz that’s great, another thing to consider is that in a professional setting you’re paying for the percussionist for their time. Whether they play for one measure or twenty, you’re going to be paying them the same amount. We’d gladly take the money either way, but ya know, make it worth your dime.
Yes as a sophomore in high school, our school marching band was completely awesome and had an invitation for some of us to come to the college to see if any of us were what they were looking for. This was concert band obviously, I had a triangle part that was only hit a few times in what felt like an eternity. Me being a nervous high schooler with these college kids had me so nervous!!! I missed it! I was early!!! He stopped!!! Said,”Triangle!! Can’t you count to 250?!” I wanted to say,”NO!! But..I can count to 249!!!😂 No I was terrified actually.
It would be nice to have a percussion score so we can see everything that's being played and we can decide who takes what part.
I know Maslanka Symphony no. 7 has a dobachi sound written at the very beginning of Movement 3, and I actually remember playing it too, so I can relate LOL
This reminds me of our sheet music for adeste fideles. The piano part has literally nothing. The percussion part is just one phrase at the end
3:50 Amen 🙌 my school just gives me boring tenor parts that really dont help me improve
Thank you. I hate the way many of the parts for percussion are written. Especially the dang grace notes after a roll! Hopefully many more composers will take note!
I like how he casually threw the lick into this video when he’s talking about switching instruments.
Oh!
This is definitely a video I need to see.
I always try to at least make page turns not awful, but learning other things to make playing my music less painful is very good.
11:12 SO much yes to this point! I remember running to this problem quite a bit in brass bands (I'm from the UK). We ended up sometimes having to completely rearrange the percussion parts to just get all the timpani on one part, as originally they were spread across 2 or 3 for no good reason whatsoever. There's definitely a special place in hell for composers and arrangers who do this, especially when it's timpani!
i once heard an arrangement of the piece 5 on 5 for marimba, it was called 6 on 5 and th4 6 percussionists were constantly changing positions on a 5 octave marimba
I have this vibraphone part and it's somewhat difficult but it's at a part where the rest of the band is very loud. It's so frustrating because it feels like there no point in putting time and effort into learning it because it's not going to be heard anyway.
I literally have a Snare part this semester that has several rolls that lead into flams/grace notes. It's so annoying! It's even by Sousa!
Also, I played a piece last semester that was written by a flautist, but the piece was supposed to feature a huge tenor part... the rhythms were so annoying, janky, an unnecessary.
The timpani section was so relatable but as someone who has perfect pitch, it was tolerable. Except Havendance by David Holsinger, that was a nightmare I'll never forget
So many changes x.x
@@Oracleswrath9999 especially when it's clearly designed for 5 timpani and my high school had 4 timpani, it was a agonizing process to covert to my playing standards but it was worth it
Hello! I am a Middle School percussionist. Last night I had a concert, and there were judges. I keep tempo in all songs, and have the main percussion part. I got sick, and I couldn’t go, i’m still sick, but i really wanted to perform. I don’t know how the band did, but at least we had our conductor help with tempo. We have a UIL competition with those same songs, but I cant have my family come watch, so we missed the opportunity to listen. We also had sight reading, so I’m not sure what score we got. I’m sure I will be better by the competition, but I hope all goes well, and I can make it.
how was it?
@@steeno861 we did pretty good! i wish we got all ones, but we won’t 1 2 1 on our songs, and 1 in Sight reading. (BTW, most band people would know 1 in UIL is the best rating. On Wednesday, we have Sunfest, and are play ping pirates of the carribean, and fireball!
I had one piece that I played drum 2 the whole time and the drum line played the exact rhythms
Have you heard of a LAGERPHONE before? I played it in my concert last week in a piece called "Bushdance". WHAT A BLAST
I once had one not in an 80 measure song
When I did my masters in composition one of the things that was drilled into me was the fact that if you want people to play your music, you have to write for PEOPLE. That means avoiding stuff that is impossible or very, very, difficult unless you can justify it as an effect or something. There is no reason to write a part that is unreadable if what you're going for is actually simple. Also, if you don't know if something is possible, have somebody who plays that instrument try to play it, or ask them... Nobody is going to program your piece if it is literally impossible to play.
That flute cue is definitely something you communicate to your conductor about from the 1st rehearsal. It's quite normal to listen for cues. Symphonic gig approach is different than dutdutdutdut.
As a composition major who doesn't know much about percussion this was very helpful for me. Great job I learned a lot.
I like to tell people how many instruments I switch from I'll tell them "so straight after this song I run over to the xylo to the snare then after that I have to step to the bass drum..."
Weird percussion? I got ya, fam. Some setup is needed for this, and it took me down memory lanes that were thirty years forgotten.
Thanks, EMC. These are pretty good memories.
My high school band director was really something else (in awesome ways IMO). He was in his second or maybe third year in our district when I started my freshman year and he had a whole bunch of ideas, some of which were actually pretty good. For marching band (we were a competitive district), he always seemed to prefer to hire as instructors former members of World Champion corps; while I was in high school we had at one point or another a total of three from Scouts 1988, two from Star 1991 and IIRC two from Cavaliers 1992. It might sound a little weird for a high school band of not more than seventy members on the field (I know it was less at its most but I can't recall how much less) to have what amounted to caption heads with staffs of their own, but we had a hell of a booster program at the time and that let us do a lot.
Concert band was just as unconventional at time. Alongside the high school band standard rep- Second Suite in F, Irish Tune from County Derry, Mars from The Planets, Armenian Dances (the fun, more frequently performed one), Cake Walk by Robert Russell Bennett, Sleigh Ride (God yes THAT one), The Stars and Stripes Forever, etc., etc. ad nauseam- he would also have us rehearse some really interesting modern pieces for each concert. Sometimes they worked, sometimes they didn't, but we had fun regardless.
Some of it was pretty out there and wouldn't often be found even in university ensemble rehearsals and concerts, let alone concerts given by a "class B" high school program. We had Eliot del Borgo in for one or two rehearsals when we performed his *Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night,* (*) which was super cool for us all to experience (he did attend the performance), we did Russell Peck's *Cave of the Winds*- yes, in the dark, with a lighting "part" and the whole nine other flamboyant yards... and we did some stuff that was really *really* out there, such as John Paulson's *Epinicion* which you can hear here:
link: th-cam.com/video/LWlGvuXfKK8/w-d-xo.html
IIRC the percussion score in that fun little ditty calls for a water gong. Ours was nowhere near this elaborate but here's what that is:
th-cam.com/video/ZctqhSMuA60/w-d-xo.html
I know it's not the weirdest thing ever, but for a high school it was definitely something new.
---------------------------------------------------------
(*) We were performing del Borgo's piece in memory of a member of our student body who died just down the street from where I lived in a violent and fiery drunk driving accident coming home on prom night. He got behind the wheel completely sloshed, didn't wear his seat belt, put his foot on the gas on a country road, and hit a telephone pole head-on at over 50mph less than a half mile from his own front door.
del Borgo's piece, a tone poem reflecting the poem of the same name by Dylan Thomas, was written in 1978 following the exact same kind of incident involving two other students. Kids, DON'T DRIVE DRUNK OR EVEN A TIT BIPSY- call an Uber or a cab or yes even your parents! Call a friend's parents! Adults remember being stupid! ASK FOR HELP! We're much, MUCH happier screaming at living children than sobbing over the graves of dead ones!
Link to the original poem by Dylan Thomas:
poets.org/poem/do-not-go-gentle-good-night
I remember when I did LGPE my sophomore year and played this piece on a crappy vibraphone. During my vibraphone solo, the pedal snapped off, and I’m not sure if anyone heard it. But I literally had to get down on my knees and readjust the pedal, as I had a bunch of rests. I was then sweating like crazy. Another complaint is how the school maintains the instruments, especially if a vibraphone has a loose pedal
I remember when I did all district we had a piece that had instrument changes every few measures for all parts, so we carefully planned out and choreographed the handing of instruments and others in a big collection of various instruments with tray tables in the middle for everyone's sticks and mallets. fun times.
We had one fantastic piece I remember playing my Junior year of high school. It had 4 percussion parts. My percussion part covered marimba, bass drum, crash cymbals, suspended cymbal, and bass drum. Another part was timpani and triangle. Another part included vibraphone, suspended cymbal, wind chimes, gong, and bass drum. Another part featured chimes, marimba, crash cymbals, slap stick, glockenspiel, and wind chimes. So the bass drum, marimba, suspended cymbal and wind chimes repeated. No part had more than a 2 bar transition between instruments, so what our percussion section did after hours of trying to figure out ways to share instruments, we decided that each of the 4 parts would have all we needed in a little cage/area. My school was fortunate enough to have so many percussion instruments that we could set up these 4 sections that took up most of the stage, and then still have a few other setups made for the 2 other pieces we had for the concert without having the majorly rearrange the stage during the concert. Fun times!
AMEN! I'm so sick of tiny percussion parts and the winds getting all the attention. We must start a percussion revolution!
are you the one who made The Truth About Klug thing
@@blakeblockblook5522 Yes, but I'm trying to move past that.
my band instructor told me to play the vibraslap part louder (aux. percussion instrument that you slap against your hand, and it makes a rattle noise) 💀 i had a literal bruise on my hand for a few days from trying to play it louder and you still couldn't even hear it soo 🤷♀
The switching instruments is particularly real for me.
I was playing a piece several years ago and had a switch from bass drum on one side of the stage to tubular bells on the opposite in the space of 2 bars. This was one hell of a sprint down the narrow percussion riser dodging the cymbal stands and other percussionists.
Come performance day some of the other percussionist decided to pull out chairs for their rest parts of the concert. Turned my sprint into hurdles on the spot. Felt damn sure I could compete with some olympians after that concert.
So true! Loving the videos and humor!!
Awesome video, I gotta bookmark this. Explains all the little unseen difficulties so well. I'll pull this out the next time I get pulled into one of _those_ arguments
I currently have a part in wind ensemble where I switch from one snare stick in each hand playing on concert snare to one stick in my right hand and two brushes in my left hand using Stevens grip, where the left hand plays a little piccolo snare drum lick and the right hand plays a field drum note two counts later. Granted the part is meant for multiple people, but I have to make it work on my own.
The only time you won’t have at least 15 measures of rest: drum cadences
The last one- we played Selections from the Music Man and I played bells. I later found out that the chimes part was written on the timpani part, and it had some similar parts to the bells part. So I’m like, well why didn’t the composer just write the bells part AND chimes part together? 😑
congrats on 200k!!
For percussion (I always run it by my band director for playability and being not painful to play) I try to implement them a lot and give them similar parts for bass lines
CONGRATS ON 200K!!!!
In a song that my concert band is playing right now, I have play four different mallet instruments. The switching can be difficult in some spots, but most of the time I’ve got it under control.
:| I hate parts like the first one I had to count 493 measures just to play a triplet, hole note, and 4 8th notes
The joys of being a concert percussionist...
I Had a Concertpiece, where i had 13 different Instruments and they we're all over the Place, because other People Had to play them at some Part
It was like a Marathon everytime we played that
@@mrnoname2353 Damn sounds kinda fun tho running all over the place
As a non-percussionist, I can confirm percussion sheet music is different from normal sheet music
i took one look at the thumbnail and instantly related
heyo i saw you yesterday at the WGI Regionals in new jersey, i was bass 4 in Lower Dauphin’s “Red”, it was so cool seeing you, highlight of my day
Congrats for 200k EMC love your work
Bro I HAAAATE this. Back in band I had a tendency to lose track during long rests. Had a cowbell feature in the middle of a song, was two measures short, screwed the entire piece up, and got read the riot act from everyone after the show. Never again lol
9:09 In the Rhode Island Wind Ensemble our director usually tells us when to ignore the written dynamic and what it should ACTUALLY be.
Omg I'm so glad I presented visual loudness during festival last week! I had this roll on triangle during a piece called 'raptor rides the whale', (I was on auxiliary) and my director told me to hold the triangle up while I was playing. I thought it looked really goofy at the time but I understand now! Thanks emc!
Happy 200K! Very well deserved!
I was asked to play drums for a show - The Sound of Music - and it was only the second time I'd done a show, but ok, no prob - except we were playing in a smallish space, and the director said can I use rods. Fine, no prob - except there's one spot where I have a snare roll. I can't do a closed roll with rods !! So - I had time to switch to sticks just for the roll, then I continued the beat for 2 bars (fast tempo) just on bass & hi-hat while I dropped the sticks and picked up the rods. Also, there was a cymbal roll and a timpani roll wanted (no timpani, so floor tom) - I said which one do you want, I can't do both - she said But I want Both !! So I did both. It was fine :o)
You know, I found a case of Conductor 1: Rest Counting. And as soon as I did, it reminded me of this video. Love the content
I appreciate this video. I’m a composer, and learning to write for percussion has been the trickiest for me. I’m definitely someone who is prone to making these types of mistakes, so it’s good to hear someone call us out on it.
I'm not a percussionist but I really enjoyed how you presented this material. Well done.
7:22 It's happening! You're FINALLY talking about MY percussion instrument!
8:10 YES!!! THANK YOU!!! I had to play some Japanese piece that wanted 5 timpani heads (4 is normal, and my band only has 3 so I ALREADY have to double up on one...) and it had me changing THREE OF THEM (which in my case was ALL) at a time...with a few second before the next runs of notes...of which there were 5 so I had to modify the run because it was SIXTEENTH NOTES. REALLY? SIXTEEN NOTES??? ON A TIMPANI?? AT AN ALREADY BREAKNECK SPEED???
In a percussion ensemble piece I have gong, temple block, triangle, suspended cymbal, crash cymbal, claves, and tambourine... i have 3 pairs of mallets to switch between, 1 pair of sticks, and that many instruments to move around between.
Our small school ended up with four drummers on-field for my jr and sr years. Our instructor was inventive, and likely a bit mad, so we used plastic frames to mount a pair of 6" drums to the front gaps of the quads and a 4" pop drum in the inside frame, making Septs. We also managed the 4-drum tones by mounting a second drum on the basses. 1+4, 2+3. We did fairly well in the competitions, edging out quite a few A and AA drumlines, though missed best overall by a few tenths every time.
And yes, we all have back problems now.
yooo i pressed on the video seeing 198k just for me to end the video with 200k POG
Just found out about this channel and I really enjoyed this video. You've earned a subscriber :D
I am not even close to ever being able to play percussion of any sort, but I still found this video to be incredibly entertaining.
Last year for marching band I was playing timpani and I had every single problem the players can have as you listed, there was even a part where it wanted me to play 6 different notes in under 2 measures.
I could never go more than like 8 measures before running into a problem, it took an extremely long time to work out the logistics for which drums to tune and when
I, Igor Fyordorvich Stravinsky, believe that the greatest line ever composed went something like this: “DEFGECD”
Not percussion related, but similar topics
1) mute charges. PLEASE just put it right after the section not at the beginning of the next. Also, don't have trumpet taking out a harmon mute during a quite section, there's bound to be a cork squeak.
2) different keyed instruments. Unless you're going for a very specific sound, have multiple parts with different instruments that could be used. A piece I'm playing right now came with 5 different trumpet parts (Bb, C, Eb, A picc, and Picc in F). Was great getting to pick which one I wanted.
3) cues (for non-concert pitched instruments). Make cues in my pitch, not concert pitch... If I see a written Bb in the flute cue before I'm about to play a written Bb, I really hope they're going to be the same note.
Rant over
lol….. I laughed so hard over the marimba part. Where you rest while someone else comes over to play marimba, they leave, then you play marimba again.
One of my biggest gripes is district auditions requiring that students not use tuning gauges on timpani AT ALL.
I thoroughly understand the importance of tuning without them, but with certain pieces of music it's like telling a wind player they aren't allowed to know note fingerings and to just play a different instrument tuned to a different note. Especially with the quality of instrument that students are forced to practice and audition on. They must exist somewhere, but I've never been to a high school with fully functional, well-maintained timpani where the pedals don't play pong with you.
There was this one song where I had to play toms, triangle, and crash cymbals, all in the same beat. Obviously I don’t have 5 arms so I had to get two people from out other band to cover for me.
I've noticed that when composers write in the tuning changes for timpani they often get it wrong, in terms of which notes sound good on which drum. Usually the mid and high ranges of each drum sound good, and the low ranges are less articulate and muddier sounding. Yet composers will think that because a D is technically in the range of a 23, they can write that into their tuning guide. I always scrap the written tuning guide and put the notes on drums where they will sound the best, like a D on the 26, a C on the 29, etc. It usually results in more tuning changes, but sounds a lot better!
Big agree on all this except for the timpani part. Lots of tuning and even simultaneous tuning is fine, but the composer has to have an Idea about how to actually play it so theyre sure its possible before putting it to print. (This critique is only for concert writing. For marching band/drum corps timpani, write whatever you want to hear and the player will figure it out or change the parts)
Yes, I had logistics and instrument problems in high school concert band.
We were entered into the Music Festival, sometimes called Solos and Ensembles, and sometimes called Contest.
I couldn't play trombone due to a facial accident and broken teeth, so I played the keyboard instruments: chimes, marimba, triangle, and glockenspiel. Glockenspiel was mercifully short for our piece ( _Novena_ by I don't know who), and so was the marimba-whose part was played at a mostly bare part of the piece.
What my favorite part was the chimes.
We had a beautiful set of chimes that would ring forever! The notes had a wonderful crescendo like
ring ring ring RING!!!
and the chimes would ring forever, filling the transition part of the piece, I think a dal signa. It was a glorious sound.
We went to Solos and Ensembles and played our piece. I wondered where our chimes were.
There was one on stage. I inspected it: it was old brass with the damper dropped, which meant every note was going to be very short. I hated it.
Instead of ring ring ring RING!!
It went clunk clunk clunk CLUNK.
I was mortified! How did people use this in concerts?! I was devastated. I thought for sure that would lower our evaluation.
I was wrong: our rating was "Superior," The highest rating possible. Still, to me, my memory of that day will always be as tarnished as the stage chimes.
As a 6 grade beginner percussionist, i have no idea what he was talking about.
Rocky Point Holiday on timpani... sucks. You like having a beat to change the tuning on 3 drums? This is the piece for you!
In my schools show this year, there were multiple points in the show where the trombones (me) were within reaching distance of the bass drums and the first time that I put my horn up at the first spot punctured a bass drum.
It's like when someone ask you to come in for a drum audition playing drum set and they hand you a triangle a pair of maracas or wood block. And want you to play on 1 of each measure. And ONLY that for an hour.
I feel like I need to send you beard manicure items.
Please
He needs to hurry up and get to 69 videos so he can shave!!!! 29 left to go!
I had a concert piece where I had the bass drum. I only had one note out of the 100 measures. Thankfully I had other parts written in the music paper. And now I can read 3/4 rests better
Great delivery EC. You are sooo entertaining.
Cues are usually written in by the orchestra members themselves but in a school
setting, that is not usually going to happen. I stopped playing in our local orchestra
years ago for the same reason-nothing much to play but you still had to attend the
rehearsals to play your "one note". Such a boring endeavor.
I really enjoyed this entertaining negative video.
I relate to many of these complaints, and I'm glad you're bringing these writing mistakes up.
just discovered your channel. absolutely hilarious. love from the rack section
One of my favorite musical theatre pit experiences was playing aux percussion for Les Miserables. I didn't have a lot of space, but I did have bells, a small xylophone mounted underneath, a single timpani, and a dozen smaller instruments either mounted or set up on trays. I was regularly using 4 mallet grips but with 2 or 3 different types of mallets.
And then, of course, there was the "rest page." It was actually 1 1/2 pages filled with rests and rehearsal marks. 16 bars of rest then letter A. 8 bars of rest. Letter B, 16 bars rest. Letter C, 15 bars of rest, whole rest with fermata. On and on. Rest rest rest ritardando... rest rest cessura... rest rest rest over a vamp... Good times.
11:38 the idea of boxing people out someone like a basketball drill is honestly hilarious
This is happening to me. In a concert band piece called Legend of Knife River I have to Switch instruments from Glockenspiel to Suspended Cymbal to Xylophone and back and forth
I have to preform the drum part for my class, i play piano and not drums.. but the drum is particularly easy since my teacher introduced me to one of the cymbal and the snare drum first
i'm actually so glad that our school's techs write all of our parts out. yes, the arrangers for our band pieces suck really bad, but for our drumline shows, our techs are working hard at it. appreciative of our techs, they're the best!