Laziness Guilt

[the elephant]

I am feeling some guilt right now. I only let the music dictate what instruments I use. Sometimes this sees me carrying two tubas and a mute and sometimes I get by with just the F and a smile. The type of part and the orchestration have always been my guide.

However, one of my general rules has been to have the absolute minimum of equipment on stage or with me.

We currently have six folders published for the orchestra, as we are quite busy, each of them being for a one-rehearsal set of performances of Pops or educational programs (mostly runouts) with our first big subscription series program tossed into the mix. Tuesday night we had our rehearsal for three upcoming runouts that kick off with a local outdoor program, which is tonight.

I was pleased to see that this program, the "thinnest" folder of this current clutch, is all really easy stuff and can be played on F tuba. I have not yet had a chance to work on the Adams in the orchestra, and the quintet has not played anything other than our educational program since I bought it last Fall. I played a solo recital and the quintet did a pretty tough recital about two months prior to buying this tuba, but outside of a rather heavy Christmas recital and a ton of freelance work, I have not got to work on the Adams that much. I have to perform the Broughton with a local community orchestra in late April and need to get some face time in a large group on some new material, so I thought I would use the Adams on these four upcoming concerts.

I used it at the rehearsal on Tuesday evening. Everything went well enough. I have the outdoor program tonight. I was worried about the leanness of the F tone outside, but I will be micced.

So why do I feel like I am cheating in some way? I have this odd feeling that I am going to "get caught" doing this and get into some sort of trouble. But this is not the case whatsoever. Yet I feel very strongly that I am cheating by using an F on Sousa, John Williams, Mancini, et al — almost like I am cheating my colleagues or some such nonsense. It feels like I am "skating" due to some sort of laziness because it is so much easier to take the F to work, I guess.

WTF is wrong with my brain…?

[Pauvog1]

Healthy boundaries can totally be hard. I don't see any reason for feeling guilty based on what you have written. I think you are used to a pattern related to something that you are passionate about. That can feel funny, and while your feelings may be valid, they are likely a result of "new" and probably not rational.

I don't have any advice, but I can identify with change feeling off, especially when you are interacting to something that matters.

[Pauvog1]

Also, I have a tremendous amount of respect for you and what you do. I completely trust any decisions you make on tuba / equipment related to rep.

[bloke]

I totally get those feelings.
ex:
The first time I ever played Saint-Saëns 3rd Symphony, I didn't own any contrabass tubas (anyone who has read all of my ridiculously voluminous posts knows that this was the case for several years of my life). I played it with the F tuba.

The second time (yeah...I've only played it three times, because I'm not in a full-time orchestra, but only a small group of per-service ones, as well as having subbed in one barely-full-time one for - gulp - fifty years) I went ahead and did it again, because - the first time - it worked great. The most recent time (again: the same). There's a video of the "finale" (most recent) on youtube, and the tuba is easily heard. As a matter-of-fact, it might not (??) have been as well-heard (through all that organ racket) with a big "pillowy"-sounding tuba...and (sure) I've had larger tubas - now - for quite some time.

Knowing a bit about tuba history and the "French tuba"...etc. (ref: French composer - this work), my original choice of the F ('cause that's the only tuba I had) now makes even more sense than a great big ol' 6/4 thang...

...and I feel the same laziness-guilt (hyphenated - no comma in-between, just to clarify), when I only schlep my F tuba to a job, these days...It's wrong, but I feel it. fwiw...Trombonists (from very-good/unknown to very-good/known players) all like the clarity of the F tuba. Particularly with non-pillowy-sounding F tubas (as pillowy-sounding F tubas - in the last third of my lifetime - have become a "thing"), trombonists LIKE being able to easily interpret the pitch.

[York-aholic]

If you feel guilty walking in with only one tuba, just watch the flute player’s load as they walk in.

[donn]

Needs to be Eb instead, then all would be OK.

[bloke]

Needs to be Eb instead, then all would be OK.

silver?

[Mary Ann]

Well since I have a silver Eb, I can play everything completely without guilt.

[bloke]

I should only speak for myself, but I don't believe the point is that the guilt feelings are justified... I feel particularly guilty, because none of my instruments are silver.

[Mary Ann]

Sorry Wade, you know what happens when just about anybody starts responding; it's like the TFFJ has a "go" button.

[bloke]

Sorry Wade, you know what happens when just about anybody starts responding; it's like the TFFJ has a "go" button.

One or two sympathetic or serious responses, and then it's time to crack jokes. That's how this stuff goes.

[bloke]

Sorry Wade, you know what happens when just about anybody starts responding; it's like the TFFJ has a "go" button.

One or two sympathetic or serious responses, and then it's time to crack jokes. That's how this stuff goes.
------------------
I'm scheduled to play a ridiculous concert tomorrow night whereby it's outdoors and it will be a miracle if it's not raining and the ground will be totally drenched regardless. I've surely posted enough whereas everyone here knows that I have a big-big B-flat and a little-big B-flat. I'm taking the little-big one and -admittedly - barely felt those same feelings (which were ridiculous feelings) about making that decision.

[Three Valves]

I feel so guilty about my laziness I’m just going to sit inside and sulk about it until Happy Hour rolls around!

[Mary Ann]

it will be a miracle if it's not raining and the ground will be totally drenched regardless.

I think we need a tubabrella device that attaches to the bell rim and keeps the rain out, plus keeps your hair dry.

[Three Valves]

it will be a miracle if it's not raining and the ground will be totally drenched regardless.

I think we need a tubabrella device that attaches to the bell rim and keeps the rain out, plus keeps your hair dry.

Tuba/Sousabrella patent pending since 1981.

[bloke]

There's a ridiculous amount of crap to play for this outdoor concert. After a 3-hour rehearsal, there are still at least three or four tunes that we haven't even looked at, and we probably won't even rehearse 1812 or Stars and Stripes, because those are sort of "autopilot tunes".

One thing that sure was a pleasure to play at the first rehearsal was the 32 inch tall 19 inch bell Holton B-flat with the 11/16 inch bore and semitone 5th valve. That thing just purrs like a kitten, and everything is effortless. I'm also liking this new prototype mouthpiece that I've gone back to revisiting. It slurs really easily. It's more of a deepish bowl shape than anything else that I've offered forth previously.

I'm using the F cimbasso on a big band medley, because of the entire tuba part is written like a fourth trombone part - nothing in unison with the basses at all, and of course I'm using it on a James Bond medley. ...What would a James Bond theme be without those low B-naturals being barked out on a contrabass trombone?

I think what I'm saying is that I'm falling back in love with my small Holton in the same way that Wade is falling back in love with his large Holton.

[the elephant]

Well, I played the outdoor program, and the little F — which sounded fine in the rehearsal hall with a real acoustic envelope to play into — sucked in the Great Outdoors. It is just too skinny to be audible in any meaningful way to help with intonation or balance. Also, Stars and Stripes in D is too awkward on an F tuba for me to want to mess with it.

Funny, I allowed convenience to dictate which tuba to take, causing me to feel guilt since I *knew* this would be the outcome, and then common sense kicked in, dictating that I shall take the YamaYork to the other three performances of this program, despite them being in three very nice venues with excellent acoustics that would allow the F to sound just fine on this rep.

Heh, had I taken the 826 to the outdoor program I would have then taken the Adams to the other three, and all would be fine. But noooooo, I have to do things bass-ackward. Hence this thread…

I have nine other Pops concerts and a Masterworks Series program coming up in the next two weeks. I have four freelance large-chorus-with-brass-quintet and -with-full-orchestra gigs in October, and I have several German Band gigs, to boot.

I will have to use all of my horns to cover this handful of programs. Lucky for my lazy butt none of them will require two horns or a mute.

[bloke]

Agreed that C tubas negotiate Stars and Stripes remarkably well in D Major and G. B-flat is probably the next easiest, but it needs to be a slippery B flat with a slippery mouthpiece, and not one of those stiff B-flat setups that aren't particularly slur friendly across partials... and there are not a whole bunch of those.

Rather than playing in D, they just need to write wire players' parts out in D-sharp major and G-sharp major.

Wade knows all about this -"but maybe only a few others do, so I'm going to talk about this march just a little bit more in regards to keys and ease of playing:

to the topic of "marches written in particular keys and playing them with instruments which are not particularly friendly to those keys" :
Modern flute players practice the most well-known part of that march - which, of course, is the piccolo solo - and completely have it under their fingers and mastered extraordinarily well, but - originally, with wind bands and the flats keys - that famous solo was performed using piccolo's pitched in D-flat (rather than C - and with the music written for D-flat piccolo) and it was considerably easier to learn and play that solo in the D-flat piccolo key of G major (vs. A-flat).

even MORE off-topic:
Mrs. bloke has a very nice solid silver D-flat piccolo made by Bettoney, which - while in business - was another Boston made flute with just as much prestige and quality as Haynes and Powell.

attempting to salvage appearing to be on topic:
Hands down, I refuse to play that piccolo solo if I hired to play with a band at some (typically) outdoor concert. It's just not funny, no one in the crowd gets the joke, and it takes away from the spotlight that the flute players deserve and even flute players in the audience are waiting to hear and see. One time, I consented, because It was a brass choir concert and a brass band arrangement of that march, so obviously there were no piccolo players from whom thunder could be stolen. I brought my E-flat tuba and set it behind my chair for that encore piece, because I realized that - just as with the D-flat piccolo fingering simplicity- that entire piccolo obligado could be played nearly exclusively with the combinations no valves, second valve, first valve, and first and second valves.

[Three Valves]

It stopped raining so I moved my lazy dupa to the patio and lounged out there today.

[donn]

I was worried about the leanness of the F tone outside, but I will be micced.

Well, I played the outdoor program, and the little F — which sounded fine in the rehearsal hall with a real acoustic envelope to play into — sucked in the Great Outdoors. It is just too skinny to be audible in any meaningful way to help with intonation or balance.

Illuminating perspective on amplification. In a serious microphone situation, like a studio, everyone's wearing headphones so they hear what's to be heard, but of course mics on an outdoor concert are just half assed sound. Everyone's going to suffer to one extent or another, just a matter of degree. How does anyone have a handle on balance? I have no idea.