oboeinsight

A few notes …

Ravel’s Piano Concerto:

Piano left hand is your metronome. People often breathe too late. You need to listen to the 8th notes, but you also have to have a good internal metronome.

First two breasts breaths (Oh my … thank you Vladimir! I had to leave my typo up because it made me laugh so much!) should only be small. Third breath is larger.

Start softer so you can expand.

She suggests a breath between second and third bars of rehearsal 8, not between th G# and B.

Don’t get too loud between 7 and 8.

Be careful to pay extra attention to matching the colors.

Don’t use air the same way you do on oboe. English horn is NOT oboe.

Ein Heldenleben, final solo:

You must focus on where the solo is in the piece. Save yourself during the battle scene. The fourth oboe can’t be heard.

Breathing is a challenge. (She said she chose the “least bad places to breathe”.)

Don’t overplay … allow the instrument to vibrate.

She lifts the half hole finger for D to get the slur down the octave. (I do too.)

Play less at the opening when EH doubles violins. Watch the string players … don’t rush.

Use less finger pressure and you’ll get a much smoother line.

Don’t get too soft too soon at the end.

Think about subdivision. ( Not just on Strass.)

People who have bad rhythm NEVER get passed on to the final round.

Not only drop your jaw, but drop the angle of your head.

Dvorak’s New World:

Sometimes there are different tempi for the first six bars so you have to be ready for anything. There is no right tempo for the solo.

Know what is going on harmonically … not much happens at first. First two bars can be subdued. Next two have more dynamic contrast.

Bars 13 and 14 shouldn’t be an echo if you see what the strings have, but instead bars 11 & 12 should be the softer two.

Add the D key to high B flat.

Emphasized lighter finger pressure … always, not just with this. See how light you can go.

The class continued, but I didn’t! At 1:55 I realized I’d forgotten to eat today. Typical me!

A few notes … I’m paraphrasing sometimes as I can’t type fast enough to keep up!

Get out of that correct and seriousness mindset.

Feel like there’s an incredible whitewater of air. (Brahms’ 2nd symphony, last movement)

If you’re playing the Violin Concerto it doesn’t matter if your reed is great at 7:00 if you are playing the second movement at 8:30. Keep reeds damp rather than keeping them wet. (Talked about leaving a moistened reed in the case … don’t leave in water … either an open reed case or closed depending upon how open you need the reed, and its state, age and condition.)

Learn the WHOLE part rather than learning from the excerpt book.

How many of you care if she is feeling uncomfortable or not? (When student said what he suggested, which worked, felt uncomfortable.)

The common culprit is “support” and I don’t like that word. When you hear support you kind of clench everything. … instead think soft but athletically ready for anything. Of course you have to use your abdominal muscles, but think air. (He’s not saying don’t support, but is talking about how we think of that.)

It’s not blowing harder, but letting go. (On the high D in the first.)

This solo is piano, but it’s a noble piano. (Brahms’ 1)

I had all these nuances planned and then I played it in the orchestra and was then obliterated. (Said because he could tell the student had never played the work with an orchestra.)

I like finding different ways of playing it (a solo) and then deciding which one you like. … and that way if a conductor asks you, “can you do it this way?” you don’t say, “Well NO!”

Test your reeds on the hardest thing that you have to play.

Get a reed too vibrant and then bring it back. (Just like) when you adjust an oboe, get the screw too loose and then bring it back. Embrace going over the edge. Play like Elvis. (His demonstration was incredibly over the edge.) Now play like a big sloppy drunk. (Hysterical!) Now play that way like you are too loud and in my face. You can’t play right on the edge unless you’ve first crossed it to know where the edge is.

I play the first note with a harmonic A. (Brahms’ Violin Concerto.)

Show solo vs tutti. In an audition the bassoonist on the committee will say, “She obliterated my solo!” If you don’t pull back. (Points out that you have to know the all of it, just not the oboe part.) Play it as if you are playing in the orchestra, not as an excerpt.

If you use a mute (he does) don’t broadcast it.

Don’t double dot because you are afraid of playing a triplet. It’s just math. (Variations on a theme by Haydn)

Piano [the dynamic marking] is a range rather than a level.

I love his suggestion of taking a very small section of a phrase and turn it into an exercise. You really start to hear how inconsistencies. He talks about an audition being about a thousand little consistencies.

I’ll stop now … it’s difficult to listen and blog at the same time! (I lied … I’m adding more.)

I’m delighted the Peter Cooper just mentioned Marc Lifschey in his Brahms masterclass.