Skip to main content

Accuracy

Accuracy


Accuracy is a challenge we face as horn players on the daily basis, especially the higher in our range. To combat this, there are some fun ways to work through fundamental exercises and help your accuracy at the same time. The best way to start is just playing scales and arpeggios with different articulations at varying dynamic levels. Work on playing scales in your full range as loud as possible to as soft as possible while playing the notes from slurred all the way to staccato. This will give you some ideas about where you have the biggest holes in accuracy.
Josef Schantl wrote a book of studies called Grand Theoretical and Practical Method for the Valve Horn as a series of over 200 exercises in all major and minor keys. Not only does this book help with the fluency of all key signatures, but can be a resource when working on accuracy issues. He has suggestions on articulations written throughout so feel free to use those as needed, but play around with dynamics more than anything. Once you have an exercise down, play it across a wide dynamic range to help all notes become more comfortable.
There is also an app called Quality Tones that will randomly select one note at a time for you to play. You can customize the range, dynamics, and articulation types that the app can throw at you. Once you hit start, you are timed at various intervals to perform the note before it changes to a new one. This is a fun tool to have literally in your pocket that you can work on for a few minutes a day. You can start with basic concepts and range and then build from there as you become more comfortable.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Transposition

Transposition The purpose of this post is not to completely teach you how or why we transpose, but rather a few ideas on how to work on transposition. The short of it is, we transpose because of our tradition coming from the natural horn where you could just change a crook and be in the right key. The how gets a little more complicated, but with proper guidance and lots of patience is easily achievable. Further reading can be found at: http://hornmatters.com/?s=transposition I highly suggest that you find a teacher who knows what they are doing when you start learning transposition. It is a tricky matter that if learned incorrectly to being with can hurt things down the road. When you are first learning transpositions, give yourself some baby steps. First, identify the key you are transposing to and the interval over which you need to make the chance. Take Horn in D for example. This means you are transposing down a minor third. Check the key signature and see if there are an...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ensemble Types

Ensemble Types Most of us spend our pre-college lives in the band setting. If we are lucky, our school has an orchestra program that tries to incorporate winds. In the band setting, we are surrounded by other woodwinds, brass, and percussion instruments. Bands are the leading forces in school ensembles through college, but then there are not many examples of bands outside of the school setting. They are many military bands that exist across the world, but professional bands outside of military connections are rarely found. Orchestra is the other most common type of ensemble you could be a part of. In this ensemble, the winds sections are greatly reduced and the string family is added in. The standard setting is for two violin sections, a viola section, cello section, and bass section. If you are put in orchestra for the first time when you enter college, do not be afraid to ask your teacher and your colleagues for tips and advice. It is a different setting from band and can req...
Post a Comment
Read more

Scales: Chromatic/Major/Minor

Scales: Chromatic/Major/Minor Scales are a great starting point for fundamentals on the horn. Most exercises are built around scales and arpeggios so learning them early is key. I suggest starting with a chromatic scale. Find a trusty fingering chart from one of your band books or online ( http://www.public.asu.edu/~jqerics/HornFingeringChart.pdf ) and find a note that is in the middle of your current range that is comfortable to play. From there, work your way chromatically down as low as you can continue to get notes to speak. When you reach your lowest possible note, turn around and work your way back to to where you started. Now do the same thing going up. Go as high as you can without forcing and come back down. This is a great starting point for getting to know your way around the full range of the horn and you should start memorizing your chromatic scale as soon as possible. Then we need to work on major scales. Full range of the horn makes it possible to play every sca...
Post a Comment
Read more