Since joining the mhcc symphonic band as a first flute, i've had to sightread so many pieces, but this is one of my favorites. it's a celebration in metal, featuring brass and percussion. there are some nice flute solo/soli sections too, and we get to play up to high b flat (oh, about four of us and piccolo) and, wonder of wonders, we're actually in tune.

i'm playin tempered steel now and i love it. It's the marching band version and i cant wait to see how the sets will go along with the music!

Does anyone know were i can get a media clip of Tempered Steel?

A high school band playing it. Another one, a bit better. A CD of the North Texas Wind Symphony playing it.

I find this to be kind of boring for a grade six piece. it is to repeatitive for me, even the solos. i think there are much better pieces. such as "Blue Shades", "Vesuvies"(Frank Ticheli) "Morning Star" (David Maslanka)those pieces and "Tempered Steel" sound very wow when played right but they aren't very repeatitive.

we just started playing the piece and of course i am a bassoon player with a crappy part.

Hang in there. Eventually you may get to play cool parts. But you'll have to join an orchestra first. :)

i am in one thats why i say there is better music.

I know what you mean. In my experience Orchestra music was always leaps and bounds better than band music, for the most part. I mean, you got to play the occasional Holst or Percy Grainger, bust most band literature crap. That, and band instrumentation is pretty awkward to begin with. (I mean, who was the fuckhead who first thought 15 clarinets could play together, in tune, and sound good?) On the flip side, though, all of the bands I've been in have been great social orginizations, and the orchestras have been mostly snob filled cliquefests. Violin players, for the most part, are arrogant twits, and they generally dominate the orchestras. But the music is great and the musicians are usually more skilled than the bands. Anyway, my advice: if you want to always play good music find a great woodwind quintet. Bassoon parts generally suck. Or, better yet, branch out into older double reeds, and get yourself a shawm. Head out to a rennaisance faire and play in an early music band. That's a barrel of laughs. :)

What Antigone says. My little sister got carpal tunnel within four years of playing the bassoon, so take good care of your hands. If your write music, you may want to show it to your conductor. Most conductors are happy to work with you on your own pieces and this means you can play whatever you want!

For some reason yesterday I had this craving to listen to Mussugoursky's "Pictures at an Exibition" in the original two piano arrangement. Freaky.

i decided last night im going to learn to play the harmonica. nico bought me an "Ole Standby" harmonica and i've been 'playing' if for eva, but i sound like shit. what a hoot and what a party favor that would make me right? bust out the ole stand by and knock out "Jane Says" or "Yellow Submarine" on the harmonica?

I see what you mean. there is actually one piece that i have always wanted to play but no band director wants to play it because of the many soli's in every instrument. you may know it "Four Scottish Dances" (Sir Arnold) if you don't know it look for The Dallas Wind Symphony "Arnold for Band". not only is it a cool song it is played by a great band. The part i am talking about mostly is the second movement where the melody starts out at about 120 with bassoon and clarinet(3 clarinets ;) ). The melody is played in E flat and goes up to G one step at a time when it gets to G Major it then has this massive bassoon solo of the melody 3 times slower than ever played(representing a drunk man). I know i am self centered but i just hate it when the song is boring on my part. unlike "Finlandia" (Jean Sibelius) where my part isn't very important but i can enjoy playing.

I never "got" the harmonica. Though the jaw harp is extemely easy once you've got the technique down....

by the way what instruments do ya'll play

i play the doppler effect. those things are a bitch to tune.

Played "Four Scottish Dances" before. Actually got to play it for Malcom Arnold when I was on tour with the St Olaf Band in England back in '91. That were kewl. I play the bass trombone. Being a trombone player I'm used to having boring orchestral parts. But I really enjoy hearing a piece from inside the orchestra. Funny you should mention Dallas...that's where I live. The Myerson symphony hall here has seats behind the stage, and that's my favorite place to sit. (Right behind the trombone section, when they play. :D ) Makes me feel like I'm back in a section again.

Who do you play with? I'm actually a student in Irving. My Junior high teacher plays contra-bassoon with the wind symphony.

I Have a lot of respect for trombones. I had to play valve trombone for our marching band.

I play flute (see that first post, way up there? That was me, under a former name) and tenor saxophone. I dabbled in french horn and clarinet as well. I always wanted to play the bassoon, but to a twist of fate I became a flutist and my sister played the bassoon instead. I found out recently that she originally wanted to play the flute....

I started on a trumpet, but went percussion. . And the jaw harp.

> For some reason yesterday I had this craving > to listen to Mussugoursky's "Pictures at an > Exibition" in the original two piano > arrangement. the original "Mussugoursky" "arrangement" is for one "piano." which is not an "arrangement" it is the "original" that was later orchestrated/arranged by "Ravel" and then many "others" because "Mussugoursky" didn't know dick about "orchestration" but there is a morbidly interesting orchestration of "Pictures" by "Mussugoursky" that gets performed once in a while. Pictures has been arranged for multiple pianos, organs, bagpipes, accordians, harmonicas, car horns, whatever. but the original version was for solo piano.

"Picture's at an Exibition" is weird. The thought he could make fifteen movements for one museum is mind boggling. I wonder how long it took him though.

"Picture's at an Exibition" is weird. The thought he could make fifteen movements for one museum is mind boggling. I wonder how long it took him though.

"Picture's at an Exibition" is weird. The thought he could make fifteen movements for one museum is mind boggling. I wonder how long it took him though.

sorry for the repeat

I wanted to play oboe at first but then in sixth grade i had to make a choice because there wasn't enough oboe's. the other person wanted to stay on oboe and i went to bassoon but then the next week that person quit band. but i stayed with bassoon and have loved it ever since. i wished i would have played something less heavy but i got over and now im going to start on contra bassoon. i wonder how many of ya'll know what it looks like

Gods, man, never play the oboe. It will rot your brain. And I knew that talking about piano pieces would bring Mark out of the woodwork. :) Anyway, CM, I play mostly with a trombone choir these days. Other than that I play occasionally with local community orchestras when they need a sub bass trombone. (I actually sat in on a New Irving Philharmonic rehearsal a month ago.) I sometimes play in local community bands, but I've gotten so tired of band music that I only do it when my mom really wants me to. (Both my mom and her fiance are heavily involved in local community bands.)

The air force woodwind quintet came to play once at my highschool a few years ago. They have a guy that works with them, just arranging pieces so they can use a variety of different instruments. One was a variation on the crocodile theme from Peter Pan featuring contrabassoon and E flat clarinet. I think when intruments go lower they begin to look cooler and cooler. I was in a flute choir my senior year, playing bass flute and that was loads of fun.

I really dig the bass flute. Almost bought one once. Actually, I dig instrument consorts of all sorts. (Even clainet choirs, despite what I said above.) I guess it's the influence of all the renaissance music I've played. There's just something kewl about capturing a particular tone quality of an instrument and exploiting it to the hilt.

Kewl. Antigone said kewl. I'm debating right now on whether to buy a new flute or a computer. See I've been wanting this flute for the last five years or so but I don't have a computer of my own. Hrm.

hey pez. do your read the Mercury? we just got this weeks issue in the mail, the one with Jerry Masterson on the cover. That has to be one of the funniest weekly 'columns' ever.

Hey, Antigone ain't no square daddy who never says kewl. kewl?

The flute would be a more satisfying purchase, and would encourage you to play more. . But the computer would be good too. It's nice to have one of your own.

Oh, and I like kids, as long as I can give them back to their parents when I'm done with them. . The best kids are ones that can carry a conversation. The worst ones are the kids whose parents don't talk to them. If you try to talk to them, they either stare blankly at you with their mouths hanging open or ignore you... like dogs. . Of course, I'm not talking about babies. Babies are another thing entirely. . An example of this is the family that moved next door to my mother after I left home. 7 kids. The mother was a complete lunatic. All 7 kids were completely out of control, and she basically ignored them when she wasn't screaming at them. They destroyed that house before they were kicked out.

Uh, yeah. Wrong thread. Huh.

i been looking at buying the dulcian(i think i spelled it right) It is believed to be the first bassoon. but no one can prove it even though it looks like a small bassoon. that one and the true renaissance bassoons(classical composers years) there is one i have seen that is called a fagottino, it looks no bigger than 4 feet tall, the picture showed a fence that had the three horizontal beams and the fagottino fit between the two bottem beams.

of course i can top any of you on prices of these instruments. eventually in life, because this happens to all bassoonists, i will have to choose between a car and a bassoon.

True. Bassoons *are* mighty expensive. I should probably wait until I find a new living situation. I don't have room for a computer in my room here (besides, I can practically monopolize the communal computer) and any type of musical practice is uncomfortable to undertake (my imagined aura of hostility begins slamming doors even with pianissimo lullabies). No sense in doing anything now. The Mercury? Sometimes. Mostly the letters and "I Saw U"s. Julianne Sheperd is a cheap joke in the house.

My dad's a bassoon player, plalyed baroque bassoon with the Texas Baroque Ensemble. CM, if you ever want to chat bassoon lore with him I can give you his e-mail. :)

K...Had t post this. :)

kewl. thats ok.

thanks for the site Antigone, that was very uplifting to see what i get to do in college. Though i'm not going there.

What is "The Mecury"?

"The Mercury" (or "The Merc" as some call it) is an independent weekly here in Portland. It has two pages of new but its main focus is entertainment, catering towards the "Rock and Roll lifestyle". It's alright. Just like any other paper they tend to get facts wrong. Sometimes I get a good laugh because they start treating a friends house as a venue. Julianne Sheperd is "Look at me! I can Tap Dance!"

going back to tempered steel real quick. friday afternoon my school band let out and i went to the board at the front of class and put "Tempered Steel=Bolero"(I can explain if i need to) when the band director saw it he did not understand it. the problem is that he should be able to get it but he didn't even though he knows alot of music. Just thought i let you guys here that.

What, listening to Tempered Steel makes you want to get jiggy? He can't read your mind. Maybe you should explain it to him. Be patient with old people. :)

lol. some of my friends explained it to him. the only problem is that he is 30.

kiss my ass

Antigone- Just wanted 2 ask something Do you know how many tenor saxes were in any of those recordings you posted? My H.S. band doesnt have many "low" instruments so the Tenors (4 in total) have the main melody (excluding the brass parts) and i think my band director is an idiot for not using our ONE bassoon and 3 bass clarinets, all of whom are in the other period not playing this song. Am i right? thanks for the input. Also, thx 4 the songs. ...l8r............dont ask about the name >_>

I have no idea about the tenor sax thing. How could I? "i think my band director is an idiot" This seems to be a theme of yours. Stop calling people idiots and work on yourself first. You can start calling other people idiots when you're...oh...33 or so. "...l8r............dont ask about the name" If you didn't want me to ask you wouldn't have mentioned it.

If experience (and intelligence for the matter) comes with age, then my Director is younger than me. She repeatedly hires a guide for our band trips to an interesting country or countries, which we take once every 2 years. Last trip, she got drunk and ended up in a city 40 miles from our hotel in the house of her *random* cab driver, who she slept with. Since then she was fired for incompetence 4 fucking times!!!!! Also, I assumed you would know the number of tenors since, hmm; you’re the one who posted it. I assumed wrong. And I assumed that if I said not to ask about the name, it would prevent any fool from bothering to ask. BTW: Get a life outside of insulting kids, despite what little good it must do for somebody whose ego must be pretty damn small.

Just curious what is your "Real Life" name Crazy musician. I have a hunch i know who you are. :) (Hint: I also play in the IISD) Weird how i came across this board...

any director is an idiot if they don't use a bassoon player when they have one.

Damn right they are.... That bassoonist made all state band 3 years running and is going for #4

Eat dye and shit.

You know, it's funny to read this thread every once in awhile... this week my house was listed in the Mercury club listings.

We played "Tempered Steel" at my high school. Trombones finally got a cool part! Since when does THAT happen? Some of my friends and I actually joked around about playing "Tempered Steel" for our show next year in marching band. I think it'd be nifty, but hard on the brass player's chops.

Heh. i just found "Tempered Steel" online. not a bad song. it does seem like it would be a good marching song. btw, anyone know anyone who has recorded a 'good' recording of the third and second movements of "third suite" by jager? I've been looking for it for a while, all i've found are some half-decent recordings >.>

Oh, and about oboes, mentioned above? I remember hearing something about how the vibrations of the reed go to your brain and cause people to go crazy. lol Oh, and from the experience of playing oboe for 6-7 years (still going) i can tell you that i'm pretty sure it rots your brain. Fun to play once setting aside that small sacrifice

Yeah does anyone have a recording or clip of david maslanka's morning star. Email me a.manzanera@comcast.net

I was just thinking. I found another really awesome but 'repetitive' piece. It's an Eric Whitacre composition called 'Equus'. You can find a free recording on Eric Whitacre's website if you're interested. The piece is completely mezmerizing and is more interesting than Tempered Steel (which I also like). Equus modulates, changes like crazy, and literally never stops running. I don't know how any musician could survive this music. I've never seen the score, but I bet it looks like someone dropped an inkpot on it...

Hehe, funny how you sould mention Eric Whitacre. In band, i play oboe(i'm the only oboe in my highschool) and we are playing Tempered Steel and October by Eric Whitacre. They're both pretty awseome songs.

I'm one of 2 oboe players at my Highschool and we're playing Tempered Steel. Last year we played October and it was really pretty.

aww we have like seven oboes at my school. and we played tempered steel at graduation and october like two years ago? for contest. does anyone know were i can get a recording of morning star! by david maslanka

Well, I was going through sheet music for the band (section leaders do that boring crap sometimes) and I came across the original part that I had used about a year ago. Last year was filled with crazy seniors so I didn't expect any less from a very funny and another very stoned senior and what they wrote on the music. One block day (we take three classes each day on Wed and Thurs and we do 1,3,5 one day and 2,4,6 the other, so class time is doubled) I had been somewhere else when the mentioned seniors got bored out of their minds since the conductor was too busy correcting the clarinets to pay attention to the band so they began this epic story according to the music. As soon as I can get a blank copy, I'll show you what they wrote if you email me or something.

wow. we played tempered steel this summer. except compared to the recordings on here we played much faster. personally i think it sounds better that way

I heard a marching band play an arrangement of tempered steel, but they called it "fire" to fit in with their field show of the elements. It was done by the calgary stampede showband, and they took it at a really really really fast tempo compared to the recording here. I unfortunately cannot find a way to get a recording online. The show also featured Samuel Hazo's "Ride" as "Water". It also had excerpts from the Symphonies of Gaia for "Earth" and "Air". It was a rather cool show.

Hello everyone i was searching the web for a recording of Tempered Steel so i stumbled upon this page, it is a great piece of music, just finish perfoming it. I think this would make an Awesome Drum COrp show :)

hi i was doing the same...searching for a recording of tempered steel and i found the page. i must say, this is the hardest song ever. haha. of course i'm a 10th grader too...but oh my! i'm having a hard time with some of the fingering patterns in the 2nd part...with the high d flat high g flat stuff...i guess i'll get better with some practice though...i hope anyway.

you'll get there. i wish i could remember what it sounded like but it's been a long time. . . . trolls?

sorry im commenting on an earlier one but our highschool played october last year and it rocked my face off.. but we were sposed to play tempered steel this year but my director took and now we are playing it for our show next year during marching season...

Does anyone know where i can get a recording of tempered steel online?

Scroll up. The middle link on the fourth post above seems to still work.

I'm a flute player and my high school is playing tempered steel for our spring contest/concert. I'm on the 1st flute part, and it goes really high! lol I'm only a 9th grader.....and get this, there's almost 20 flutes going up to a high Bb! Talk about dog whistle...Anyways, for those of you who are doin tempered steel for a field show, I think it'll be incredible.

twenty flutes on first part?!?!?!?!?! i cant imagine that. that is insane. especialy going up to the hign Bb.. you must have a pretty big band. chronicdepantser... you played october? i love that song.

wow... this thread is really long !!! it dates back to 2001 !!! cheerios ! anyway.. i'm from Singapore and as you all might or might not know.. the band scene is quite big here as well... just heard tempered steel (i know you all think its passe and all) but i loooove it !! haha.. cool song... right now i'm in a youth wind symphony playing the tenor saxophone.. we're currently playing pieces like invictus (philip sparke), puszta (Jan Van der Roost) just to name a few major works... quite fun though i'd liek to play more challenging pieces.. right now, my few favorites are: Earth,Water,Sun,Wind (Philip Sparke) Spartacus (Jan Ven der Roost) Apocalyps II (Piet Swerts) Prayer (Hardy Martens) Year Of The Dragon (Philip Sparke) Movement For Rosa (Mark Camphouse) Watchman Tell Us The Night (Mark Camphouse) Sixth Suite For Band (Alfred Reed) you might wanna check them out for yourself.. really neat pieces !!

Hey band geeks, check it out.

Vivaldi is still the best,an amazing guy.

V, i liked tichavoksy!but excuse my spelling....

D,I allways understand your spelling,it is allways better than mine,I can post post in perfect English if I wish,but it involves dictionarys and a lot of time,so I dont bother any more,I just post,,,,its more "organic" dont you think? you know,it makes me laugh when I see a "Good ,ol boy" Sorabji takeing me to task over some shitty little error...you know what counts in a posting? content...most dont have it,we do,if I want,I can ignore you and shut you out,but I dont,as you have guts like me,look,to survive in this place,you need to be a "cenobite" like that movie about Hell...what was it.."Hellraiser"?...with a girl called "Kirsty" that needs to solve a puzzle?...I expect you understand.....more,I expect you have times when you wonder why you post to such fools? but we do,its what we are good at.To teach new things is allways good...and you know why I stay? because so many people tell me to fuck off,.....I dont take orders from anyone.,much like you.

This song is really cool. We're playing it for competition in San Antonio. I like the repetativeness of the piece. It's really a work out trying to play it up to speed.

Funny how everyone is also speaking about whitacre's october. We're also playing that song for San Antonio Contest. It is the coolest song i have ever listened to, i can never get it out of my head.

I dont know it but wish I did.

Hey Loser Bassoonist, what competition did u go to? We went to a competition in San Antonio too.

*sigh* Brings back memories. There was this girl, see. It was my freshman year in highschool and I went to a dance with my girlfriend, A. When we got there she immediately ditched me and made me dance with this other girl, M. I might have thought this odd if M hadn't been so enchanting. OK, she was fucking hotttt... Anyway, I ended up breaking up with my girlfriend after that. Seems she was trying to hook up with a guy at the dance, who coincidentally ended up being M's date. Funny, that. Also my girlfriend pretended she was pregnant for a couple of months. This was not fun. Not. Fun. But, that's beside the point. A few months after that I was in Nashville with my highschool band at a contest. Turns out another Dallas band was at the contest, and they were also staying at the same hotel. Guess who was there? Turns out M was a tuba player with the other band. (I played trombone.) It was love at second sight, I tell ya. We were inseperable for about a year. Until she was institutionalized. Something has me recalling those days. I must be having a highly hormonal spring.

If anyone knows where i can find a recording of symphonies of gaia i would love you forever Email me Jmonday1@utk.edu

hey, antigone, im really glad to find a place where everyone talks about these things, i of course am a bass trombone player myself, i plan to go to UNT to play, gah i love it, email me MoleofFury@yahoo.com

last night i fell asleep listening to brazilian jazz on the radio. i start dreaming about "crouching tiger hidden dragon" type marshal arts figures. except they were all singing in portuguese. it was like chinese opera composed by antonio carlos jobim.

Chat here, Mr BassBone.

hey, im a junior in high school, but i im trying to become a professional trombone player, i already live in the state of texas so going to UNT would just be an in-state school, do you go to college antigone or grad?

Graduated in '93. I played in college but haven't done anything much professionally. Mostly I play in a trombone choir here in Dallas. I think my last paying gig was December '03. If you're looking to become a professional player, UNT is definately a good pick if you're a jazzer. Otherwise you may be SOL in Texas. Have you picked out a piece for this year's UIL solo and ensemble contest? If not, I'd suggest either selections from bach's first cello suite or Donald White's "Tetra Ergon." (Also, buy a Douglas Yeo bass bone mouthpiece. They're a touch pricey but well worth the investment.)

Two years ago, our Symphonic Band was given a copy to play. It's awesome! Us tubas and bass trombones loved all the soli's We were the first band in Australia to ever play it. does any one have a audio file with it?

Our high school band consisting of 55 members or so has just begun this peice. Its a lot of fun! We're a really not-wonderful band (haha) but its fun! Our teacher wants us to play it for our Spring Concert. WTC!? Oh well, we're all working pretty hard on it. Loving the audio files, too. Thanks!

Hello fellow bassoon player! I'm working on tempered steel right now and although I'm not a big fan of the part for me it's fun to be part of the ensemble. The top band, orchestra, and choir at my school got selected to take a once in a life time trip. So I'm gonna end up playing Tempered Steel and Dvorak's New World at Carnegie Hall. I'm so excited it's not even funny anymore. I've also fiddled with the contra-bassoon some but I found that me being me, standing up straight I make five foot and my hands are tiny, it was more trouble than it was worth. I loved the sound though, I just can't pysically play the damn thing for more than about 10 minutes.

Don't give up the contra. Live low, live happy. I just bought a contrabass trobmone mouthpiece for my bass trombone. It's fuckin' AWESOME, I must say. I can easily hit the lowest note possible on the horn. (double pedal A) If I had $12,000 to blow I'd get me one of these: linky Rath contrabass trombone. :)

oooh, pretty. trombones are fun to chase kittens with.

hey, the wind ensemble i am a part of played this for a state band clinic in mississippi. it was my favorite piece i've ever played. the xylophone part is a lot of fun.