The Musicians Library

Tip of the Month

When you play a fermata at the end of a piece (or movement),…: …always sustain it for, at least, 4 counts beyond when you think you should release it. Assuming you’re in tune and have a well develop sound, this can be musically effective with both loud and soft endings even if you choose not to change the note’s dynamic or vibrato during the hold. There are two prevailing reasons why sustaining a fermata longer than your natural instinct will be is a successful device *.

The physical stresses experienced by a performer are not shared by the audience. When holding an un-metered note at the end of a work, these stresses can often distort a performer’s (instrumentalist or conductor) perception of the amount of real-world time that has passed. When such distortion occurs, it almost always makes the performer feel that time is passing faster than it actually is. That is, a performer feels that they have held a note for a certain length of time only to discover later, during a timely review of the performance tape under less stressful conditions, that they didn’t hold the note as long as it originally felt to them. Many things can contribute to this phenomenon, including;

the technical difficulty of the held note

how well the performance has gone

the performer’s opinion of the music

the performer’s perception of the audience’s opinion of the music or performance

the temperature on stage

fatigue

the acoustics in the room

and any number of other factors.

In great performances, the pacing of the music, including its conclusion, is careful controlled by the performer(s). There is a natural sense of pacing at the ends of phrases and pieces which everyone, including the audience, feels. This can be observed when large groups of non-musicians sing together (e.g., hymns sung in church). When you end a piece with a held note, the audience has an idea of when the release will happen. By extending the anticipation of the release for a few more moments you unexpectedly, yet inoffensively, defy and surpass this communal expectation. During a loud, intense ending the audience is just waiting to burst into a fevered applause. During a soft, delicate ending they’re wait to exhale (emotionally) with the release. At this point, before relinquishing control of the moment, the most uplifting thing you can do is…
One of the important and distinguishing characteristics of an efficient chamber music rehearsal is…: …a streamlined verbal communication. Below is an example of a verbal exchange between Susan (clarinet), John (French horn) and Mike (flute) during an average student woodwind quintet rehearsal.
SUSAN: Uh, John, I think you may be a little behind in measure 12?

JOHN: Oh? Where? On the high note?

SUSAN: No. Actually, going into beat four.

JOHN: Oh. I thought I was right with you. You want to try it?

SUSAN: Yeah. Sure.

JOHN: …

SUSAN: …

JOHN: Where do you want to start?

SUSAN: How about measure 10?

JOHN: Okay.

SUSAN: …

JOHN: …

SUSAN: Mike, can you start us off?

MIKE: Where are you guys talking about?

SUSAN: Measure 10.

MIKE: With everyone?

SUSAN: Sure.

MIKE: Okay. One, two, three, {breath}…

The preceding exchange is quite common in chamber music rehearsals. Unfortunately, a lot of time is wasted and the pace of the rehearsal is bogged down by the players’ lack of verbal efficiency. The result is that they will spend less time actually playing and get less accomplished during the rehearsal. Here’s an example of a more streamlined “exchange.”

SUSAN: John, it sounds like you’re a little late or I’m early going into beat four of measure 12. Let’s try it again, with everyone, from measure 10. Ready? One, two, three, {breath}…

All the same information is there: what the problem is, where it occurs, the invitation to fix it by starting with everyone playing from a specific measure and the count off to start the ensemble. Notice how Susan doesn’t wait for a verbal response to her only question. The question, in this case, is more of a command: “Get ready.” She can visually confirm that everyone is ready rather than waiting for responses which may not come if her colleagues realize that the question is rhetorical. Inflecting it as a question is simply being more polite.
Following some basic guidelines during a rehearsal will speed you on your way to a quality performance:

Talk only of issues that affect the rehearsal at hand.

Use the minimum amount of words to communicate your point. You can work on this by limiting yourself to 10 seconds to make your point. If possible, try to inflict this limitation on your colleagues as well.

Only ask “real” (as opposed to rhetorical) questions when you can’t obtain the answer from listening to the particular passage being played. If you’re unsure about what someone is doing at a particular place, simply have the group play it again. This will develop your listening skills and avoids the possibility of someone inadvertently telling you that they’re doing one thing but actually doing something else when they play their instrument.

If you are the last (or only) person to bring up an issue, take responsibility for restarting the group at a specific place in the music. Much time is wasted when everyone sits and waits for someone else to take action. Luckily, this sense of responsibility is contagious and, once your colleagues see you with it, they will quickly want a taste of such power when they have the floor.

The more playing a chamber group does, the greater their chances of improvement. Focusing and trimming the dialogue during rehearsals will pay off with the musicians achieving their goals faster and giving them a greater sense of accomplishment for the time spent together. Eliminate inefficient dialogue from your rehearsals. If not, you may find that your rehearsals improve your group’s ability to be inefficient faster than its ability to play well!
How to begin practicing with a metronome is somewhat intuitive, however,...: …knowing how to use one to monitor and test one’s rhythmic develop is not. When you initially practice a piece, setting the metronome to click on every downbeat is certainly a good idea. The danger of setting the metronome this way is that a musician can become very good at “following” the metronome instead of internalizing the time. Once you are confident that your rhythm and tempo is steady while the metronome marks downbeats, it is important that you use the metronome to further test and, if necessary, solidify your sense of subdivision. This can be done using a couple techniques.
First, set the metronome to click on the upbeats. If you listen to rock music you’ll notice the “snap” in the time comes from the drummer striking the snare drum on beats 2 and 4. The bass drum hits on beats 1 and 3 have a relatively “fat” or “wide” articulation and doesn’t possess the same “pop” that energizes the rhythmic groove. Jazz musicians have always felt the rhythmic groove of the music through the “weak” beats (they, literally, snap their fingers to it). When practicing, this concept can effectively be extended to the upbeat.

It’s easy for a player’s weak sense of tempo to go unnoticed if they are playing with a metronome clicking downbeats. The articulation of a downbeat seems to be psychologically longer than that of an upbeat and tiny, unconscious adjustments can be made by the player in order to “stay with” the metronome. With the metronome clicking the upbeat, it is almost impossible to play more than one or two beats without first mentally establishing a strong sense of rhythm (folks with a weak sense of rhythm or those who don't subdivide the beat before they start playing even have trouble doing a count off and coming in with a metronome set this way). Ironically, when a strong sense of rhythm is present, a metronome clicking on upbeats reinforces this sense in the player and it becomes very easy to settle into a steady groove. This technique is a way of ensuring that your subdivision within each beat is even. If it’s not, the truth will become apparent much more quickly than playing with downbeat clicks, and, if it is, this practice technique will be very reassuring.

A second technique for testing and monitoring your sense of time is by having the metronome clicks spaced father apart. When you get to the point where you believe your time is steady, have the metronome click on every other beat (or every bar in 3/4 or 5/4 time), then every bar, then every other bar and finally have the clicks spaced as far apart as possible. Depending on the tempo of the music, this can be done by setting the metronome to half the tempo and/or (on some metronome models) setting the click/chime to sound only after a certain number of beats. Going through this process will make you very paranoid about whether you’re playing in tempo but will eventually make you more confident about your rhythm than playing with continuous downbeat clicks ever will.

Imagine, after incrementally spacing the metronome clicks farther and farther apart, practicing Stars and Stripes Forever with the metronome set to chime every six beats with the tempo set to 60 beats per minute. This would mean that the metronome would chime once every six measures! When you can do this successfully and consistently, you will have the mental concentration and confidence to do it comfortably and at any tempo.

The effective use of a metronome follows the same concept as that of a tuner and many other performance enhancing tools: At some point it must stop being used as a crutch and be set as a unaccommodating reference of one’s technical achievements.
When you absolutely, positively, have to get to a city for a concert or audition and your flight is canceled just minutes before it’s supposed to leave, don’t just get in line for rebooking with the rest of the passengers…: ...pull out your cell phone. If you’ve done a lot of air traveling, you’ve been the victim of last minute cancellations. They can happen while you’re waiting in the gate area or after everyone has boarded the aircraft. When a cancellation happens after you’ve boarded and you’re seated in row 25, don’t bother racing to get your luggage out of the overhead bins—you’re not going to be able to push your way to the front of the line. If you have to be in your destination city by a certain time and it doesn’t look like you’re going to be among the first in line at the gate counter for rebooking, use your cell phone to call the airline’s reservations desk (or, even better, their frequent flyer reservations number if you have an account).

If the weather is good, tell the reservations agent on the phone that you’re at the airport and you’d like to make a reservation for the next flight that will get you to your destination city earliest (which, depending on layover times, may not be the next flight leaving). If the weather looks bad for flying, ask to be booked to your destination on the next departing flight. Confirm with the phone representative that the ticket you’re about to purchase can be cancelled within 24 hours, give them a credit card number and get a reservation confirmation number and seat assignment. The phone representative may be unaware of the most recent cancellations so, don’t let them mess with your pre-existing reservation and be certain not to buy a ticket for that same flight that was just cancelled!

After you’ve booked your ticket, get in line for rebooking anyway. If the line at the gate counter is extremely long you may want to try your luck at an airport customer service counter for your airline if you happened to have noticed one earlier. When you finally do get face to face with an agent, see what he or she offers you. If the agent offers you a seat on the flight that you just booked by phone (or a better one) take it. After you get your seat assignment, call the reservations number back and, using your reservation confirmation code, cancel the reservation you made by phone (you can also ask the agent standing in front of you to do this). If the agent stays that all the seats on earlier flights have already been assigned and offers you a seat on a flight that is leaves much later than the one you got on the phone, simply let the agent know that you are holding a seat on an earlier flight. Give the agent the confirmation code and seat assignment and let them know that you would like to release that reservation and seat assignment to the ticket that he or she is currently trying to reroute for you. Any airline employee who has a few years of experience will probably smile at your ingenuity and be happy to swap the seat assignment. With less experienced employees you may have to talk slowly and explain what you have done. Once you have a boarding pass for the new flight, ask the agent if they would cancel the other reservation (the one that you made over the phone with your credit card). Even if they say they have done so, once you step away from the desk, call the reservations number again and verify with a phone agent that the reservation you made moments ago with your credit card has indeed been cancelled and your credit card will not be charged (you don’t want to pay for two tickets). Be sure to use the right confirmation number when cancelling the temporary reservation to make certain you don’t cancel the reservation that you’re actually flying on! Take note of both the phone and airport agent›s names, just in case.

To show that you’re a real road warrior, before you walk away from the desk, ask for an airport meal coupon. If your delay is the airline’s fault (e.g., equipment problems) and the delay is more than a couple hours, they will usually oblige. If you ask quietly, the gate agents will appreciate the fact that you took measures not to alert the other 200-plus passengers that meal coupons can be requested and they will be more likely to grant your request than risk you raising a disgruntled voice and enticing a mad rush of hungry passengers to the counter.

This double booking technique is not without its risks; don’t forget to cancel that extra reservation before that flight takes off, even it means calling and having a non-traveling friend wait on hold for 30 minutes for a phone agent to cancel it for you while you continue your travels—but, when you absolutely, positively, have to get to a city that day, you’ll have to weigh these risks against the risk of missing your concert.
Most audiences like it when a performer speaks to them at some point during the program. If you have trouble speaking loudly and clearly to a crowd, just remember…: ...the three “B”s.

Breathe. Take the deepest possible inhale you can before you speak and let the rush of exhaled air generate the power needed to project your voice. When you do this, don’t try to control the exhale too much. You’ll be surprised at how loudly you can speak without straining your voice or sounding like your yelling if you let your body naturally expel a full breath of air as you engage your vocal chords.

Bilingual. Imagine that the audience is learning conversational English as a second language. Whenever we meet someone who we believe is just developing their understanding of conversational English, we instinctively talk slower and more clearly. Simply trying to remember to talk slowly and clearly often does not work. Imagining you’re addressing a room full of Martian businessmen and women is just goofy enough to stick in one’s memory during the address.

Back of the Hall. Keeping the first “B” in mind, pick three sections of seating at the back of the hall: one straight ahead, one slightly toward your left and another slightly toward your right. Direct your speech to them (i.e., turning your head periodically to momentarily focus on each section). This will keep you from mumbling to the folks sitting in the first couple of rows of the hall. If the hall is so big and dark that you cannot see the seats in the back, direct your speech to the glowing exit signs along the back wall.

Feel free to invent an acronym of your own. If you do, be sure that it is simple, effective and just strange enough to be memorable. The old trick of visualizing the audience in their underwear may work to relieve nervousness but it won’t help your projection and, given the demographic of many classical music audiences, may even be uncomfortably distracting.
Are you the musician who knows that recording yourself is extremely helpful, but…: ...you still don’t do it as often as you should? Overcoming the hassle factor of dragging around a recording device can seem daunting, so, until you do, consider these options.

If you normal carry around a laptop, instead of leaving it in your locker when you practice bring it with you. There are free programs that come pre-installed with many operating systems (e.g., Windows› Sound Recorder) or are available on the internet that can do a modest job of capturing your sound. Many notebook computers even come with built-in microphones. Remember, you’re not trying to record a CD; you’re simply setting up a means by which you can reexamine what you think you are doing.

An even more convenient option is to use your cell phone. I’ve done this will much success and no hassle. Most cell phones have a memo feature by which you can record 10, 20 or even 60 seconds of sound. The tone quality is not very flattering; however, it is great for checking your rhythm and, to a lesser extent, your intonation. If you are practicing a passage and want to be certain your rhythm and tempo is unwavering, record a memo of yourself. If you have a phone where you have to hold down a button during the recording process an elastic band and a peanut M&M can easily replace a finger—and the M&M makes for a tasty treat when you’re done!

The most convenient option I've found is in the new wave of digital audio players (a.k.a. MP3 players). You can now buy an MP3 player the size of a tube of chapstick for under $20USD which are equipped with built-in microphones and can record hours of sound. Granted, they are design for recording voice lectures and the quality of the sound is not very good; but, if you want to check your rhythm or intonation on a given passage they do the job wonderfully! Add to that the fact that you can easily carry around a commercial recording of the music you’re working on and you have a practical and convenient solution to this issue.

Once you get used to the feeling of progress and accomplishment that recording your practice sessions generates, you’ll more easily overcome the hassle factor of using more appropriate recording equipment.