LentheLessons

StudioLenthe


Prelude


Barat
Andante et Allegro


David
Konzertino



Rimsky-Korsakov Concerto



Guilmant
Morceau Symphonique

Barat

Lesson 2

Technical twists - the tuplets

...or click here

The very first entrance provides a nice little technical nut to be cracked, and will lead us into some key aspects of articulation on the trombone. First of all, don't let the 16th note triplets lead you to play too fast here. At tempo 52 they are more rolling than barreling, and they should be played as lyrically as possible. Now granted, the 32nd note triplets in b. 4 - with 9 notes to a beat, are quick, but should still be played in a singing manner – with polished agility. Despite the relative quickness of these many notes, they can have a taunting, lingering quality, and should not sound hasty or athletic.

We will practice all of these figures. I count ten of them, all on the first page. One appears twice, so we really only have nine. Two of those are the quicker "nine-tuplets".  

It's a trombone thing....
(Playing against the grain)

These quick tuplets present a good opportunity to explore some slurring possibilities on the trombone.  On a valved instrument (this piece is very effective on euphonium!) the player could simply blow through the entire slurred tuplet passage, not having to give any thought or care to avoiding smears. While that concept of blowing through the phrase is very good, on the trombone we have to micro-manage a bit in order to keep certain connections from smearing, glissando-like from one note to the other. While one could lightly tongue each and every note of these figures, you will find that blowing your way through them while using the natural slurs, or the breaks between partials can be helpful and effective in achieving the beautiful legato delivery that this music calls for here. Some refer to this natural slurring as playing "against the grain". For example, changing from the very first d-flat to e-flat and back, you do not need to use the tongue. In the second 16th-note triplet, if you were to play the d-flat in 5th position (slightly lowered, for intonation purposes), you would have the same effect. Try it. See if you like it.

...or click here

The change between notes should not sound brittle or snappy. In the same manner, you could try your f in 4th position (slightly higher) in measures 6 & 8:

Mix and Match

Now, even using these positions with resulting natural breaks will leave some connections that must be articulated anyway. Coordinating between untongued, natural breaks and the articulated "otherwise-they-smear" connections (one could speak of inter-partial and intra-partial connections) requires advanced facility. 

If you are not really good at mixing and matching like this, I encourage you to work on this concept. You can pursue further refinement of these techniques in the context of your scale and arpeggio study (Schlossberg, Marsteller, Kopprasch, or similar). Mastering these techniques will enable you to explore and exploit a fuller gamut of trombone technique and expression.

A further twist
(legato multiple tonguing)

A further twist that could help is trying to lightly multiple-tongue these figures, or at least parts of them. Instead of the hard and precise TTK, TTK, TTK of the standard triple tongue, try the softer DGD, DG, DGD. This is a legato triple tongue. There are many possibilities that are worth trying. I personally use a combination of natural slurs and legato triple tongue, striving to make the natural breaks as smooth as the softly articulated connections, and the softly articulated ones as clean as the natural breaks:

measure 54

...or click here

Go through the Andante, searching out the 10 tuplet figures, and try out various ways of executing these.

Listen to this IU freshman before and after practicing the figure as suggested above (recorded in one of our Monday master classes):

Before:
or here...

After:
or here...

Even though his first attempt was already quite good, I hope that you can hear that it gained in smoothness and ease.

However you end up playing it, the end result should be a smooth, even execution of the tuplets. Strive to make the natural breaks smooth, avoiding a definite click or break between notes. Both the tongued and the natural connections should sound the same.

Even if you return your original instinct, you will at least know why – and be a bit wiser for having tried these possibilities.

So -- this lesson has taken us into some advanced articulation concepts on the trombone, and I encourage you to explore these in other parts of your practice as well. In lesson 3 we will begin looking at some of the phrasing possibilities contained in this beautiful Andante.

Lesson 3