Ricco Kuhn maintenance

I took my horn to Wally's Music today, in Oregon City, OR, to see if they could determine why all the notes on the 1st valve, F-side, don't center. He examined it and said that there are no leaks, he blew compressed air through it, snaked it out, checked for solder in weird places. The only problem he could find is that there is a 1/16th inch gap between the crook and the inner tubing. Also, apparently my valves were never aligned/bumpers trimmed when I bought the horn, so I left it with him overnight. Let's see how much better it plays tomorrow.

sustaining air and sound, and pulling slides for intonation

Today I had a lesson with Larry Johnson. I played a number of excerpts, and he noticed two patterns in my playing.

I tend to drop the blow before I articulate notes, or toward the end of long notes, when I should be sustaining or increasing the air. In the Beethoven 3 2nd horn excerpt, I wasn't blowing through the first dotted-half-note In Shostakovich 5, the low tutti, I need to blow through the articulations, sustaining all the way through the phrase. And in the high, quiet solo, I should use subtle crescendi the beat before moving to give the phrase direction, as well as set up the slur.

The second pattern is that I don't always consider the key I'm in and treat the 3rds accordingly. He encouraged me to pull the slide that's used for the 3rd, if possible, or find fingerings that get everything in tune. It really helped, for example, in Gliere to use 3rd valve on the F side for the E at the beginning of the lyrical tune. Also, pulling T1 in Fidelio, or T2 in Brahms 1 call.

Tongueing

Julie Landsman was right, as usual. It does work best to tongue by only moving the very tip of your tongue, like saying "tssss-tsss-tsss."

Singing and the horn

I don't think any teacher of music would disagree with the statement that no matter which instrument you play, singing what you play, or at least its melody, is beneficial. It bypasses thinking, analyzing, and technical considerations, and puts you right at the point of creativity.

I have been finding that if I can take a snapshot of how I feel when singing emotively--feeling the rhythm and character in my body (so much that it makes me dance)--I can apply that feeling of singing to my playing, to great effect. It's just a matter of getting really into the music I'm working on, singing the melody, paying attention to how it feels to really sing, and then "sing" through the instrument. It works wonders!