BassoonPadwan

WOOOOOHOOOOO~!!!!! YEAHHHHH!!!! I GOT A 1 FOR THE FIRST TIME!!!!! I'm soooo pumped!! It's party time! I played at 3:40. My judge was Kristin Wolfe Jensen. She's really cool. I can see myself being one of her students.

I'm soooo PUMPED~!!!!!! YEAH!!!!!!!! WOOHOOO!!!111ONE1!!! Cannot wait.

Being a fellow bassoon player, I've had the exact same problem. I've pretty much fixed the problem for the most part now, and my band director sometimes tells us(there's one other bassoonist) to back off a little sometimes. And the sections I'm talking about aren't really that exposed either. I think that's great problem to have. =) All this advice that I'm about to give has been given' to me by great teachers not just stuff I've made up. I'm just saying that so you'll have an easier time believing stuff you here over the internet(I know I have to question some stuff I read): What I did with my playing is everytime I practiced, I push myself to play as loud as I can(soft as possible too), not gross, but everyday pushing myself to get louder. Work on your breathing too. Take as big and as fast a breath as possible EVERY time you breath. I'm 100% sure breathing will help you out instantly. You'll definitely have pipes after a month of this. Open up your mouth more. After you do this, you'll notice that your pitch will smack into the ground. You have to push the pitch back up with your air. Practice playing with that open sound and mouth at FF and pp while keeping the pitch in tune. Keep a good sound that's open even at pp. Next, up is....... LONG TONES!!! Dun dun dunnnnnn!!! I know. You hate them. I used to hate them. But I have to tell you, I freakin' love them now. They have been good to me. In my opinion, bassoonists especially, need to play long tones. I went to a little master class with the bassoon professor at UT, and she could not stress them enough! I've tried them out, and I've never looked back. My playing has One-billion% improved since I've started doing them regularly. I usually try to get in a good warm-up each day of a minimum of 20 minutes, to a max of about an hour. But I'm going to be a performance major soo........ I don't know if how committed you are to this stuff....... but that's just me. I'd say out of everything really this is the number one thing I would stress. In my experience, there is a little bit of a pain period in the beginning, haha, where you absolutely DO NOT want to do them. You have to push yourself past this and do them anyway. Once you see first hand how much they are helping you, you will want to do them, to get your "bassoon sound goin". And finally there's reeds. Yeah you're going to need a good reed. A good reed, should be able to play loud and soft and WHILE playing loud, it shouldn't be bright, ect. You know what I hate? Those little flimsy reeds that you can't push ANY sort of volume on and when you try, they squack!! I've had bad experiences with these, haha. So if you have one...... SMASH IT!!! j/k. A bad reed will screw you over no matter how good a player you are. So try and find a good one for you. My lessons teacher makes mine right now, and I'm in the process of learning, but I've been with her for about seven years now, and she's just starting to make them so that they are perfect, for the most part, for me. And I'm always changing a little, improving. I am also going to recommend a GREATTTT bassoon Cd if you don't have it. It's Shadings by Kristin Wolfe Jensen, the bassoon professor at UT. Try to emulate her open sound and volume. Itttttssss succcchh a good Cd! ALL bassoon. Hope you can take something away from this. =) Always willing to help a fellow bassoonist out and hopefully save some of your time to find these things by just learning them on your own. Any questions are welcome, and I'll do my best to answer them. Have a good day!

Thou shall not eat in uniform Thou shall not poor water down the mouth piece of a brass players instrument when they get up to use the restroom when sitting in the stands. Thou shall not rip off somebody else's gauntlet while they are wearing it, and throw it on the floor. Thou shall not give a *sigh* of exasperation, and moan and groan when the director says, "Ok, let's run that from the top". Thou shall not EVER walk to set when a director says, "Go to set 32". Thou shall not be low energy during marching band, no matter how tired. Thou shall respect every other band. Thou shall not put GATORADE in your water jug instead of water.lol

Bassoon

Our band was super dedicated two years. I really can't think of a single person who was not supportive and dedicated. I was a freshman then. Then last year with those seniors it was the exact opposite; they were so negative and unsupportive. That really pissed me off big time. I couldn't wait till they graduated. It shows in the show too. This year is like a GOLD MINE of dedication, he he. The freshman are so awesome. I know a lot of bands hate their freshman, but this year, they kick arse. The seniors are great examples, their attitudes are great. Sophomores and my class are awesome too; I couldn't ask for a better year this year. Assssssss a matter of factttttttttt, I think even the guard was for the most part drama free this year Don't see that too much, haha Ahhhhh the positive energy.

Hey, I can play Sax, Bassoon, and Euphonium. My first instrument is bassoon. So I've had experience with Single reeds, double reeds, and brass. Here is the order of difficulty IMO. Sax is the easiest of of them(single reeds, don't know about clarinet but I heard it's similar to sax) by far, then would have to be Euphonium(The only thing difficult{not too much though} was playing in tune, but I just started a year ago and I think that people who have been playing since say, 6th grade, should have fixed a majority of those problems...), then there's the monumentous monstrosity evil level of difficulty that is bassoon(for me atleast lol I hate it, and love it for that.). I've heard the oboe is really difficult as well. If you're wondering too if I just picked the instruments on the side and barely tried to learn them, that is not the case hehe. I tried to dig deep into those two instruments, practicing hours and hours on them( a lot of times neglecting the bassoon), 'cause I wanted to get to the level everybody else was at. I learned a lot about them......... In order funness, He He, I would rank Sax third. Bassoon's second(It gets really fun when you get to a certain level! At first though..... it's like pulling teeth). First to me would be Euphonium. It's great. Not too hard. Get to play loud( I really love this after playing bassoon all these years). Great sound too. Has some good/fun parts in marching band as well(which is why I learned it.) Best overall is Woodwinds for me though <3 ps. Yeah woodwinds is more than just pushing buttons also. lol My band director(he's a trombone player) sometimes says this when the brass play bad, "You guys, you know, have it harder I know, you have to do a lot more work. I mean these guys down here just have to push buttons and the notes comes out blah blah blah.....". I'd like to see him try to play my bassoon, and tell me it's just pushing buttons, haha.

This guy's pretty cool Can Gokturk - Can's Mood Can Gokturk - Blues improvisation (training) with Bassoon A little messy, but sweet nonetheless WOW!!! Flight of the Bumblebee, Terry Ewell, bassoon *Edit- Lol, pretty dumb Chasers War on Everything - Air Bassoon Championships Hope you enjoyed

That's amazing! I never thought of things like that! I played in an orchestra this past summer for five weeks. Two and half hour rehearsals everyday. I know what you're saying about the level of accountability being raised. I knew that I wanted to do something in music. I wasn't swinging towards mainly playing, but composing or maybe teaching. I also because of that experience, fell in love with orchestral music. You shed some more light on my situation. Thanks!

Insane! Haha

Ya, I got to play one. It was sweeeet! And...... dare I say?.......... I kind of liked better than............ basso............ naaaa, but it was wicked. Like the subwoofer of the orchestra. lol I played Britten- Requiem something something(don't remember all movements or exact name), and Richard Struass- Till Eulenspiegels Merry Pranks(that was funnn)! I had this great reed too. Man things couldn't get any better. The bassoon professor said told me that I have great contra sound. That felt good, after only practicing it for a week before a performance. And any concert band pieces that use contra.......? I remember two years ago in band we played Divertimento byyyy, gosh..... can't remember the name of the composer. Yeah my memory is bad. It had a contra part. I wish I had one right now. Man, that thing takes A LOT of air, haha. After that week of practicing that thing I had abs of steal. lol Not to mention after playing a few long tones, the dizziness, who needs drugs?lol Glad I didn't drop it when that happened. Hahaha, this brings back memories......

No, that guys comment just burnt me a little and I wanted to set him straight. I didn't mean the things they achieved dropped in their lap right now, but all the great middle school/high school band programs with years of experience and success they may have been "born" into. If you've had great instruction throughout your whole life you are just taught all these great things by some of the best out there........... you're bound to be something(yes there are always exceptions). Even if said person doesn't try as hard, he will most likely do better than the person who hasn't had the same opportunities who tries equally as hard. That's just how it is. Most people that go to Akins, don't come from well, *cough* really awesome band programs. So now my point was to that poster was that we've have worked immensely hard to get where we have in this short period of time. The guy who said, " that's the band who beat us? *sigh*" or something to that effect, just telling him that we deserved what we got. Not apoligizing for what I've said, just clarifying. Sticking up for my band. Here's a more recent video btw. It's a lot better than the first one. =) http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseacti...eoid=1450485384

If Denis Hopkins has his way, woodwinds will be in Drum corps =)

I go to Akins High. This is from my proud director. I thought it was really impressive and beautiful. Can be applied to many areas of expression in life, not just music. I'm really proud and content as well, and decided to share it with you guys. This is our personal experience.....

It has to be all the fun we've had, all the memories. Our band director's pretty crazy, he can get DOWN! Hahaha, there was never a dull moment. Just a huge string of good times running togethor and overlapping, it's impossible to isolate one. Actually, I can think of one......... one of the best things would have to be coming off the field, sweat running down your eye, shins burning, out of breath and staring up at the crowd listening to the applause. Reminiscing of the journey and work it took to get there. It's just amazing. ......... oh and there's the occasional time you're smackin' yourself because of the step off you missed or the interval problem in that one spot, haha =)

Sorry everybody else, I usually try to be as modest and high spirited as possible but I needed to say something.

Yup =) That's area. But our state prelims performance can't be touched haha *licks finger, touches butt while making sizzle noise* j/p We've come along way and deserved what we've accomplished. I've been associated with a few band programs and I've have to say, Akins band has the best student leadership, attitude, and work ethic I have ever seen. The kids that feed into Akins aren't fortunate enough to come from middle school band programs that as good as others, that doesn't bring down their(our) spirits though. It should be this way too. The rewards should go to the band that works the hardest, and not to those who might have gotten what they have by what has been "dropped" into their laps. Actually have to work for it. Put in a tape from just 2-3 years ago. It's almost inconceivable how far we've come. How does one achieve something like this "overnight"? Not by fortune or accident. Hard work.

Akins & Bowie............. mostly Akins =)

Hahahaha, ouch.

We had this freshman tuba player last year who couldn't to save his life, get through atleast two weeks of marching band without falling atleast once. He fell many time throughout the season, and one of the times he fell, he got his tuba bell to kind of be, folded over itself. He only fell once though at an actual performance. The one time he did fall though during a performance, we were in our second movement(there were four) which had a lot of velocity, and direction changes. Needless to say he didn't have the experience yet to get back in the drill. So he backwards marched to the back sideline and just stood at attention the rest of the show. Talk about EMBARASSING . A lot of people had a field day that night when we were watching the video.

We dance! *starts shaking butt*

Akins- The Pines of Rome

Hi! I'm a bassoon player(o rly?) from Akins High. I just want to wish everyone competing tommorrow a HUGE GOOD LUCK!!!!! HAVE A GREAT SHOW!!!!

Samuel Clemens.................. I'm sorry, I'm sure I've seen you guys............ I just am not able to recall at the moment, ya, my memory is bad Well I go to Akins. Hope you guys enjoy our show this year........