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View of electronic drum kit.

Electronic Drums 101

Written by Mike Lewis on . Posted in Electronic Drums.

If you’re a first-time shopper — or even if you’ve been playing acoustic drums for years — buying an electronic drum kit can seem like a daunting task. But with all of the advances in technology and the multitude of options available today, now is a great time to jump into that arena.

In addition, parts of an electronic kit can be incorporated into an acoustic kit to create a hybrid kit, giving you the best of both worlds. Parents of budding drummers should also bear in mind that a starter electronic drum kit will allow your son or daughter to practice quietly, and then down the road move on to an acoustic drum kit as their skills develop.

In this article, we’ll take a close look at the components of a standard electronic drum kit and talk about the features you should look for when making your shopping choices.

Components

As shown in the illustration below, a typical five-piece kit will include a snare pad, three tom pads and a kick pad, plus two or three cymbal pads and a hi-hat pad. The hardware will typically include a drum rack (with module, snare, tom and cymbal mounts) and the sound module itself.

Electronic drum kit.
Yamaha DTX6K-X electronic drum kit showing various components.

Sometimes pedals are included too — for example, the Yamaha DTX402 electronic drum kit comes with two of them. All you’ll then need to round things off is a throne (a drum seat) and a high quality set of headphones or a drum amp to hear yourself.

Let’s take a closer look at the main electronic drum features you should look for:

Features

Snare drum and tom pad surfaces will typically be made from a combination of plastic, rubber, mesh or TCS (textured cellular silicone); the latter is used by the Yamaha DTX-PAD. Each surface will have its own feel and degree of acoustic sound (yes, even pads make some acoustic noise, and this can be a factor if you require significant sound isolation), with sizes ranging from 6″ to 14″.

Here’s a video showing the differences between a standard rubber pad and the Yamaha DTX-PAD:

Cymbal pad surfaces will generally be made of plastic, acrylic, metal or rubber. Like drum pads, each cymbal pad surface will have its own feel. Typical sizes range from 10″ to 15″.

Kick drum pad surfaces are usually made of rubber or mesh, but there are also beater-less kick pedals. These operate without striking a pad, and work great for those who have noise restrictions, but if you want the feel of playing on an acoustic bass drum, choose a pad that allows you to use a real bass drum pedal; some will even let you attach a double bass pedal.

Trigger Zones

This refers to the number of areas on a pad that can trigger separate sounds. A one-zone pad can only be used to play a single sound, while a two-zone pad can trigger two separate sounds. Yamaha even makes three-zone pads that can be used to play three separate sounds; the XP80 DTX-PAD also supports open rimshots and closed rimshots, plus you can assign different voices to different zones. This makes highly original performances possible. For example, you can create an acoustic drum sound when you hit the head area, a cowbell sound when you hit the open rim area, and a loop sound when you hit the closed rim area.

Mounting Hardware

Your options here are to use either a drum rack or standard acoustic drum hardware. Whichever you choose, you want to make sure to select hardware that is durable and dependable so you get the most use without having parts break down.

Racks are great if you’re not likely to be moving your drum kit from one location to another very often. However, if you are planning on using your electronic drum kit on gigs, you might want to think about using acoustic drum hardware instead, since it will make it much easier to pack up and transport your rig.

Drum rack on left; acoustic drum hardware on right.
Sound Module

This is the heart of every electronic drum kit. It’s where you plug in your pads or triggers, adjust the trigger parameters, choose which sounds are assigned to each pad and set up collections of sounds (typically called “drum kits”) so you can make fast adjustments from song to song — or even within a song. The outputs of the module are connected to a drum amp, your band’s sound system or your trusty headphones or earphones so you (and your audience) can hear your playing.

Most modules offer the following features:

1. A built-in metronome
2. Recorded songs that you can play along to
3. An auxiliary input for hooking up an audio player so you can play along to your favorite songs
4. Training exercises designed to make you a better player

Many electronic drum manufacturers also offer apps that allow you to control the module from your own smart device. Using these kinds of apps makes operation of the module easy and intuitive, while at the same time adding more features. There are numerous Yamaha DTX apps, for example, that allow you to make custom kits, edit sounds, play along to songs in your smart device, set up the metronome, do firmware upgrades right to your module and adjust the triggering parameters for your playing style … all with just a simple swipe. For more information, see our blog article “DTX Apps Make It Easy.”

Additional Features

Like acoustic drum kits, electronic drum kits come in many models. As you move higher up in price, the number of features also generally increases.

View of advanced drum kit from above.
An advanced electronic drum kit.

Here are some upgraded features to look for:

1. More drum and cymbal pads
2. Larger size drum and cymbal pads
3. Upgraded hardware

In addition, many advanced sound modules will offer additional features such as:

1. More individual sounds
2. Higher quality sounds including samples of real acoustic drums
3. More inputs for adding tom or cymbal pads
4. Individual audio outputs instead of just the standard stereo outputs
5. Sample import so you can load in your own sounds

Above all, you want to purchase a kit that is durable, dependable, and will last you for years. Remember: This is a product that will be beat on and used a lot, so make sure you choose a good quality kit the first time. Taking this approach will definitely save you money in the long run!

Photographs courtesy of the author and Kunhardt Photography.

Click here for more information about Yamaha electronic drum kits.

 

Black heavy speakers with an amplifier.

Bringing Bluetooth® to the Stage

Written by Rich Tozzoli on . Posted in Live Sound.

Anyone who has set up a PA system for a performance, presentation or party knows just how complicated it can be. You’ve got heavy speakers and amplifiers, confusing cables, a mixing board, effects boxes, and of course the cases and bags for it all. Then you have to figure out how to plug in all the wires, instruments, microphones and music sources. However, with the new Yamaha STAGEPAS 400BT and 600BT, life just got a lot easier.

These systems are simplicity itself. Each consists of two lightweight speakers, a pair of color coded speaker cables, a power cable, and a detachable mixer (with onboard effects) that fits neatly into the back of one of the speakers — and that’s it! With so few pieces to set up, you can have a powerful PA up and running within just a few minutes, quickly turning any space into a stage.

Yamaha PA system.
STAGEPAS 400BT components.

It’s easy enough to plug in guitars, amps, keyboards and microphones, but it’s wireless Bluetooth connectivity that makes the 400BT and 600BT truly special. For anybody who has had the unpleasant experience of trying to connect a smartphone or tablet to a mixer using complicated and confusing cabling, this is a dream come true. Instead of figuring out what wires you need, all you have to do is pair your device via Bluetooth and you’ve got instant audio streaming of backing tracks, break music, loops, even software instruments — all from up to 33 feet away, allowing you to place the device where it is most accessible and/or safest.

A single Bluetooth button/LED is used for easy pairing and also switches Bluetooth connectivity on or off. When the LED is off, Bluetooth is off; when lit steadily, it’s on. When flashing slowly, it’s waiting for a Bluetooth connection; when flashing fast, the STAGEPAS is paired with your device.

There are plenty of input channels, power and connection options on both models to cover most small- or medium-sized venue music or public speaking needs. The 600BT offers 680 watts of power and 10 mixer channels, including four mic inputs (two with phantom power); each of its speakers provide a 10″ woofer and a 1-1/4″ tweeter. The 400BT features 400 watts of power and eight mixer channels, again including four mic inputs, two with phantom power; each speaker is outfitted with an 8″ woofer and a 1″ tweeter. Each system also allows you to connect one or two onstage powered monitors such as a Yamaha DBR Series. If you need additional low end, you can also connect a powered subwoofer such as a Yamaha DXS Series to the dedicated Subwoofer Output jack. A Master Level control lets you determine the volume of the L/R speakers with a single knob, and there’s an equivalent Monitor Out control for the speaker(s) connected to the Monitor outputs.

Two pieces of PA equipment.

For tonal adjustments, there’s an independent two- or three-band equalizer on each channel, with up to 15dB of boost or cut. (The 600BT offers High, Mid and Low bands, while the 400BT provides High and Low bands.) There’s also a simple one-knob Master EQ, which you can use to tailor the system for optimum Speech, Music or Bass Boost usage. Another welcome feature is feedback suppression, which helps target and reduce frequencies that might cause feedback before they can be heard (and before they cause the audience to go running for the exits!).

Need effects? The STAGEPAS 400BT and 600BT have you covered. An onboard professional quality SPX digital reverb (based on the famed standalone Yamaha SPX effects processors) gives you the option to choose from Hall, Plate, Room or Echo. Reverb can be added individually to channels 1 – 4 (at whatever amounts you desire), plus turning the Type/Time control to the right lengthens the time of the selected type. You can also use a footswitch to turn off all reverb — very useful when MC’ing a live event since it allows you to sing with reverb and talk between songs without it.

But it’s the small details that make these systems so flexible. For example, various inputs that accept stereo phone (1/4″), stereo-mini (1/8″) and/or RCA jacks. Or ST/MONO switches that allow you to assign the L and R signals to the equivalent left and right speaker outputs (when set to STEREO), or to mix them to both the left and right speakers (when set to MONO). In addition, a Hi-Z switch on channel 4 enables you to connect an instrument such as electric guitar, bass or keyboard directly without the need for a DI box — one less accessory to have to carry to your event and hook up.

With STAGEPAS BT, you can set up a fully functioning Bluetooth-capable PA system in no time at all. Lightweight, portable and powerful, these systems are ready to make your events shine!

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha STAGEPAS BT systems.

How to Get Funds from ESSA’s Title IV-A Grant Program

Written by Marcia Neel on . Posted in Funding.

Updated 6/22/2020  

Every year, I have the privilege of attending the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) Music Education Advocacy Fly-in in Washington, D.C.

The goal of this program is to train NAMM members about the policies and priorities of the current administration so when we meet with our members of Congress, we can better advocate for the importance of music education.

This year, we were unable to attend in person because of COVID-19, but we received training through the NAMM Advocacy Summit and are now equipped to accomplish the same goals virtually.

I always learn so much in a few short days at the fly-ins. In recent years, one of the most helpful and talked-about topics has been how to access Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) funds, and this is what I want to pass along to music educators who do so much with so little.

ESSA Background

When ESSA passed with bipartisan support in December 2015, music educators around the country stood and applauded. The act not only called out “music” and “the arts” in its definition of a “well-rounded education,” but it also allocated resources to provide that well-rounded education.

Under ESSA, the highest poverty schools benefit the most from Title I funds. For FY2020$1.21 billion was appropriated through ESSA’s Title IV-A flexible block grant program known as Student Support and Academic Enrichment Grants (SSAE). That’s a lot of money, but accessing it requires a little effort.

Ask and Keep Asking

The most important thing to remember is that the Title IV-A (SSAE) grant program is an ANNUAL source of federal funding to states — and subsequently, to districts — which is why it is vital to keep asking every year for funds to help serve more students. Start with your principal, arts administrator or the specialist charged with applying for federal funds. Ask them if your school/district has submitted grant applications to your state to receive these SSAE resources.

If SSAE funds have been applied for — and potentially already received — in past years, ask how to leverage these resources to meet the needs of your music program so that it may be expanded to provide equal access to all students, which is another ESSA tenet. For updated information on the funding process itself, check out this infographic from the Title IV-A Coalition.

Perform a Needs Assessment

Next, perform a needs assessment. If you’re not sure how to do this or where to start, the National Association for Music Education (NAfME) can help. Its Opportunity to Learn Standards (OTLs) document specifies the resources your school should provide to give students a “meaningful chance to achieve at the levels spelled out in the Core Music Standards.”

Many programs in a variety of states have benefitted from this resource. The NAMM Foundation recently revealed that 277 school districts reported using Title IV, Part A (SSAE) funds during the 2019-2020 school year for music education.

Start With a Simple Search

Most school administrators now know about ESSA’s Title IV-A SSAE grants, but they may not realize that these funds can be used for music programs. Start by searching “Title IV-A in (insert your state).” This should take you to your state’s Department of Education (DoE) landing page that provides a vast amount of information regarding the use of these funds. You are looking to discover how SSAE funds are allocated to support well-rounded education opportunities.

As an example, I searched for “Title IV-A in Colorado” and was taken to the CDE Title IV-A landing page, which provides a “Use of Funds” section that lists, among other offerings, music and arts programs as eligible activities “to support well-rounded educational opportunities for students.”

Next, contact the person at your state DoE whose is responsible for education in the arts. Because these are federal (i.e., public) funds, you should be able to find information on which districts/schools have been awarded these grants in the past and for which programs. Check the State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education (SEADAE) roster to find your state’s arts representative and his/her contact information. Simply reach out to your state’s SEADAE representative and ask how you might be able to view the list of SSAE grantees from past years. If you find that music programs in your state have benefitted from these grants, contact that school to determine how the funds were used. If there are no music programs indicated, take your plan to your supervising administrator and go from there.

Finally, be sure that your plan addresses the intended purpose of the Title IV-A (SSAE) grant program. In Colorado, the purpose is stated on the DoE landing page as follows:

“Title IV, Part A of the Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015 is intended to improve students’ academic achievement by increasing the capacity of States, local educational agencies (LEAs), schools, and local communities to provide all students with access to a well-rounded education, improve school conditions for student learning, and improve the use of technology in order to improve the academic achievement and digital literacy of all students.”

Many music educators believe that applying for a grant is a complicated procedure but it starts by simply asking questions to learn how federal funds are applied for and allocated in your own district. In some states, the application that districts use to apply for these funds from the state is a one-page document. Don’t let the process scare you (or your principal) away from providing more students with access to a well-rounded education through music.

Change Lives

Those of us who continue to attend the NAMM Fly-in do so because we know that becoming a more informed advocate translates into serving increased numbers of students with life-changing experiences. Title IV-A (SSAE) provides that opportunity. Music educators just need to take that first step.

Resources

Yamaha is an active advocate for music education, and we want to empower music educators to strengthen their programs in any way we can. Please register for the Yamaha Educator newsletter to read up on advocacy, professional development, information about instruments, resources, partnerships in education and more. Join the Yamaha Music Educator Community on Facebook or email us at educators@yamaha.com.

The Art of Arranging

Written by Howard Massey on . Posted in Creativity. 1 Comment on The Art of Arranging

September: The last rays of summer, the first blush of fall … and, for many of us (or our kids), back to school.

This time of year I often find myself reflecting on my own school days. I wish I could say that I had many influential music teachers who shaped the course of my life, but the truth of the matter is that the state of public education in Brooklyn, where I was raised, was woefully inadequate in that area, at least in the years that I was a cog in the system. I did have one pretty cool professor at the university I attended — a gentleman and scholar by the name of Peter Winkler, who actually viewed popular music as worthy of study, in stark contrast to most of his rather snobbish peers, for whom classical was the only music to be taken seriously.

Fortunately, I think most people had a better scholastic experience. I know that Brian Wilson, the famed leader of the Beach Boys, did. In his 2016 book I Am Brian Wilson, he talks about a high school music teacher by the name of Fred Morgan, who actually failed the burgeoning young composer because Brian didn’t know how to write classical music. Despite that, writes Wilson, “He got me thinking about some of the different ways music can work. … He taught us that music was a contrast, pale parts versus emotional parts, and that not all the instruments in a song had to go in the same direction.”

What Brian’s teacher was talking about, of course, was arrangement — the art of bringing variety to a melody, and an integral part of what makes a piece of music special.

The classical world has offered brilliant arrangements and orchestrations for centuries. From Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony to Ravel’s Bolero to Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite to Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, composers have found imaginative ways to utilize and blend the tonalities of traditional instruments — and sometimes non-traditional ones too (think Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, with its climactic volley of cannon fire). The same can be said of the jazz and big band arrangements of Duke Ellington, Billy Strayhorn, Glenn Miller, Count Basie, Nelson Riddle, Quincy Jones and others.

But it can be argued that until Sir George Martin brought his classical training to the melodies of The Beatles, arrangement usually played only a very minor role in pop music. Songs written in that genre tend to be played by very small ensembles consisting of guitar, keyboard, bass and drums, sometimes augmented by a saxophone and/or small horn section. (The exception, of course, being Phil Spector productions!) Sure, most pop and rock records start off soft and end loud, with dynamic and tonal contrasts between verses and choruses, as well as layers of instruments and vocal harmonies being added as the song goes on — but that’s about it in terms of arrangement. Martin brought a deft touch and enhanced instrumentation (much of it symphonic) to many of the Beatles recordings — particularly later ones, like “Hey Jude” and “Something” — that gave pop music a new degree of sophistication and made it more interesting to the ear. Since then, modern-day producers such as Max Martin, Mark Ronson and Paul Epworth have taken up the mantle, bringing sonic diversity to contemporary hits.

Brian Wilson playing a grand piano.
             Brian Wilson … then and now.

Brian Wilson — who, despite failing music in high school, went on to become one of the most significant composers of the 20th century — became a master arranger too. Nowhere is this more evident than on the 1966 Beach Boys Pet Sounds album, which features Brian’s spectacular arrangement of the traditional folk song “Sloop John B” (incredibly, created in just one night, yet so much more intricate than the rather pedestrian Kingston Trio version he based it on). It’s also an album that boasts a ton of “ear candy” courtesy of esoteric percussion instruments such as sleigh bells, timpani, güiro, vibraphone and bongos … supplemented at times by empty soda cans and water bottles.

Even before Pet Sounds, Wilson had taken the art of arrangement to a whole new level by using the human voice as a primary instrument. As his brother (and fellow Beach Boy) Carl once explained, “Our vocals were voiced like horn parts, the way R&B records make background vocals sound like a sax section. It sounded big, because the four parts were all within the same octave; that was really the secret. [Brian] used a lot of counterpoint, a lot of layered sound; it had a real depth to it. We didn’t just duplicate parts; we didn’t just sing octaves; that would sound really lame.”

There are many examples of genius in Brian Wilson’s vocal arranging skills. Check out the stunning a cappella breakdown in “Sloop,” or in the lesser-known “Heroes and Villains,” or the round that concludes “God Only Knows.” You’ll hear a depth of complexity cloaked in an illusion of simplicity — much the same way virtuoso instrumentalists make everything they play look easy.

So next time you listen to a piece of music, try to focus on all the embellishments and underpinnings swirling around the central melody instead of just the melody itself. You may be surprised at just how much is going on beneath the surface!

Photo courtesy of Beachwood Entertainment Collective

 

Check out Howard’s other postings.

Electric basses in rack onstage with amps.

Choosing the Right Bass Guitar, Part 2: Active vs. Passive

Written by Michael Gelfand on . Posted in Bass. 1 Comment on Choosing the Right Bass Guitar, Part 2: Active vs. Passive

Perfection is in the eye of the beholder, and perhaps nowhere more so than when defining the perfect bass guitar. As we discussed in Part 1 of this article, some players prefer four strings on their instrument, while others want five (or more). Some say long scale, others say short scale. Solid body or hollow body, bolt-on neck or neck-through, fretted or fretless … the list of differentiating and distinguishing features, qualities, characteristics, specifications, materials, designs and components goes on and on.

Yet whatever your preferences, there always seems to be just enough logic to keep the argument festering. And so, in that spirit, let’s focus here on one of the trickier decisions you can make about a bass guitar: Active or passive?

An active bass is an instrument equipped with an onboard, internally-mounted, battery-powered preamp (usually nine volts but sometimes 18 volts) that boosts and equalizes the pickup’s signal before it arrives at the output jack. In some cases, an active bass will even be equipped with pickups that require power. In contrast, a passive bass has none of the above … and to confuse things even further, some basses are switchable between active and passive modes.

So which should you choose?

On the surface, the debate between active versus passive may appear to be between new-fangled complexity and tried-and-true simplicity. But as you may have already guessed, it’s far more complicated than that. So without further ado, let’s explore the pros and cons of each:

Active: The Pros

Bassists often use adjectives like “snappy,” “sparkly” or “sizzling” to describe the sound of an active bass. These descriptions are likely attributable to the fact that active basses enable you to shape your tone much more than a comparable passive bass.

A bass guitar.
Yamaha BB734A.

The tone controls on a passive bass can only cut frequencies, but the tone controls on an active bass allow you to boost frequencies too, giving you much more flexibility. This can be especially helpful if you play in a cover band where you need to wander across a diverse tonal landscape during a set, or if you want to dial in a specific signature sound for a specific genre like slap or grind metal. Many active basses have three- or even four-band EQs, letting you select specific frequencies to sculpt your bass sound before your signal even gets to your amp. Several Yamaha basses are equipped with three-band EQ and active/passive electronics, including the BB700 Series and the TRBX600 Series.

In addition to greater tonal control, active basses introduce far less noise and interference than passive basses, as well as delivering a stronger signal with less degradation than their passive counterparts. This gives your amp a cleaner, much hotter signal to work with. Bear in mind, however, that you can always roll off the volume slightly on an active bass to reduce some of the hi-fi qualities for a more “passive” sound.

Active: The Cons

To the ears of those who prefer passive basses, active basses aren’t very dynamic sounding. Sure, their signal is hot and consistent, but it can sound compressed. In addition, putting all of that frequency boosting control in the wrong hands can lead to a painful amount of ear-splitting hiss if treble frequencies get cranked too aggressively.

Also, if you’re the practical type, you also need to be fully aware that when the battery in your active bass dies, your sound will die with it … unless, of course, you have a bass that’s active/passive switchable. Changing out a dead battery for a new one on an active bass with a hinged battery compartment isn’t a big deal in theory, but only if you’re prepared with a fresh battery. If you don’t have a fresh battery on hand, or if your bass’ battery compartment is accessible behind screws, it’s a huge deal … especially if you’re on stage, in the middle of a set. It’s like getting a flat tire in your car and realizing that the spare is in the garage or doesn’t have air in it. And on the same note, players who habitually leave their instrument cable plugged in should be aware of this painful fact: If you do that with an active bass you’ll be draining and replacing batteries faster than you can say “a pack of fresh 9-volts, please.”

Passive: The Pros

A bass guitar.
Yamaha RBX170EW.

Bassists often use adjectives like “earthy,” “warm,” “full,” “punchy” or “round” to describe the sound of a passive bass. That’s likely because passive basses rely on less circuitry than their active counterparts, and so they deliver a sound that’s more pure, and more sensitive to “touch” from a player capable of finessing real dynamics out of their instrument. Yamaha offers a wide array of passive basses, including the RBX Series and most of the BB Series.

The tone controls on a passive bass are much simpler than those found on active basses. No micro-switches or tiny pots inside the control cavity to tweak, no hissy highs or blossoming bottoms to contend with. Just straightforward tone and volume controls that are wide open when rotated to the right, and cut frequencies or volume when rolled off to the left. This leaves you with a more dynamic attack that doesn’t have to fight against the compression inherent in many active bass circuits.

Playing a passive bass means not ever worrying about what can go wrong with onboard active electronics. Sure, something can go wrong with any bass, but there are less connections, components, and overall circuitry that can develop issues — no batteries that can run out of power in the middle of a set or session, no circuit boards that can work loose, and fewer wires to become unsoldered. And while you may not have the steroidal tone shaping of an active bass at your fingertips, you can always get the extra oomph from any decent quality bass amp — its tone shaping capabilities should at least be comparable to that of an active bass.

Passive: The Cons

There’s no getting around the fact that the signal coming from a passive bass is not as strong as on an active bass. That doesn’t matter if the pickup on that bass is delivering a sufficiently “hot” signal, but if it’s actually weak, that’s a bonafide problem, especially if you use long cables and don’t have the best amp in the world. In such instances, you might actually introduce noise and RF interference from nearby computer monitors and fluorescent lighting. In addition, compensating for weak output often requires you to rely on your amp’s gain, and doing so may mean introducing undesirable but very audible noise from the amp’s circuitry.

Clearly there are upsides and downsides on both sides of this debate, but if you want the best of both worlds you can always consider a bass that comes equipped with an active/passive switch to change how the signal courses through your bass’ electronics. When it’s in active mode, you get the hotter signal and monstrous tonal shaping capabilities. And when it’s passive, you get the dynamic control and safety net in case your battery gives up the ghost.

One last note: Regardless of whether you prefer active over passive or vice versa, remember that there are lots of other variables that will contribute to your sound. If you’re fortunate enough to find a bass that meets most, if not all, of your criteria, all of these nuances will become irrelevant as you get accustomed to your instrument, and everything but the music will eventually recede into the background.

Diagram of a deconstructed snare drum into individual parts.

Anatomy of a Snare Drum

Written by Dr. Dave Gerhart on . Posted in Drums. 1 Comment on Anatomy of a Snare Drum

Snare drums come in all shapes and sizes. They are used in concert and orchestral music, marching band, pop music and many other genres. The instrument is basically a short cylinder with a drumhead at each end. The top head is struck with sticks and the bottom head is fitted with snares that vibrate sympathetically, giving the snare drum its distinctive “snap.”

Below is an annotated illustration of a typical snare drum, followed by a description of each part. It’s always helpful to become familiar with the anatomy of any instrument you play, especially if there is something that needs to be repaired!

Snare drum image with annotations and arrows pointing out the specific parts/features.

Air Hole: Allows air to escape the cylinder when the batter head is struck.

Badge: The identification plate that is attached to the shell. Information that is found on the badge can include model number, serial number and manufacturer of drum.

Batter Head: The top head that is struck with sticks or brushes. This drumhead is thicker than the snare head (the head on the bottom) to withstand the repetitive playing from the drumsticks.

Butt Plate: This part secures the snares on the shell opposite from the strainer.

Counter Hoop: The rim or hoop that tightens the drumhead.

Lug Casing: This part receives the tension rod.

Shell: The body of the drum. Shells can be made out of wood, metal, aluminum, and other materials.

Snares: Wire, cable, gut or synthetic materials that are stretched across the bottom head to produce a buzzing sound.

Snare Head: The bottom head, also known as the resonant head, is thinner than the batter head (the head on the top). Snares are stretched over the snare head to allow them to vibrate when the batter head is played.

Snare Strainer: The mechanism that includes the snare strainer release and the snare strainer adjustment screw.

Snare Strainer Adjustment Screw: The screw that tightens or loosens the snares.

Snare Strainer Release: The lever mechanism that engages or disengages the snares on the snare head.

Tension Rod: A threaded metal rod that is inserted into the lug casing. The tension rod can be tightened or loosened to get the desired sound of the drumheads.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha snare drums.

The Disklavier Piano Pedals

Written by Kathleen Green on . Posted in Acoustic Pianos, Digital Pianos.

Arthur Rubinstein Quote saying "The more I play, the more convinced I am the pedal is the soul of pianoforte!"

Legendary pianist Arthur Rubinstein was famously quoted as saying, “The more I play, the more convinced I am the pedal is the soul of the pianoforte!” No doubt he was speaking about the piano’s damper pedal, also known as the sustain or right pedal, but to some extent his comment is also applicable to the una corda, or left pedal.

In the early days of electronic keyboard instruments it was typical for the sustain pedal to record just two values: on and off. Today, however, some sophisticated reproducing pianos (including the Yamaha Disklavier), hybrid keyboard instruments (for example, the Yamaha AvantGrand), and digital pianos (like the Yamaha Clavinova) are capable of recording a wide range of incremental values that represent the full motion of the sustain pedal.

Image of a pedal going down

The Importance Of Incremental Pedal Data

Let’s take a look at how the sustain pedal is used in an actual performance and the reasons why incremental pedal data is so important. Here’s a graphic representation of a pianist’s performance of a work by Frédéric Chopin:

Sample graphic representation of a pianist’s performance

As you can see, in this section the pianist moves the pedal swiftly between fully down and fully up. Yet despite the rapidity of those pedal movements, the Disklavier is able to record incremental pedal locations between fully up and fully down, and that same data is then used to ensure smooth pedaling on playback.

Now let’s take a look at the sustain pedal data in a performance of a piece by Claude Debussy. In the sample below, notice how long the pianist keeps the pedal in the half-pedal range between fully up and fully down:

Image sample of how long the pianist keeps the pedal the half-pedal range between fully up and fully down

In this range of pedal motion, the damper only slightly engages the strings to a greater or lesser degree, thus only partially damping the notes. It would be impossible to reproduce the half pedaling accurately if the instrument could not record and play back incremental pedal data:

Pedal motion animation showing greater or lesser notes degree

This is another example of how the Disklavier’s advanced technology captures and plays back piano performances with all of the expression and nuance of the original performance.

This article was adapted from a video by pianist and music technologist George Litterst.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha Disklavier Pianos.

Two yellow and white recorders.

Eco-Friendly Plastics from Plants

Written by Matt Kerns on . Posted in Sustainability, Winds. 1 Comment on Eco-Friendly Plastics from Plants

Recorders are some of the most-played instruments in the world, and millions of students in countries all around the world play their first notes on a Yamaha recorder every year.

Yellow plastic pellets in a glass bowl.
Ecodear pellets before processing.

The vast majority of Yamaha recorders are made from ABS plastic, a very durable and safe material that has withstood the test of time. However, traditional plastics are made from petroleum oil, a resource that’s certainly seen its fair share of controversy over the years. What if there was a way to make a recorder with a plastic that didn’t use as much petroleum, but still sounded just as good?

Yamaha found the answer in Ecodear®, a special type of plastic that replaces some of the oil needed by normal plastics with resins extracted from corn and other plants. The result is a material that has about the same durability and characteristics of regular plastic, but one that reduces carbon dioxide emissions by an estimated 20%.

How is that possible? Since plants absorb carbon dioxide from the air when they grow, the corn used to make Ecodear traps some of the carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere, which in turn is then locked into the plastic itself. If a million recorders were made using Ecodear instead of regular plastic, the growing plants would reduce carbon dioxide emissions by about 230 tons, or the equivalent of a car driving around the earth 25 times!

Ecodear has another feature that’s especially beneficial for recorders: It’s a little more dense than ABS plastic, which changes the acoustic response of the recorder. This gives recorders made from Ecodear a more mellow and centered tone, with improved resistance and breath control. Many players feel that this makes Yamaha 400-series Ecodear recorders feel and sound much closer to an instrument made from wood … but with more durability and at a fraction of the price.

Ecodear® is a registered trademark of Toray Industries.
Disneyland Orchestra playing music.

Making Magic Happen

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Percussion.

Ever been to Disneyland or the Disneyland Resort? If you’ve been fortunate enough to visit the “Happiest Place on Earth,” you know that music is at the core of the Disneyland experience. Everywhere you go, your sense of place and era is reinforced by carefully selected background and live music.

For more than a decade, the company that has provided the tools to make that magic happen is Yamaha. Disneyland is one of the largest employers of musicians in the world, and Yamaha outfits those players with professional grade instruments including drum sets, pianos, guitars — even the Disklavier that occupies the lobby of Disney’s Grand Californian Hotel and Spa. Yamaha mixing boards also help enhance the sound experience at many of the resort’s theaters and music venues, including the flagship Hyperion Theater, home to Disney’s “Frozen – Live at the Hyperion.”

As a further measure of the two companies’ unwavering support for music education, Yamaha also provides instruments and support for the prestigious Disneyland Resort All-American College Band, a 21-member ensemble selected from the top college-band students in the country, all of whom receive a world-class summer internship program.

Orchestra Disneyland child playing the drum.

Launched at Disneyland in 1971 and Walt Disney World in 1972, the All-American Band was designed to cultivate relationships between the Disneyland Resort and colleges and universities around the country. The collaboration between Disney and Yamaha allows the members of the AACB to excel in their musical careers, and in turn, inspires young children to explore the joys of making music.

For the past eleven years, Yamaha has hosted annual lunchtime concerts by the AACB on the front steps of Yamaha Corporation of America headquarters in Buena Park. On July 31, the AACB gave a rousing performance on Yamaha flutes, clarinets, saxophones, trumpets, flugelhorns, trombones, mellophones, tubas, horns, marching bass drums, and a Silent Bass — all to the delight of employees, children from the Boys and Girls Club of Buena Park and Mayor Virginia Vaughn.

Disneyland orchestra child doing a hard jump.

“It was really exciting for the All-American College Band to perform at Yamaha,” exclaims Nathan Hatton, the ensemble’s 2018 teaching assistant. “We had so much fun performing several of our favorite tunes in such a different and unique setting!”

Photographs courtesy of Steve Leiken.

 

 

Click here for more information about the Disneyland Resort.

Someone's feet on a coffee table with chips and pretzels with a football game on a large flat screen in background.

Six Reasons Why Watching Football at Home Is Better than Going to the Stadium

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in TV & Movies.

For football fans, there’s nothing like the excitement of watching your favorite team sweat it out on the field with bone-crunching blocks, gravity-defying catches and, at times, the graceful elegance of an end zone dance. Watching it unfold in person is an experience that some fans view as a requirement for appreciating the game, but the stadium experience isn’t for everyone. In fact, some could argue that today’s home theater provides the ideal way to enjoy a football game — free from the hustle and bustle of the stadium and with the best seat in the house: yours.

There are plenty of reasons why watching football at home is better than attending in person. Here are just six of them:

1.  Audio/video quality. Unless you’ve got loads of money to spend on field-level seats or corporate boxes, your view of the action at the stadium will look more like a flea circus than a football game, even with the help of binoculars — assuming you’re even allowed to bring these in past security. Watching on a quality home theater system while listening in surround sound gives you an experience that’s hard to beat. With high-definition video, you see every play perfectly, including the wince of a quarterback as the ball narrowly misses his target. High-quality speakers (or a sound bar with wireless surrounds) allow you to hear things like plays being called on and off the field, play-by-play commentary and the grunt of the gridiron combatants as they battle it out, all in full surround sound. You don’t stand a chance at hearing or seeing that level of detail at the stadium.

2.  Multiple angles. To capture the action on-screen in a way that makes the most of technology like 4K Ultra video, NFL broadcasters have upped their own game with a wide array of video cameras: sideline still cams, above-the-field drone cams, sky cams and end zone cams — another way that the in-home experience goes above and beyond what you can get at the game with just one angle at your stadium seat.

3.  The power of choice, price and what’s in your fridge. Long lines, limited options and high prices. Show of hands — who’s lining up for this? The nationwide average for the most basic and smallest of adult beverages at professional stadiums is nearly $8! What’s more, your beverage brand options at the stadium may be limited based on vendors and sponsorships, while you can enjoy any number of alternative drinks at home. You can also create a varying buffet of chips, dips, cheese, popcorn, sliders, nachos and more — and for much more agreeable prices — when you enjoy the game at home. Tip: Link a wireless speaker to your home entertainment system to broadcast audio of the game in the kitchen. That way, if the custom nachos are taking extra long to pile up to the right height, you won’t miss a single audible. So stock your fridge with what you want, wait for no man and enjoy to your heart’s content.

4.  Quality time with friends and family. Watching football is a great way to bring people together, and there’s no question that hearing yourself talk to an aunt or uncle you haven’t seen in years is way easier at home than in a decibel-shattering stadium. Plus you can have anyone you want over to watch the game without having to purchase a group of tickets at $100+ apiece so you can all sit together. And, with your remote in hand, you can turn the volume up or down at any time, depending on how much you’d like to hear those around you in relation to the game.

5.  Comfort. Between the cost of gas, the stress of getting to the stadium and the price for parking (not to mention the potential for bad weather), keeping your car at home is a no-brainer — and a comfortable armchair or sofa beats a hard plastic saucer with limited leg space hands-down! In addition, at home you don’t have to contend with grumpy seat-holders next to you who moan when you ask permission to squeeze past during a much-needed restroom break (after an $8 beverage or two). You also don’t have to dress for the elements — whether it be sunscreen, a parka or a snowsuit.

6.  Control. Let’s face it: it’s impossible to have much control over anything that happens at a football stadium. Sure, those mismatched socks that you wore during the playoff push in the late ’80s might help influence a successful two-point conversion, but mitigating fans’ reactions is a different thing entirely. It’s hard to pay attention to the game when you have 50,000 fans shouting, talking, obstructing your view or adding other distractions. Yes, it could be argued that those are some of the reasons for attending a live football game. But if you want to know what you’re in for (other than the outcome of the game), there’s no place like home. You can use your remote to pause and play action at will, lower and raise the volume (useful if you want to drown out over-excited guests), even link the sound in multiple rooms if you enable wireless speakers with a system like Yamaha MusicCast. In your home theater, you can make the game come to life in ways that the stadium experience could never compete with.

So the next time you’re considering putting in the time and effort to attend a pro football game in person, remember that your living room is only steps away and might well offer you more excitement and a better experience at a lower cost, both physically and financially. Plus the money you save could instead be put into a surround sound system that would make you the Sunday destination of choice for all of your family and friends!

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha AV products.

Three studio monitors of various sizes.

The Importance of Neutral Monitoring in the Home Studio

Written by Mike Levine on . Posted in Recording. 1 Comment on The Importance of Neutral Monitoring in the Home Studio

In a recent blog posting entitled “How We Interpret Sound,” famed acoustics expert Dr. Floyd Toole stressed the importance of listening to music through neutral loudspeakers — that is, speakers that have a flat frequency response, so they aren’t coloring the sound.

This is something that’s probably even more crucial when recording or mixing music, because you need to be able to trust what you’re hearing — especially if you’re working in a home studio, which typically has little or no professional acoustic treatment. If your monitors (the common term for studio speakers) aren’t providing you with an accurate representation of the frequency content of your music, it will adversely affect your ability to record and mix successfully. And if your finished mixes sound good in your studio but nowhere else, odds are that your monitors are at least partially at fault.

The Difference Between Speakers and Studio Monitors

Speakers intended for use in the home or in the car often hype specific frequency ranges to make music more exciting to the listener. However, quality studio monitors are designed to reproduce sound accurately. They reveal the music as it truly sounds so that you can adjust the frequency balance with confidence, assured that your productions will translate everywhere they are heard.

Why Accuracy is Necessary for Recording and Mixing

Here’s what happens when you create a mix while listening on speakers that accentuate the bass and the treble ranges: You set the bass instruments — mainly the bass guitar and kick drum—at what seem like the right levels, based on what you are hearing, and you use EQ to reduce the highs on some of the sounds that seem overly bright.

Makes sense. But the problem is, when you listen to that mix on other systems, it’s all out of whack, with too much bass and too little high end — a boomy, dull mess.

This didn’t occur because of your ears or your mixing skills; it happened because of your monitors, which made it difficult (if not impossible) to gauge the frequencies correctly. You mixed based on what you were hearing but what you were hearing was inaccurate. That experience is akin to an artist trying to paint colors correctly while wearing orange-tinted glasses. It’s virtually impossible.

So neutral monitors are vital when mixing, but they’re equally important while tracking. After all, the sound you hear in your speakers will influence how you position microphones or set equalizers. If your monitors are inaccurate, you’re more likely to make bad decisions all around.

Yamaha makes two different monitor lines: the MSP Studio series and the HS series. All are self-powered, two-way, bi-amplified loudspeakers (which means there are separate power amps for the woofer and the tweeter), and they come in a variety of sizes: 7″ and 5″ for the MSP Studio series; and 8″, 7″ and 5″ for the HS models. The larger sizes offer extended bass response, but the smaller models can be better for space-challenged studios or studios on a budget. An optional subwoofer, the HS8S, can be added to any of these to take bass response down to 20 Hz.

Set of 3 white speakers and 3 black speakers.
The Yamaha HS series monitors are designed to reproduce audio without coloring it.

Near-Field Monitoring Plays A Big Role, Too

Professional studios are constructed so that their acoustics don’t distort the frequency response of the monitors. In a home studio, however, you’re generally working in an existing space, not a purpose-built one. Adding acoustical treatment can be expensive and may require invasive installation onto walls and ceilings in ways that might not be practical in many living situations.

Fortunately, most loudspeakers made for the home studio are near-field monitors, which are designed to help minimize problems caused by room acoustics. The concept behind near-field monitoring is that the listener is able to sit close enough to the speakers so that he or she hears mainly the direct sound coming from them, and a relatively low percentage of reflected sound from the walls, floor, or ceiling. Near-field monitoring won’t eliminate all acoustical issues from your studio, but it will help lessen their impact.

Where you position your monitors is vital for ensuring accuracy. First, unless you have no other options, don’t place your monitors in corners or right up against a wall; try to set them at least five feet away.

In addition, set up your monitors in an equilateral triangle, with your listening position (where the back of your head will be) at one point and your monitors at the other two. Ideally, the left and right speakers should be the same distance from each other as they are from the wall behind them. If you can, set up your listening position so that it is centered between the walls to your left and right but not centered between the front and back walls.

The monitors should be angled inward equally (at roughly 30 degrees), so they’re pointing right at your head, which shouldn’t be more than a few feet from either speaker. (The less distance there is between your ears and the monitors, the less your room acoustics will interfere with what you’re hearing.) Additionally, because high frequencies can be quite directional, for the most accurate monitoring the speakers should be set up so that the tweeters are at approximately the same height as your ears when you’re seated at the listening position.

Diagram showing speaker placementer in a room.
Correct near-field positioning minimizes the effect of room acoustics.

It’s also a good idea to use isolation pads, available commercially from a variety of sources. These go under your monitors and decouple them from the surface they’re on. They help reduce the chance of sympathetic resonance developing that could overly boost or otherwise interfere with low-frequency response.

Built-in Correction

Although properly configured and positioned near-field monitors will get you a long way towards the goal of neutral (and therefore accurate) monitoring, the specific physical aspects of your studio might still interfere enough to distort their accuracy. Fortunately, Yamaha HS and MSP monitors are equipped with a number of controls for adjusting both the high- and low-frequency response.

Closeup of panel with switches.
Room Control and High Trim switches on the back of the HS monitor allow you to match response to room acoustics.

For example, the Room Control on HS monitors is specifically designed to reduce the low-end build-up that can result from monitors that are placed too close to a wall, while High Trim enables you to boost or cut the high end as needed.

The bottom line is this: When you use quality monitors and place them correctly, you’ll be able to enjoy the benefits of a neutral monitoring system. You’ll hear the frequencies in your music more accurately, and your mixes will translate better. As a result, you’ll be able to concentrate more on making music … an end goal well worth pursuing!

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha studio monitors.

Woman leafing through stacks of albums.

Five Reasons Vinyl Is Making a Comeback

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in Vinyl. 4 Comments on Five Reasons Vinyl Is Making a Comeback

It started with Thomas Edison’s first phonograph in 1877, which played back sound from wax cylinders coated in tin foil. That quickly evolved into the vinyl record and the turntable, which eventually became a mainstay in most households. In the mid-1960s, along came cassettes and 8-track tapes, making it easy to play your favorite tunes in the comfort of your automobile. It seemed as if recorded music couldn’t possibly get any better (or, at least, any more convenient).

And then digital recording was invented, opening the door to CDs and then to digital streaming, which is at an all-time high right now, with individuals listening to more than 32 hours per week in 2017, according to Nielsen Music.

But if you think that vinyl has been relegated to the role of a niche collector’s market, you’d be quite mistaken. The Nielsen Music 2017 U.S. Music Year-End Report states that over 14 million vinyl records were sold in the United States alone that year — the highest level since 1991, according to Billboard.

You’d think that such a resurgence in popularity must have a definitive cause and effect relationship with a market event. But it turns out that the explanation isn’t quite that simple. Here are five possible reasons why vinyl is making a comeback:

1. Tangibles. Sure, subscription streaming services provide unprecedented access and convenience, but something is lost too: ownership. When you play streamed digital files through an app, you don’t own that music. On the other hand, vinyl records are physical items that you can collect, hold in your hands, purchase in person and discuss endlessly with record store clerks and fellow music lovers. Vinyl also offers other tangibles, such as album artwork and liner notes; if these things are even offered by streaming services, you better know where to click.

2. The Cool Factor. Nearly half of all current vinyl record buyers are under the age of 25, according to record industry research site MusicWatch, and with every new generation comes a new outlook on the past, present and future. Some millennials have made an art of taking dated concepts like fedoras and ponytails and making them relevant and cool again. If you doubt this, visit your local record store. Chances are you’ll spot a man bun, a flannel shirt or some other identifiable accoutrement of this popular sub-culture. Clearly, repackaging old albums and calling them retro makes them attractive to trend setters and trend chasers alike.

3. Vinyl Collectors. Serious record collectors are helping drive the rebirth of the medium: There’s something to be said for the thrill of finding a rare LP in a random cardboard box at the back of a tiny record store and being able to add it to your personal collection at home. What’s more, MusicWatch reports that 27 percent of vinyl buyers are 36 or older. That should come as no surprise, since collecting records is a means for people who grew up with vinyl to reconnect with their youth.

4. The Listening Experience. How people listen to music has definitely changed, thanks to the popularity of streaming music. Earbuds and computer speakers have come to predominate, but it’s a fair bet that vinyl lovers are still spending time and money on dedicated Hi-Fi setups in their homes. Yet having a nice set of speakers along with a quality turntable and stereo receiver is only part of the traditional experience. It’s also about sitting down and listening attentively, as opposed to the ease of playing streamed music in the background or while you’re at work. If you put on an album, it’s probably with the specific intent to sit back in your listening room and enjoy it.

5. Sound Quality. Many experts feel that the old-school analog audio provided by vinyl sounds superior to digital audio — especially the lossy (compressed) digital formats used by streaming services. It’s true that there are better digital playback formats available, such as FLAC (Free Lossless Audio Codec), but you’ll have to search them out specifically (and possibly pay extra for them), whereas vinyl is readily available from online sellers and at your local record store.

Learn more about vinyl with our blog posting Appreciating Vinyl Records … and the Best Way to Enjoy Them.

Two clarinets.

Yamaha Clarinet Bore Taper Explained

Written by Tomoji Hirakata on . Posted in Woodwinds.

At first glance, the Yamaha CS series clarinets and SE series clarinets may appear somewhat similar. However, there are several important design differences that result in sonic variances, too:

  • The bore of CS clarinets provides a clear, focused tone with excellent projection. The sound is well-centered and extremely flexible, providing a wide pallette of tonal colors.
  • The SE bore produces a warm, round tonality with an abundance of resonance and rich overtones. SE series clarinets blend easily with other instruments, yet are equally suitable for solos.
Clarinet CS and SE keys closeup.

As shown in the illustration on the right, the CS bore is more cylindrical than the SE bore and less “under- cutting” (and more upper) than SE tone holes.

The right-hand chimney tone hole illustrations below show the difference between the tone hole shapes, and the sectional view of the two models shows the difference in bore (note also that the CS has a thicker wall than the SE):

Diagrams showing difference in clarinet bore tapers.

Click here for more information about Yamaha clarinets.

chamber ensemble rehearsal

Chamber Ensembles Help Develop Student Leaders

Written by Mckenzie Moore on . Posted in Student Leadership.

Several students sit in a practice room, their chairs arranged in a small arc with their music sitting on stands among them.

While they lack the physical presence of a band director, they take initiative and guide themselves through rehearsal.

After warming up, they run through their pieces, making improvements and adjustments to their individual parts as well as helping their fellow musicians. Through communication and leadership, the small group keeps itself on track and pushes toward the goal of a solid performance.

Being in chamber groups gives students greater control over their musical experiences as they select their own repertoire, run their own rehearsals, and show their audiences in all sorts of spaces — including, nursing homes, department stores and music festivals — the level of leadership they are capable of achieving. These skills, in turn, benefit the larger ensemble.

Starting Slow

The easiest way to recruit students to chamber music is to start them off in large instrument choirs, with up to 30 members on single instruments such as tubas or flutes, says Sam Ormson, music director from Mountain View (Washington) High School.

“It brings students into the chamber music realm in a nonthreatening way,” says Ormson, whose chamber ensembles have performed at the Music for All Chamber Music National Festival. “Then as they get older, they start to form other groups.”

Ormson recommends repertoire written in four parts for students to get accustomed to the musical style of a small group while staying comfortable in the larger numbers. Once students have developed to a higher level of musicianship, he suggests introducing them to publishers’ websites to let them select their own pieces.

Teaching Solid Fundamentals

Learning how to rehearse is a key component to chamber music success. “[I] make sure we demonstrate in a large ensemble all the fundamentals students need in a small group and show them how to rehearse it, so they can go through the same process without me,” Ormson says.

The subtleties of music, such as dynamic contrast, articulation and crisp rhythms, are the backbone, says Sam Pilafian, tuba soloist and arranger for the Boston Brass quintet. “If we’re doing scales or rounds together, we’re doing them in a certain dynamic and certain articulation, [and] we’re creating a language,” he says.

Both Pilafian and Ormson say warmup progressions that last about 10 minutes are the most beneficial for reinforcing basics before moving into the day’s music. Start with long tones, then lip slurs for brass and chromatic exercises for woodwinds. Articulation and technical studies should lead to air support and breathing exercises. Finish the progression with a chorale that incorporates strong intonation and dynamic range.

Learning to Listen

Musicians must listen to the parts around them in order to balance their own parts within the ensemble. “Getting a cognitive awareness for what’s around you and the ability to play at the same volume with similar tone is fundamental to making a chamber music experience work,” Ormson says.

Pilafian, who taught at the Frost School of Music at the University of Miami and was a founding member of the Empire Brass Quintet, recommends having students stand in the far corners of the room and choose another player to listen to. He also recommends having students sing their own parts, then sing each other’s parts to familiarize themselves with all facets of the piece.

“Have [students] listen [from a position that is] the farthest away [where] they can hear and track that person and their part,” Pilafian says. “Find the principal players. It’s fun for them, and they learn to lead musically because of exercises like that.”

Rounds and call-and-response exercises also help improve students’ listening skills.

Letting Students Lead

Chamber ensembles are designed for musicians to take greater ownership. Pilafian suggests that music educators take a “coaching” approach rather than directing the groups. “You can teach your leaders to step up in chamber music without too much pressure,” he says.

Ormson helps students select repertoire and instructs them in occasional “clinician” settings but gives them freedom during rehearsal to make their own musical decisions. “I know that I might have been able to make an ensemble achieve a higher musical outcome if I’d intervened more frequently, but the measurement of success goes far beyond that musical outcome,” Ormson says. “It’s the opportunity for students to grow as leaders and musical decision makers.”

Benefits to the Band

The skills students take back to the larger ensemble benefit them as well as the musicians around them. “It’s when they get back to the band that it really pays off,” Pilafian says. “They think in ways they’ve never thought before; they learn to take responsibility for the music. They can infect so many people around them with their seriousness in rehearsal and their ability to stay focused. They have a better ear, and all those musical fundamentals are strengthened and brought to the people around them.”

Those students can then be used to set a musical example by playing a hard section for others to emulate. “The other students always listen carefully when their peers play examples for them,” Pilafian says. “When [others] mimic the students who just played, the concepts you have taught carefully to the chamber groups are transferred to the whole band with less teaching time used in rehearsal.”

Student Benefits

Musicians who have experience in chamber groups can also transition more easily to be featured players in the larger ensemble. “Band members who have had chamber music training have learned to play solo lines with enough opinion and presence to warrant a musically supportive accompaniment,” Pilafian says. “Their featured moments will help the entire large ensemble to form unified musical moments.”

In general, chamber students become more effective in all types of rehearsals. “They realize how much time can be lost by not starting on time or how frustrating it can be to have someone absent from rehearsal,” Ormson says, “I have seen an increase of student engagement and a reduction in down time once chamber ensembles get established each year.”

Last but not least, chamber ensembles prepare students for life by teaching them people skills. “Music will teach you that kind of team management at a young age,” he says. “It’s the magic and chemistry of chamber music.”

Photo © 2018 Daniel Yang, All Rights Reserved 


cover of the 2018v1 issue of SupportED featuring clarinetist Julie DeRoche

This article originally appeared in the 2018 V1 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Julie DeRoche

Clarinetist Julie DeRoche Molds Music into Art

Written by Nicole Roberts on . Posted in Educator Profiles.

In the early 1980s, Julie DeRoche — who had recently received her degree in clarinet performance from Northwestern University — was juggling four jobs to make ends meet as she worked toward a fulltime career in music.

Teaching private lessons, recording commercial jingles as a freelancer, working as the first-call substitute with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and selling mail-order clarinet accessories out of her apartment all helped DeRoche develop an entrepreneurial approach to music. She also wanted to open her own studio. “You can’t just sit around and wait for something to come,” DeRoche says. “You have to pursue it.”

Now serving as the chair for the Department of Music Performance at Chicago’s DePaul University, where she has taught for more than 30 years, DeRoche inspires her students with this mantra of perseverance. Whether making them repeat their scales again and again until they play with the desired speed and accuracy or assigning them to work with her and other professors simultaneously to perfect their audition skills, DeRoche doesn’t let her students take the easy way out. “I tell my students: ‘You’re going to do it because I don’t give up,'” she says.

Technical Toolbox

Clarinetist Julie DeRoche

Back in 1968, 9-year-old DeRoche started playing the clarinet in her school band in Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois. Although she originally wanted to play flute, she says she fell in love with the clarinet the instant she set eyes on it. DeRoche went on to spend her high school years performing in the Chicago Youth Symphony Orchestras and teaching private lessons to elementary school students.

Giving private lessons early on helped DeRoche develop a set of teaching skills that she still uses today with her university students.

For musicians who are in eighth grade and under, the focus needs to be on having fun, with some skill-building mixed in. “Get them enamored with it, but don’t forget to teach them skills, so they feel like they’re accomplishing something,” DeRoche says.

Molding elementary and middle school students starts with sculpting the perfect embouchure. “I always say, ‘Bottom lip in, chin muscle down, corners in, jaw forward, top lip stretched down and under the nose,'” DeRoche says.

For beginners in fourth grade, DeRoche doesn’t bombard them with all of this information at once. Instead, she breaks down the technique one component at a time. “I’d say, ‘Right now, I want you to focus on getting your chin down in the perfect place; now let’s play this piece, and we might have some fun with dynamics and rhythm,'” she says.

Mastering technical skills then allows advancing students to craft something beautiful. “I think of techniques as tools in a toolbox,” DeRoche says. “You have to have all the skills, so that you can build a much better, more significant artistic product.”

DeRoche has her students add some color to their music by painting in their emotions. She tells her students to think of someone important to them, down to the details: the color of their hair and eyes, the sound of their voices, the way they walk. She then asks them to think about how that person makes them feel and to weave in the resulting emotions into their playing. “When they think about how they feel, the source feels like it’s coming from their heart,” DeRoche says.

Sculpted Skillset

DeRoche worked on assembling her own toolbox when she traveled the world as a musician. While performing with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as well as various chamber groups including The Chicago Chamber Musicians, Music of the Baroque, Chicago Opera Theater and Contemporary Chamber Players, DeRoche ventured throughout the United States, Europe, South America and Asia.

Collaborating with top-notch musicians fine-tuned DeRoche’s already well-sculpted musical skillset. “Having the opportunity to work with the best musicians [and] great conductors has made me learn so much about the depth of musical understanding you need to play at a really high level,” DeRoche says.

Recording commercial jingles for large brands such as McDonald’s, Froot Loops and United Airlines also honed DeRoche’s sight-reading and versatility since she often did not receive music prior to recording. “It’s very expensive to do these commercials, so you have to be right and you have to learn fast,” she says.

Team Approach

In 1984, DePaul University, just 10 miles from DeRoche’s alma mater, was in need of a new clarinet instructor. Professor Larry Combs reached out to DeRoche, and she added adjunct professor to the long list of jobs she was juggling at the time.

That first year, DeRoche had only six clarinet students, so she worked quickly to find ways to attract more students to the program. She started by organizing and managing summer clarinet workshops, which she co-taught with Combs. Then, she had a breakthrough. During the summer workshops, she and the other faculty members were advertising themselves as a team. “So I thought: Why don’t we create a team approach to teaching clarinet?” she says.

DeRoche decided it would benefit students to have access to more than one professor during their college careers. “It unifies the students,” she says. “Because the faculty don’t draw these boundaries, [the students] don’t have this jealousy. They support each other.”

As part of the team approach, professors evaluate each student’s needs for growth. DeRoche recalls one student who went to many auditions but often lost jobs to others with better musicality and articulation. DeRoche then worked with the student on articulation while Combs worked with him on his musicality. “He got a job pretty quickly afterwards,” she says. “We look at what the student needs and decide what works.”

DePaul’s clarinet program now averages about 25 students every year, and all wind departments at DePaul practice the team-learning approach that DeRoche introduced. “You’re constantly working to make it better, to make the level of experience the students have more professional,” DeRoche says.

Increased Inclusivity

DeRoche’s belief in teamwork and bringing people together goes beyond her work at DePaul; it has also been a major part of her work with the International Clarinet Association (ICA).

DeRoche’s first major accomplishment with the ICA was a conference she hosted at DePaul University in 1994. Her major goal working with the ICA has been to increase its diversity of performers.

When hosting the conference, DeRoche reached out to musicians from all around the world — to emphasize the “international” in International Clarinet Association — resulting in performing musicians from Germany, Austria, Belgium, Japan, Canada and countries in South America. DeRoche also focused on diversifying the performances by music genre, including jazz and folk music.

The 1994 ICA conference also got an unexpected guest performer — a Chicago janitor, originally from Romania, who spoke no English. His daughter reached out to DeRoche, translating for her father, asking if he and his group could play at the conference. “He played the most intricate music with this folk group — wild music in mixed meters,” she says. “People were amazed by him.”

From 2000 to 2002, DeRoche became the ICA’s first female president. Because of this distinction, DeRoche feels a responsibility to empower young female musicians. “When I was young, there were very few female role models, and at the time it seemed you had to be masculine to achieve success,” she says. “Times have changed. I always [make] a point of being myself, wearing jewelry, clothes I like, painting my nails, not feeling like I had to be someone other than who I am. I hope this message is true for everyone now! Just be [a] good [musician] and be yourself. It can’t be one or the other; it has to be both.”

Discipline and Compassion

In her current role as chair of the Department of Music Performance at DePaul, DeRoche spends half her time on administrative duties and continues to teach clarinet students in a one-on-one setting. “The students that come are quite serious about having the life [of an] orchestral player [or] playing in an opera, musical or military band,” she says. “That’s work. That’s [going] from doing 80 percent and being satisfied to doing 110 percent and being successful and happy.”

DeRoche helps her students achieve this 110-percent level of effort by setting high expectations for them and not resting until they meet those expectations. “I say, ‘Sorry, I know you want to stop playing scales and go on to Weber 2nd Concerto, but we can’t,'” she says. “I just keep pushing them, and then they say, ‘I didn’t think I could do that!'”

Students appreciate DeRoche’s disciplined approach. “I always felt like she pushed me in the [way] that I wanted to get better,” says Audrey Denny, one of DeRoche’s former students, who now works as a clarinet specialist at Clarinetquest, part of a retail shop in St. Louis.

Though DeRoche pushes her students hard, accepting no excuses or shortcuts, her teaching style never lacks empathy. “As a teacher, she was interested not only in me as a clarinetist but also in me as a person,” says former student Tim Zavadil, who now teaches clarinet at the University of Minnesota and plays clarinet and bass clarinet in the Minnesota Orchestra. “We discussed how to be a better person, a better communicator, a better friend.”

As an educator, DeRoche’s overall philosophy is to give students the tools they need to help themselves be successful. “We have that responsibility to teach really good quality technique and to open their eyes to why they’re doing this — to create a higher level artistic product,” she says. “I want my students to feel like I’m helping them succeed.”

Photos by Rob Shanahan for Yamaha Corporation of America 


cover of the 2018v1 issue of SupportED featuring clarinetist Julie DeRoche

This article originally appeared in the 2018 V1 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Clarinetist Julie DeRoche’s Keys to Teaching

Written by Savy Leiser on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

In Clarinetist Julie DeRoche Molds Music into Art, we outlined how DeRoche, utilizes her extensive background in the music industry and teaching to help take her students to the next level of musicianship.

DeRoche, professor and chair for the Department of Music Performance at DePaul University School of Music in Chicago, has been teaching since she was a teen; as a high schooler, she gave private clarinet lessons to elementary school students.

DeRoche says a combination of these tips will open the door to successful teaching and learning.

Explain Methods Clearly: DeRoche recommends that educators clearly explain how and why students should do what is asked of them. “If your methods are precise and thoughtful, they will hear improvement, trust you and do what you ask,” DeRoche says.

Show Students You Care: DeRoche approaches students with discipline and empathy. “Don’t patronize young people by expecting less from them than they can produce,” she says. “Students want to know that you care about their success. As a colleague of mine once said, ‘Put one arm around their shoulder, and use the other to push them out the door.'”

Never Stop Learning: While DeRoche has a set of methods that she’s confident in, she always keeps an open mind to learning more and expanding her knowledge as an educator. “Never think you know it all,” she says. “Teaching is best done while learning.”

Photo Courtesy of Music for All 


cover of the 2018v1 issue of SupportED featuring clarinetist Julie DeRoche

This article originally appeared in the 2018 V1 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Festival Etiquette

Written by Marcia Neel on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

Performing at a festival is so much more than “performing the music.” You should have high expectations for appearance and demeanor for performers as well as the audience. Here are some tips for your next formal performance.

Stage Etiquette

The adjudication begins the moment the first student steps onto the stage. Plan how to “take the stage” and rehearse it repeatedly. Once students are on stage, they should not speak to one another unless absolutely necessary. Smiling at the audience reflects a very pleasant demeanor, but laughing on stage is never appropriate.

Practice taking and leaving the stage quietly. The clunking of shoes is not the best way to start the performance. Ensure that musicians know exactly where their chairs are and have them stand in front of them until given the cue to sit.

For choral ensembles, row one should enter first, and the person in the center of that row should stop in the center of the riser. His or her position will help set the remainder of the ensemble.

The quick tuning check of the ensemble is absolutely appropriate before the playing of the first selection as well as in between selections as necessary. Just be sure that the tuning is timed out appropriately.

Finally, ensure that students understand the formality of the introduction of the conductor. How will this happen? Will the director take the stage, then get introduced, or does the conductor get introduced, then walk onto the stage? What happens next? Either way, the ensemble must know the procedures, so that they may respond properly.

Performance Etiquette

Students should understand that when the conductor turns around to bow and acknowledge the applause of the audience that he or she is accepting the applause on behalf of the ensemble. Thus, students should be taught to look at the director or audience and smile during the applause.

Do not allow students to turn to the next selection during this time. Students should bring up the next selection only after the director has turned back to face the ensemble. In jazz bands, soloists should definitely acknowledge applause with a smile or nod when the audience applauds for the solo.

Audience Etiquette

Be sure to address audience etiquette well ahead of time and often. If students know what the expectations are, they will behave appropriately in concert settings themselves, plus you can ask them to share this information with those who are attending the performance in support.

This information can be reinforced by having audience guidelines printed in the festival program. Music education means educating everyone — administrators, parents and even the audience — so addressing etiquette in the program by sharing it from the student perspective is a great way to reinforce the expectations.

Here are notes from a sample program that you can use or adapt:

The abilities demonstrated at tonight’s festival include audience etiquette. The following guidelines are expected to be observed while students are listening to other performances at all formal concert settings.

  • Sit tall in your seat and give your undivided attention to the performing ensemble.
  • Be a quiet, still listener and focus on the exemplary elements of the performance.
  • Remain seated during the entire performance, including between selections, of each ensemble.
  • Turn off cell phones and put them away.
  • Wait until after the ensemble’s final selection when a “Kodak moment” will be provided to take photographs.
  • Although we encourage all family members to attend all performances, we respectfully ask that you exit the hall quickly and quietly if your young child chooses to become an “active” participant in the concert.


cover of the 2018v1 issue of SupportED featuring clarinetist Julie DeRoche

This article originally appeared in the 2018 V1 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

3 Tips to Start a Mariachi Program

Written by Savy Leiser on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

In Case Study: Celebrating Mariachi in Iowa, high school band director Ruben Newell and middle school director Patti Bekkerus from Denison (Iowa) Community Schools shared how they started a successful mariachi program.

In addition to research, patience and understanding, they offer these three tips.

Find the Right People: Newell and Bekkerus went to Las Vegas for a mariachi workshop. However, they also found resources in their own small town. Because the school district did not have a strings program, they hired a local violinist to teach strings to the students.

Involve Parents: Newell invited parents to give input. Family members enthusiastically jumped at the chance to support their students and the program by cooking cultural food for the annual Fiesta Mariachi.

Celebrate! Denison’s Fiesta Mariachi fundraiser not only makes money for the program, but it also serves as a major performance opportunity for the students and a fun time for the parents and the community.

Photos Courtesy of Denison Community Schools Mariachi Program


cover of the 2018v1 issue of SupportED featuring clarinetist Julie DeRoche

This article originally appeared in the 2018 V1 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

closeup of mariachi singer

Case Study: Celebrating Mariachi in Iowa

Written by Savy Leiser on . Posted in Case Studies.

Every spring, Denison (Iowa) High School hosts a fiesta, including a taco truck, chips and salsa, and parents’ homemade desserts. But the main attraction is the Denison High School Mariachi Band.

Because half of Denison’s population is Latino, Denison High School band director Ruben Newell and Denison Middle School band director Patti Bekkerus decided that they needed a music program to embrace those students’ cultural backgrounds. “The Hispanic [students] in this town [have] always had a great passion for music,” Bekkerus says. “This was a way for us to extend a hand and say, ‘We want to share a part of your culture with everybody else.'”

Chance Encounters

female high school student singing mariachi and holding a violin with student musicians behind her.

Newell, who became the band director in 2009, wanted to make sure his music program represented the diversity of his musicians. “I wanted to be proactive, so I started looking at schools in other states where diversity is more common,” he says.

Newell found that many of these schools had mariachi programs. At first, he was uncertain about his ability to start one himself. “I thought, ‘What other towns in the Midwest have a mariachi program?'” he says. “I kind of gave up on the idea. I didn’t know anything about mariachi, and there was no one I could talk to about it.

While at an Iowa Business Conference, Newell and Bekkerus attended a clinic about starting a mariachi group by Marcia Neel, president of Music Education Consultants and senior director of education for Yamaha. They soon learned that Neel was hosting the weeklong National Mariachi Worksops for Educators in Las Vegas later that year.

Newell and Bekkerus flew out for the event where they learned how serious and diverse the genre of mariachi can be.

Getting Instruments

When starting the mariachi program back home, Newell and Bekkerus soon encountered a new hurdle: Denison did not have a strings program, so very few students knew how to play violins, guitars and other instruments associated with mariachi — nor did the school own the instruments. Their superintendent Mike Pardun came to the rescue. “[He] said, ‘We are not going to let finances be a hurdle to them; that defeats the purpose,'” recalls Newell.

Pardun funded the purchase of six violins, five guitars, and a guitarrón, which is similar to a bass guitar. Newell and Bekkerus started the mariachi program with eighth graders to ensure that students would enter high school with some experience the following year.

A Growing Strings Section

After a successful first school year of mariachi in 2011-2012, the educators set their sights on a new goal: improving the skills of the string players, many of whom were primarily brass or woodwind musicians. They found a local violinist Claudia Rihner.

When Rihner joined the Denison mariachi family, she specifically worked with the students on their aural skills. The students warm up with scales, first in unison, then in rounds, so they can listen for the intonation. Rihner also tells students to hum their parts before playing on their instruments, then asks them if their instruments sound in tune with what they just sang.

“As far as reading notes, they had a strong foundation,” Rihner says. “The hard thing was the mechanics of the instrument.”

Community Connections

group of students in the Denison mariachi band -- all dressed in red shirts and holding various instruments

Currently, the mariachi program comprises three ensembles: a middle school group with eighth graders, one larger high school group that anyone can join and a selective audition-based high school group. While they don’t play at school band concerts, the mariachi program has many performance opportunities.

The audition-based group has performed at the Iowa Music Educators Association (IMEA) Conference, the Iowa Bandmasters Conference, the Iowa Culture and Language Conference — an event for educators working with English-language learner (ELL) students — as well as at a few elementary schools.

The larger high school group performs at local festivals and community celebrations. For the middle school program, the event of the year is Denison’s Fiesta Mariachi, the annual fundraiser where all three ensembles perform.

Starting in the program’s second year, Fiesta Mariachi raises money to buy instruments and trajes — traditional uniforms. The fundraiser has the added benefit of connecting family members. Parents attend an organizational meeting to plan the fundraiser, and the first year, Newell was surprised at the turnout. “There were a lot of families I had not met,” Newell says. “A lot of them didn’t speak English. I’d say something, and the students would translate. There was a lot of nervous energy there.”

To break the tension, Newell spoke in the one universal language other than music — food. After asking parents for food ideas to serve at the event, they began excitedly sharing suggestions. “It was incredible to see; it was something I had missed seeing in our district — families feeling comfortable in our school and excited about participating in events,” Newell says.

Bridging the Gap

During the first year’s fundraiser, parents cooked all the food. Currently, a local Hispanic grocery store caters the event through a taco truck, but parents still bring in homemade desserts.

Newell remembers the first Fiesta Mariachi as one of his proudest moments with the music program. His parents even went to the event. “My mom took a bunch of pictures,” Newell says. “[She] said, ‘There was everybody there, all different kinds of people. All my pictures [show] everybody smiling.'”

Bekkerus and Rihner both cite the Fiesta Mariachi as one of the band’s most significant events of the year. “The mariachi program, in my eyes, has really bridged the gap between cultures,” Rihner says.

Photos Courtesy of Denison Community Schools Mariachi Program


cover of the 2018v1 issue of SupportED featuring clarinetist Julie DeRoche

This article originally appeared in the 2018 V1 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Technology Tools for the Middle School Classroom

Written by Keith Ozsvath and Greg Scapillato on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

Many technology tools exist to ease your workload and move your music program beyond surviving to thriving.

To ensure success, select resources that align with your goals, improve your efficiency and create new, meaningful opportunities to extend and deepen your students’ learning experience.

The following technology tools will make a big difference for your group, day in and day out.

Organization (Google Slides or Powerpoint)

Successful music directors identify the rehearsal objectives, have a plan for accomplishing them and share this information with the students. The warm-up and rehearsal plan and any other pertinent information can be included on a “daily rehearsal slide,” created using Google Slides or PowerPoint. Display the slide as students are entering the room. You can also consider adding a countdown timer to show when rehearsal begins.

Engagement (Plickers)

Engagement is more than an education buzzword; engagement is the key to unlocking students’ creativity and passion. One way to engage students is by providing meaningful choices that impact their learning.

Technology can help reduce friction in providing student choice. In middle school, pressure (real or perceived) to conform with the group can suppress students’ individual opinions. The free app Plickers can create a safe avenue for expression.

Plickers only requires one smart device with a camera. Students are provided with downloadable, printed cards from the Plickers website. Each card has a unique geometric pattern. Students indicate answers to questions by holding up the card with the corresponding answer positioned at the top. The teacher then scans the cards by panning the classroom using the Plickers app and the camera on their smart device.

Plickers also makes it easy to do quick, informal assessments. Teachers can ask true/false or multiple-choice questions with up to four possible answers.

Here are some example questions:

• What is the dynamic we performed for the trio section of the march? (Students choose p, mp, f or ff.)

• Our goal for today was accurate notes and rhythms for the “A” section of the piece. Did the band achieve this goal? (Students indicate yes or no.)

The teacher can then project aggregate responses and other data.

THE YAMAHA EDUCATOR NEWSLETTER: Energize your creativity as you build your music program!

Assessment (Music Annotation with Google Classroom)

Teaching music annotation is a great way to help students pay attention to articulation, dynamics, tempo indicators and key signature changes. Following a step-by-step guide, students notate elements directly on their sheet music and submit a picture of their homework using Google Classroom.

The Doctopus add-on for Google Sheets and Goobric web app work together to provide an efficient method to provide feedback on this kind of assignment. These tools allow the teacher to open each student submission with a rubric open in the same window. Grading is simply clicking on the level of performance for each component on the rubric, then moving on to the next student response. Doctopus also allows for both text and audio comments.

Communication (Progress Reports with Google Docs and Autocrat)

Communicating student musical progress with parents is invaluable. By using some Google Drive tools and an add-on called autoCrat, you can email parents a comprehensive and fully customizable progress report that shows the areas the student is doing well in and which areas need attention.

Suggested data points include rehearsal contributions and personal responsibility, skill development (tone quality, rhythmic skills, etc.), student strengths, areas to improve and progress toward a growth goal.

Create a Google Form and enter the class name, student names, teacher, grade level and parent email addresses. Then include the data points suggested above.

Then create a template for the progress report and merge data from the form into the report. You may want to use tables and color coded sections to organize information.

Overall, using technology can be a powerful way to help you achieve the goals set out for your band program.

Additional Online Tools

Assessment

• Kahoot – game-based learning for individuals or teams

• Quizlet – online flashcards and games that can be played live in groups

• Wizer – engaging online worksheets

• EDPuzzle – video creation and sharing with the ability to track student understanding

Communication

• Smore – newsletter and flyer creation

• Remind – text-based group communication platform

Organization

• Google Keep – notetaking service for collecting information in a variety of formats


female high school student singing mariachi and holding a violin with student musicians behind her.

This article originally appeared in the 2018 V1 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Sunset behind the profile of a man playing a saxophone.

The Importance Of Improvisation

Written by Rich Tozzoli on . Posted in Creativity.

The first band I was ever in was your classic two-guitar, drum and bass lineup. We were all high school buddies, and none of us was a particularly good singer, so we simply learned the outlines of some basic songs by favorite artists, ranging from Jeff Beck and The Allman Brothers to Yes and King Crimson. From there, we used those outlines to jam, stretch and grow. We made up songs with weird chords, odd time signatures and unusual sounds from our instruments and amps.

Simply put, we improvised.

Time Well Spent

As we all went off to college, we stayed in touch with each other and, to this day, we still manage to find time to get together on occasion and jam. But all these years later, I’m still realizing how influential that development time was to me.

My work involves creating music for a wide variety of television shows, and I rarely if ever find myself at a loss to coax creative and interesting sounds out of my instruments and my computer. I attribute at least part of that to the time I put in learning how to improvise — how to work around chords, melodies, time signatures and song structures. What’s more, the ability to improvise not only informs my work as a composer, it also somehow finds its way into many of my daily activities, from running my business to the way I cook!

Surprised? I was too … until I began looking into the reasons why.

Training Affects The Brain

Recent research shows that long-term high level musical training has a broader impact than previously thought. In fact, musicians have an enhanced ability to integrate sensory information from hearing, touch and sight. In addition, the brain circuits involved in musical improvisation are shaped by systematic training, leading to less reliance on memory and more connectivity within the brain. Simply put, learning an instrument and how to improvise on it can have profound effects on our mind, body and spirit.

Always Be A Student

An article entitled “What Neuroscience Teaches Us About Fostering Creativity” notes that “technology is changing how students’ brains are wired, setting expectations for faster, more interactive learning, according to neuroscientist and best-selling author David Eagleman. And the most important thing that schools should be teaching students is “cognitive flexibility”: the ability to be creative and put ideas together in new and innovative ways.”

I feel that the art of improvisation is just that, with the ultimate goal of achieving a unique result. But that doesn’t mean you can tell your brain to just start creating. You have to work at it and it may not come easily. With that in mind, you should always try to be a student. Even if you have to school yourself, it’s valuable to absorb as much knowledge as you can, using the latest technologies and resources (including this blog). Having that knowledge tucked away in your back pocket allows you to push the boundaries of improvised creativity.

Bend, Break and Blend

“The unconscious brain is ruthlessly efficient,” Eagleman continues. “It is looking for the easiest path [to a solution]. You have to shake off that path.” And one of the ways to help push past that boundary, he suggests, is to do something called bend, break, blend — to practice changing objects or ideas to suit a different purpose, break them into smaller components and then blend or remix them to create new objects or ideas. This is something I do constantly to foster creativity. I find that I often have to take an idea and bend, break and blend it into something it wasn’t before I started.

For example, I might take a piano chord and reverse it in my DAW, then blend in a large amount of reverb and delay. From there, I might route it into a guitar amplifier plugin and add an unusual amount of distortion and edge. Voila! What may have started out as a nice piano chord for a travel documentary might now be better suited for a crime drama or police show — all because I was able to bend, break and blend it. And because I’ve taken the time to learn my craft, it becomes a skill I can use during improvisation.

It Isn’t Just About Music

As I mentioned earlier, learning how to improvise not only can help your music, it can enhance your life generally. In the kitchen, I tend not to follow recipes exactly when cooking. Instead, I use them as an outline, then add a dash of this and a sprinkle of that to bring my own flavors to the dish, based upon past experience of knowing which combinations will taste good and which won’t. I improvise daily in my business approach too. For example, I will prioritize a job that needs immediate attention over what I’m currently working on at the time, even though I may not feel like doing so.

It’s all about learning to go with the flow and knowing what will best help you get the end results in a timely and well thought-out fashion. Don’t get frustrated if it doesn’t just happen. Push through the challenges and know that new ideas will come out of your hard work. Believe me, it’s worth it.

 

Check out Rich’s other postings.

How to Fight Feedback, Part 1

Written by Steve La Cerra on . Posted in Live Sound, Pro Audio How-to.

One of the biggest challenges in live sound is dealing with that pesky, always unwanted gremlin called feedback. In this two-part series we’ll talk about what causes feedback and describe ways to eliminate it. Let’s start by talking about the importance of speaker placement, microphone pickup patterns, and mic technique.

Feedback happens when sound from a speaker reaches a microphone (or guitar pickup), where it is re-amplified and sent to the speaker again, resulting in an uncontrollable “loop.” (There is also electronic feedback, but that’s another discussion.) It usually takes the form of either a low-frequency howl or a high-frequency screech, neither of which is much fun to listen to! You’ve probably heard a form of feedback when a guitar player deliberately (or sometimes accidentally) faces their guitar toward their amp, causing a squeal to occur. Sometimes feedback occurs sporadically — for example, when a vocalist roams around the stage casually holding their microphone and it briefly picks up sound from the speakers — but most of the time it’s a constant annoyance, making it imperative that the live sound engineer deal with it immediately lest the performer (and/or the crowd) grow hostile.

Speaker Placement

The most important way to avoid (or at least minimize) feedback is to make sure that speakers are placed in front of the microphones. If they are behind the mics, then you’re actually inviting feedback because the speakers will aim sound right at the microphones, which will send the signal through the system again. Main PA speakers (“house” speakers) such as the Yamaha S112V are designed specifically to direct sound toward the audience, so as long as they are aimed at the audience and away from the microphones, the possibility of feedback is greatly reduced.

In addition, the more distance you can put between the microphones and the PA speakers, the louder the PA can operate without feedback. That’s why PA speakers should ideally be placed at the front edge of the stage, at least four or five feet in front of the performers and as close to the audience as is practical:

Diagram of setup.
Optimum PA speaker positioning.

If you’re not sure whether your PA speakers are placed far enough in front of the microphones, try this: Have a friend speak into a microphone while you slowly raise its volume in the PA. If you can make the microphone sufficiently loud to be heard throughout the room without feeding back, you’re in pretty good shape. If you start to hear feedback, then you probably need to reposition either the microphone or the speakers. If you still can’t get the microphone volume loud enough following repositioning, then you may also need to use EQ. We’ll talk more about that in Part 2.

If you’re using stage monitors, feedback can be even more problematic because the monitors are relatively close to the performers and are often pointing directly at the microphones. Like PA speakers, stage monitors should never face directly toward a reflective surface such as glass or mirrors.

Microphone Pickup Patterns

Most vocal microphones used in live sound are directional, meaning that they pick up sound coming from a certain direction and reject sound coming from other directions. For example, a type of mic called a cardioid favors sound from the front. As a sound source moves around the side of a cardioid microphone, sound is gradually rejected until the mic rejects most of the sound directly behind it, as shown in the illustration below. This is known as the mic’s pickup pattern.

Diagram.
Cardioid microphone pickup pattern.

When you graph out a microphone’s pickup pattern, you can see its polar response. In the case of a cardioid microphone, the polar response resembles an upside-down heart (thus the name “cardioid”):

Diagram
Cardioid microphone polar pattern.

Keep in mind that every mic responds in three dimensions, although they rarely are able to capture much sound coming from above or below. A cardioid microphone will capture sound strongest from directly in front, at “0 degrees.” It will reject sound most effectively from behind, at “180 degrees.” Most microphone manufacturers provide this documentation on their websites.

The illustration below shows the best location for an onstage monitor such as the Yamaha SM10V when a performer is using a cardioid microphone:

Diagram.
Optimum stage monitor position when a cardioid microphone is being used.

Cardioid is not the only popular pickup pattern used for vocal microphones. A pattern called supercardioid provides better rejection of sound from the sides, but has a small “lobe” of pickup directly behind it. The points of maximum rejection are at approximately 120 and 240 degrees, as shown below:

Diagram.
Supercardioid microphone pickup pattern.

This is important because if you face a monitor toward the rear of a supercardioid microphone, it is likely to feed back due to that little lobe. It would be better to place a monitor at 120 and/or 240 degrees, where a supercardioid microphone rejects sound more effectively:

Diagram.
Optimum stage monitor position when a supercardioid microphone is being used.

The hypercardioid pattern is similar to supercardioid but with a few differences. Hypercardioid rejects a little better on the sides but has a larger pickup area in the rear. Also, the points of maximum rejection for a hypercardioid mic are around 105 and 255 degrees.

Mic Technique

Equally important to placement of speakers and the microphone pickup pattern is proper mic technique — something that many performers unfortunately take for granted. First and foremost, when using vocal microphones, the singer’s mouth should be very close to, and directly in front of, the microphone grille — a position known as “on-axis.” Being on-axis helps make a performer’s voice louder than any surrounding noise, which is especially important when they are singing or speaking softly because that’s when you’ll need to turn up the microphone level. We want to make the voice louder, not the background noise. Encourage the singer to keep the mic centered in front of their mouth during the entire performance in order to ensure consistent levels, and stress to all the performers beforehand that they should never point the front of a microphone directly at any speaker.

Here’s a photo that shows the proper way to hold a vocal microphone:

Hand holding microphone.
The correct way to hold a microphone.

Notice that the hand is not covering any part of the grille. This is really important because if you cover portions of the grille on a directional microphone, then the mic will actually become omnidirectional, meaning it will pick up sound equally from all directions — and that usually results in feedback occurring at much lower levels.

In contrast, here’s how not to hold a microphone:

Hand holding a microphone and hand is gripping grill.
Unless you love feedback, don’t ever hold a mic like this!

Cupping your hand over the front of the mic will also produce feedback because a hand is actually a pretty good reflector for sound.

Click here for Part 2, where we look at the concept of “ringing out” a sound system and describe how to use EQ to eliminate feedback.

Photographs courtesy of the author.

 

Check out our other Tools of the Trade postings.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha PA speakers and stage monitors.

The Art of Looping

Written by Robbie Calvo on . Posted in Guitars How-to.

If you’ve been following my postings here on the Yamaha blog, you may have gathered by now that art and artistry are an integral part of who I am, what my music is about, and how I live my life.

Label inside a guitar as seen through the strings.

Color has the power to stimulate us, relax our minds and change our overall mood. Without tonality and color, we have chromaticism: white to black, with shades of gray in-between.

Texture adds depth to shape. Curves, lines and bumps, with random density, give our senses interesting terrain on which to gaze and feel in our hands.

I often marvel at the natural architecture, texture and color variations of the native plants, trees and flora as I drive down the country lanes where I live in Holualoa, Hawaii. The wonderful aroma of coffee beans roasting in the air; the sound of Coqui frogs singing on the leaves; the taste of freshly cut pineapple on the tongue; sun-drenched salt water as it dries on the skin. This is my cocktail of sensory awakenings that inspires new music and a true understanding of what being alive means to me.

Musicians tend to be very sensitive souls, absorbing the energy around us through every one of the five senses. Where we live, work and play all affect our general happiness, creativity and productivity. I make conscious choices every day to honor how I feel about everything I do, where I lay my head at night and the people I spend quality time with. I’m also a firm believer in extra-sensory perception and multi-sensory experiences that often expand beyond the basic five senses into other realms of possibility, like “channeled energy” or gifted input — things that I cannot always explain.

You might call this pure inspiration, your muse or spark of creativity. Whatever it is, I try to tap into it and not question where it comes from. It’s a gift that I’m always thankful for when creating music.

Man singing and playing guitar onstage.

For example, I carefully select my set list of songs during live performances, choosing to play only the songs that I love and that resonate with me as an artist. When I’m asked to play a song that I don’t like, I politely decline and offer a suitable option. This way, I stay true to who I am and remain authentic in my artistry. I believe the audience can feel that from you; they know when you love the songs that you play!

As a solo performer, I’m always looking to create the most compelling musical soundscapes that I can with one guitar, vocals and percussion loops. I work hard on my song selection and arrangements, honing them to the point where I know I can improvise arrangements “on the fly” at any point within each song.

I’ve also chosen the best equipment and guitars possible for the varied iterations of my live performances. Some gigs require nylon string guitar, while others are best done with acoustic/electric or electric guitar. Each setup has its own signal chain, mixer and P.A. system requirements. It’s a lot of work to refine each set format and to dial in the sound for every venue and its particular acoustic properties, but it’s a necessary part of the job.

One of the most invaluable tools for me in live performance is the looper pedal. This simple device allows me to record any part of my performance and then layer ideas and improvisations over that section of music, enabling me to play melodic lines over rhythm guitar parts, extend my song performances and introduce varying textures to my audience. In effect, I’m maximizing my sonic “real estate” without having to hire other musicians.

Would it be better to use live musicians? In some cases, yes, but often budgets and space at a venue preclude me from hiring other players. On the positive side, scheduling performances, setting up gear and getting a great live sound is much easier!

Acoustic guitar laying on its side on a wood surface.

I often use my Yamaha NCX1200R nylon string guitar at live gigs where I need a soft sound for background music. The guitar’s A.R.T. (Acoustic Resonance Transducer) Pickup/Preamp System delivers the natural sound and dynamics of the nylon strings and I love that I can blend the bass and treble response of the under-saddle contact pickup. There’s also a built-in three-band graphic EQ that I can use if I need further tonal adjustments.

I often pair my guitar with a Line 6 Helix® processor to utilize its stereo amp/effects modeling and built-in looper; together, this provides an all-in-one live solution. I’ll run my percussion loops and vocals all into Helix and fade in and out of performances using the unit’s expression pedal.

Guitar head leaning against a control panel.

How difficult is it to work with a looper in a live situation? If, like me, you are looping percussion and guitar at the same time, it can be very hard. The timing and execution of the loop process has to be spot on. If the loop “in” and “out” points aren’t precise, you’ll hear an overlap in the percussion each time the loop cycles and the groove will suffer. Also, you’ll have to stop the percussion tracks immediately after recording the loop as they may start to run out of sync with the loop that you’ve just recorded. Add to that the fact that this is all happening live, while singing and playing the guitar. It’s an art form that takes time to master.

On the other hand, working without percussion loops will be a lot easier, since the timing can be less precise/mechanical and more in line with your own rhythm skills.

The Videos

Here’s a video of me at one of my live performances. If you look closely, you can see the loop process happening in real time:

And here’s a studio performance:

The chord progression is two bars in length and all of the chords are derived from the key of G. (The capo is at the second fret, so the actual pitch is A.) The tonal center is that of the G chord, so we have an Ionian progression (i.e., resolution to the first chord in the key of G).

Here, improvisations using the G major scale will be a great option. For example, place a capo at the second fret and play these shapes:

I: G    Am7  I  C    Dadd4  :I (Note: the actual pitch is I: A   Bm7  I  D    Eadd4  :I)

As you can see, once I’d recorded the initial guitar part, I kept the looper in record mode and played a snare drum part with my finger on the top of the guitar. The snare attacks are on beats 2 and 4 of both measures. Note that if you keep the looper in record mode you’ll need to stay silent until you record the next part, so get in the habit of muting the strings in-between recording the overdubs, as I do here.

Next, I added another chordal rhythm part for texture and harmonic variation. Here are the chord voicings I used for that second guitar part:

I: Gadd2   Am11  I  C5/2(#11)  D/F#  :I

When all of the overdubs are recorded, I exit the record mode by clicking the loop switch one more time. This ends the recording process but continues the playback of the loop. Remember to do that before improvising!

For the solo played in this video, I used the G Major scale and some nice double-stop 6ths. Note that I’m paying close attention to my phrasing to find the “pocket” and placement for the double-stop ideas. You’ll also notice that I’m using simple motifs so as to “let the chords do the work.”

The Wrap-Up

Here are some key elements that will help you execute clean loop performances:

  • Determine exactly what you are going to play before you even think about looping an idea.
  • Define the initial guitar part and how many bars (measures) the progression will be. Work out your overdub parts in advance if you can and have a clear understanding of the key, tonal center, scales and chord tones before improvising.
  • Practice the section of music you want to record and settle into the tempo. If you are using delay (as I often do), tap tempo while you’re playing to synchronize the delay time as well.
  • While playing your loop progression, tap your foot in time with the tempo near to where the loop record button is located. (I know this sounds obvious, but make that a convenient place near your foot.)
  • When you are ready, click the record button on the downbeat of the first bar of the progression. Stay in time and click the record button again at the end of the phrase you want to record.
  • Don’t rush or be anxious: relax as you execute the punch in and out points. If you aren’t used to playing and coordinating with your feet, this is going to take time to perfect … but it will get easier.

The more you practice looping, the better the results will be. Think like a composer/arranger and only layer in parts that enhance the audio palette and make musical sense.

For more guidance on looping, check out my Truefire course called “Creative Looping Handbook.”

Photographs courtesy of the author.

Check out Robbie’s other postings.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha nylon string guitars.

Click here for more information about the Line 6 Helix.

Lyrics 101

Written by Shelly Peiken on . Posted in Creativity.

A good marriage is a team, right? It’s when two people complement one another, each making the other look better. A balanced, harmonious effort from both parties will yield the best results. Same as in a song. But if the words fall short, worthy music can be left alone at the altar. 🙁

I’ve been mentoring at a few different music festivals recently, helping aspiring (and some relatively advanced) songwriters better understand their craft. In critiquing their work, I’ve noted a number of common missteps when it comes to lyrics.

Here are some of them. You might think these are no-brainers, but it can be hard to have perspective while you’re in the heat of the moment writing a song.

– The First Line: This is sometimes the hardest of all the lines. It may take you as much time to write it (or rewrite it) as the rest of the song. Make sure it’s attention getting. Make it impossible for me to ignore you.

– Context: In high school we’re taught that in the first paragraph of an essay we should reveal things like who-what-when-where. Remember? (I hated it!) Well, the same goes for song lyrics. A little orientation in the first verse gives the listener some frame of reference as to what’s about to unfold.

– Pronoun Consistency: Is it “I”? Is it “You”? Is it “We Are The World?” Pick one. And stay there. Or else I’m not going to know whose point of view the song is coming from.

– Tense: Are we in the past? Is this happening now? Is it something you imagine for the future? Be consistent here too. Yes, we can be in the present looking back and remembering when, but make sure to be clear that you’re looking over your shoulder.

– Mood: Are you hopelessly in love? Irreparably devastated? (I hope not.) Are you sick of the world? Feeling empowered? Keep the thread of that emotion throughout.

– Flow: There can be a stream of tasty ingredients adjacent to each other line after line, but if they don’t logically connect to each other the listener is going to be confused. (My husband often reminds me that the audience isn’t in my head. What? I assume that they’re going to know what I mean even if I leave out that one thing. Sadly, they won’t.)

– Concept: It may be a noble effort, but saving the planet is too ambitious to realistically solve in one song. A song should zero in on a brief moment in time. If you put it under a microscope there is usually much to say about it.

– Overthinking: Did you have me at hello and then jump the shark with TMI? Less is more.

– Variation: If all your lines are the same length and cadence I’m going to be yawning by the second verse. Mix ‘em up. Long, short, full sentences, snippets. (You’ll find more about this in our blog article Words and Music.)

The funny things about these observations is that I learn so much about making my own lyrics tighter by listening to yours. The most important takeaway (and the one I’m constantly reminding myself of, even after 20 years of professional songwriting) is: Be Yourself. What makes a song remarkable and memorable is a universal concept with a unique point of view — something that everybody can relate to but nobody has ever said “quite like that.” So ask yourself what makes you you and try to avoid chasing the last Taylor Swift hit because nobody is going to write her song better than she is.

Last but not least, I have been surprised to hear some writers say that they write just once a week. I don’t get it. Writers write! They get better by writing. Try to put time aside every day to “journal” even when you’re not in the mood, or nothing in particular happened lately that you feel is worth journaling about. You might be surprised. It’s the best way to get through the noise and stumble on the magic.

 

Check out Shelly’s other postings.

Adults at a party in someone's living room where a player piano is playing itself.

How to Subscribe to Disklavier Piano Radio

Written by Tom Ring on . Posted in Digital Pianos.

Are you a Disklavier owner? Do you know about the Piano Radio subscription service available for your instrument?

With Piano Radio, you can access more than 30 channels of streaming piano music on your Disklavier. Imagine your favorite artists across multiple genres performing in your home! With moving keys and real acoustic sound, Piano Radio brings your instrument to life and creates the perfect atmosphere. What’s more, your Piano Radio subscription includes access to Disklavier TV programs featuring streaming video content that plays in sync with your Disklavier. (Available in the U.S.and Canada only).

Here’s the procedure for subscribing to Piano Radio:

1. Start on the Yamaha PianoSoft home page. From there, navigate to the menu in the upper left-hand corner of the page:

Screenshot.

2. From the drop-down menu, select “Piano Radio.” This will redirect you to the Piano Radio subscription options page:

Screenshot.

3. Once you’re on this page, you can select from three choices: 1) Free trial, 2) Monthly subscription or Annual Subscription. (Note: The “Free Trial” option offers one channel with 30-second samples of each song selection and a free channel of music classics). Once you’ve made your selection, you’ll be redirected to a product detail page for that subscription tier.

4. In order to activate your subscription, you’ll need to select your instrument by clicking on the red “Choose Instrument” button:

Screenshot.

5. Follow the prompts on the Compatibility Checker to locate your Disklavier model:

Screenshot.

6. Once your model is selected, you are returned to the detail page and a red “Subscribe” button appears:

Screenshot.

7. From there, simply click on the button and you are redirected to the Net Services page to complete the signup process (for legal purposes, a dialog box will pop up asking you to confirm your age):

Screenshot.

8. If you currently have an account setup on Yamaha MusicSoft, you can type in your user name and password in the “Returning Customers” box. If not, there is a separate box for “New Customers” to sign up. For the purposes of illustration, we’ll sign in as a returning customer:

Screenshot.

9. Once you’re logged in, you can select your payment method, purchase the subscription and receive a receipt for the order:

Screenshot.

It’s that simple — and now you’re ready to start enjoying Piano Radio!

Graphic showing sound waves entering a person's ear.

How We Interpret Sound: An Interview with Dr. Floyd Toole

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in TV & Movies.

Interpretation is a critical part of life. It determines our likes, dislikes and personal preferences regarding everything from food and clothing to living environment and choice of entertainment.

Photo of Dr. Toole.

To better understand the concept of how people interpret sound, we interviewed famed loudspeaker and acoustics expert Dr. Floyd Toole, who has devoted his entire career to acoustical and psychoacoustical research for the National Research Council of Canada and Harman International.

How We Interpret Sound

For some people, great sound is considered to be whatever is popular in current culture. That might be rumbling bass and just enough treble to hear the melody or it could mean an engrossing listening experience that envelops like a blanket on a cold day. Then there are the physical aspects of what is actually coming out of a loudspeaker — something that most people are not aware of, although it’s simpler than you might think.

According to Toole, internal perception and scientific truth are the two elements at play in the way we perceive sound. “The reality is that in the history of audio, the mythology that has built up about certain brands and speaker designs and electronic algorithms and so on … [but] precious few if any of those comments are based on double-blind tests, so the opinions people have expressed were partially formed before they ever heard a sound,” he says. “I did my first double-blind sound test in 1966. I thought I would [use] a [single] loudspeaker and that would be that, [but] this particular loudspeaker was awful. A friend brought [another] … loudspeaker in and it was very different. So I did [a] randomized double-blind listening test. It was very important [that] people not know what they were hearing.”

Everyone in the test agreed on what they liked, and all favored the same loudspeaker — the one with the smoothest and flattest response. Yet the results were not what Toole expected, and to his surprise, he discovered that there had never been any serious scientific research done on the relationship between measurements and subjective opinions of loudspeaker sound quality. He spoke to his boss and began his life’s work.

“I spent the rest of my [career] doing that,” he says. “Everything that followed since those early tests has confirmed those findings: The smoothest, flattest loudspeakers win double-blind listening tests. However, when you go into a store and remember what you may have heard about a product, or listen to a salesman, your mind is partially made up. When listening “blind,” without the biasing influences of price, size, brand and appearance, people turn out to be remarkably similar in [terms of] what they like and dislike.

“Recordings sound better when played through neutral loudspeakers. The goal is for everybody in the audio universe to have neutral loudspeakers. And we’re not far away,” Toole states. “Most of the professionals and [many] loudspeaker manufacturers have figured it out. The problem is, the populace at large is not well-informed.”

“If you are fortunate enough to see a set of anechoically measured curves (i.e., measurements taken in a room with virtually no sonic reflections—Ed.) that are smooth and flattish on and off axis, the loudspeaker is likely to sound good — [that is,] neutral,” he adds. “There’s no mystery to it: If you don’t like what you hear in that loudspeaker, don’t blame the speaker, blame the recording.”

How to Optimize Sound in Your Home

To make the most of your home sound system, it’s no secret that you’ll need quality speakers. “If you purchased a good loudspeaker to begin with, leave it alone.” Toole advises. “Several room equalization techniques exist, implying that any loudspeaker in any room can be made to sound good. [Equalization] may or may not improve the sound of a poor loudspeaker, but unfortunately there is a good chance you could degrade the sound of a good loudspeaker. Two ears and a brain respond very differently to a complex sound field — and are much more analytical — than an omni-directional mic and analyzer. That said, equalization at bass frequencies is almost always helpful in dealing with room “boom” – [that is,] resonances in small rooms.”

According to Toole, the first thing you should do when setting up your home sound system is to adjust all channels to be at the same levels, and so that they all arrive at the right times. Many receivers and processors offer controls that can can assist with this.

In terms of room acoustics, if you start with well-designed loudspeakers, normal furnishing may be all you need. “Some audiophiles think all reflections are bad,” observes Toole, “but such rooms are oppressively dead. It turns out that a happy medium is easily achieved in normal rooms. Bookcases, lamps, tables, chairs, carpet and drapes — all of these things bring room acoustics into the range of acceptability. If you live in such a room, just buy some very good loudspeakers, hook them up, turn on your system, play something you like and enjoy it.”

“Take note of the fact that there is substantial scientific research that has been done to provide guidance,” are Toole’s parting words. “Manufacturers of quality loudspeakers tend to reveal the performance of their products. Others don’t. You should be skeptical of those who don’t.”

Photograph courtesy of Dr. Floyd Toole.

 

For more information about Yamaha home speakers click here.

Add These 3 Exercises to Your Percussion Practice Sessions

Written by Dr. Dave Gerhart on . Posted in Percussion.

As a percussionist, there are three things that we should always work on — reading, rolls and ear/listening.

I know it is naive to believe that these are the only things to work on, but if you can continue to improve in these areas, you will be more prepared for the future.

Student performers tend to only focus on the next thing they need to prepare for — an audition, a rehearsal or a performance. Believe it or not, this is also true for professional musicians. With my work, teaching, family and playing schedule, I don’t have as much time to spend in the practice room as I would like. But when I feel like skipping practice, I always remember this quote by golf legend Ben Hogan:  “Every day you don’t practice, you’re one day further from being good.”  

This quote inspires me to keep practicing. I have found that if I practice these three areas every day, I can continue to grow as a musician and maintain my chops.

Click on the links below to learn about:


Reading

All musicians should spend 15 to 30 minutes each day sight-reading. It doesn’t need to be melodic reading (although that it is probably weaker than your rhythmic reading), it just needs to be music you have never seen before.

Where can you get music? The number one source of free, public domain sheet music is IMSLP.org. For sight-reading, I would suggest starting with a Bach or Mozart violin or flute sonata. If you have someone else who wants to do some sight-reading, check out the Bach Inventions. There is so much music on the site, I promise you will never have a problem finding something new to read.

There are many beliefs about how you should sight-read something. Generally, once you play through it once, you aren’t sight-reading any more. Here are my steps:

  1. Scan through the music and see what the most difficult part is going to be. That section will determine my tempo. I always use a metronome when sight-reading because it keeps me “honest.”
  2. Depending on your level, you can use the metronome on every beat or just the down beat of the measure. Once I figure out my tempo, I make sure I check out the road map and key signature and then start reading.
  3. Read through the piece without stopping. Once I have read through the piece, I spend 30 to 60 seconds going over the most difficult passage and then I read it again. Sure, the second time is not “sight-reading,” but I think it’s important to improve upon my previous reading of the piece.

CHECK IT OUT: The OSM Series Snare Drums

Once I have read it a second time, I put it away. Instead of printing all of these pieces, I use my laptop or iPad to view the PDF. It saves paper and I have material to share with my students. I also like sight-reading with other people to add a level of accountability. Vivaldi or Mozart string quartets are perfect for this.

Rolls

Rolls are universal on all percussion instruments and something we need to work on daily to maintain the skills. I do a regime of SD roll exercises that include single stroke, double stroke, triple stroke and multiple bounce rolls. Working on single stroke rolls helps me maintain my timpani and mallet rolls. I enjoy working on double and triple stroke rolls with different fulcrum to accurately execute the different roll types. Two great books for roll development are “Developing Dexterity” by Mitchell Peters and “The Roll” by Emil Scholle.

Here is an exercise to work on snare drum rolls:


music notes showing double and triple stroke rolls

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Ear Training

In my opinion, developing your ear is one of the most underrated and under-practiced areas for most musicians. Working on your ear should be an ongoing daily activity. Work on listening and being more aware of what you are doing and what you are hearing.

Here are some suggestions to develop your ear:

  1. Practice singing intervals. You can use your smartphone and download a piano app and/or a tuning app and incorporate this into your daily practice.
  2. Play duets and chamber music. This will help you work on your ensemble listening skills.
  3. Listen to a lot of different music styles. It’s great to listen to your favorite group, but during the week try and listen to at least one artist you have never heard before. Practice playing with the recording and transcribing the grooves on the album.
  4. Practice with your metronome more often.
  5. Go hear live performances and talk about what you heard with a friend or colleague. See if you are hearing the same things that other people are hearing.
  6. Videotape and/or record audio of your rehearsals and performances. When you are ready to run through something, record it. When you’re standing behind an instrument, you hear things a lot differently than you do from an audience’s point of view.

Reading, rolls and listening — these are the three key areas all musicians should continue to develop to be successful. Honing your skills in these areas will help you further develop your musical skills.

Graphic of stylized music notation.

Words and Music

Written by Howard Massey on . Posted in Creativity.

Have you ever read something that “clicked” and stayed with you a long, long time? Ever hear a piece of music that did the same?

You may be surprised to learn that the reasons you fall in love with a song (or symphony) are very similar to those that make you connect with a short story (or novel): Something in it “speaks” to you, making you feel as though the songwriter/composer/author were addressing you, and you alone.

It might seem that this comes down to emotional impact, and to a large degree, that’s true. How you are feeling at the time — the trials and tribulations of life that you’re going through when you’re first exposed to the work — has a huge bearing on how something resonates. I know that, for me, the songs I strongly related to as an adolescent (as well as some of the books I read at the time) are the ones that have stayed with me throughout my entire life, and that seems to be true for most people I know. There have been numerous scientific studies that prove the point empirically, but really this is just one of those common sense things: The angst we all go through in our teenage years and early 20s — when we are trying to figure out who we are and how we fit into the world around us — not only creates lasting memories but shapes (and to a large degree determines) lifelong affinities.

In terms of music, it’s true that, in some cases, the words being sung are what “speak” to you, but I think that relatively few people gravitate to a song for that reason alone. After all, nobody goes around humming lyrics! Besides, there are plenty of powerful and enduring musical works that are purely instrumental.

I would argue that, most of the time, what makes us relate to a song, sonata or symphony is the way the music itself is constructed, in the same way that what appeals about a short story or novel is the way the sentences are constructed (or, in the case of poetry, the way the words are strung together). I was reminded of this recently when I came across the following quote from the late Gary Provost, a noted author and writing instructor:

This sentence has five words. Here are five more words. Five-word sentences are fine. But several together become monotonous. Listen to what is happening. This writing is getting boring. The sound of it drones. It's like a stuck record. The ear demands some variety. Now listen. I vary the sentence length, and I create music. Music. The writing sings. It has a pleasant rhythm, a lilt, a harmony. I use short sentences. And I use a sentences of medium length. And sometimes when I'm certain the reader is rested, I will engage him with a sentence of considerable length, a sentence that burns with energy and builds with all the impetus of a crescendo, the roll of the drums, the crash of the cymbals--sounds that say listen to this, it is important. So write with a combination of short, medium, and long sentences. Create a sound that pleases the reader's ear. Don't just write words. Write music. - Gary Provost

This advice was, of course, aimed at writers, but it could just as easily be applied to songwriters and composers, as well as to musicians of every stripe.

Put in musical terms, what Provost is describing is phrasing, a word that Wikipedia defines as:

The way a musician shapes a sequence of notes in a passage of music to express an emotion or impression. A musician accomplishes this by interpreting the music … by altering tone, tempo, dynamics, articulation, inflection and other characteristics. Phrasing can emphasize a concept in the music or a message in the lyrics, or it can digress from the composer’s intention.

This is pretty much on the money, though I personally would amend the first and second sentences to include songwriters and composers, who have an equal capacity to shape music to convey emotion. John Lennon, who seemed to have an inborn instinct for phrasing, is perhaps the perfect example. Listen closely to the way he shifts the lead vocal patterns in his song “I Am The Walrus,” creating interest in what is essentially just a fairly boring five-note melody. Or check out “Strawberry Fields Forever,” with its abrupt meter change from 4/4 to 3/4 in the chorus that adds a sense of urgency and contrasts powerfully with the laconic and rhythmically straightforward verses.

Frank Sinatra was another master of phrasing. The way he stretches some notes and clips others, starting some on the beat, others just before or after it in his rendition of the song “New York, New York” is the secret sauce that makes the recording iconic. Or, for another great example of the way a vocalist can bring new life to a song, take a listen to Bobby Darin’s still astonishingly hip 1959 recording of the song “Mack the Knife,” which was composed by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht for light opera way back in 1928. Of course, there are a slew of modern vocalists, from Sam Smith to Ed Sheeran, Celine Dion to Adele, who pour a ton of emotion into just about every note they sing, giving each song their personal stamp.

Phrasing is also what distinguishes one instrumentalist from another. Take any classical or jazz composition and listen to how it’s played by any four skilled soloists. You’ll likely hear four quite different interpretations of the same piece — sometimes subtle, sometimes radical, but with each adding new intent to the composer’s original conception, as memorialized in dots on a line.

It’s all deeply personal and subjective, of course, but I think we can derive some universal truths about the importance of phrasing, in both the literary and musical worlds. And so, with a nod to Gary Provost, this is the advice I would offer to writers of words and writers of music alike … and to performers of music as well: Don’t just write words; craft lasting documents that sing to the reader. Don’t just compose (or play) notes; create lasting works that speak to the listener.

These are the guideposts to originality … and the keys to success in your chosen field.

 

Check out Howard’s other postings.

Electric basses in rack onstage with amps.

Choosing the Right Bass Guitar, Part 1: Four-String or Five-String?

Written by Michael Gelfand on . Posted in Bass. 5 Comments on Choosing the Right Bass Guitar, Part 1: Four-String or Five-String?

Life is often at its best when you have choices, but sometimes having good choices makes for hard decisions. Such is the case for bassists who are wondering whether to buy a four- or five-string bass. Who knew that adding a single string could complicate things so much?

It’s fair to view the four-string bass as the standard bearer against which all other bass concepts are measured. It was an established instrument decades before the electric five-string bass evolved from an experimental oddity into a bonafide option in the mid-1970s. Now, with many years of design refinements under its belt, the five-string bass — with a burly low-B string added to the traditional four-string’s E-A-D-G — is considered almost mainstream, to the point where many bass manufacturers offer five-string instruments. (All Yamaha BB basses and most TRBX basses are available in four- and five-string configurations, and the BBNE2 Nathan East Signature Model is a five-string as well.)

Here are the pros and cons you need to know when considering whether a four-string or a five-string is right for your arsenal.

Four-String: The Pros

Electric bass guitar.
Yamaha TRBX604FM four-string bass.

The physical characteristics of every bass are subtly different, but they boil down mostly to string spacing, neck width, neck profile, scale length and overall weight. When you step up from a beginner four-string bass to a pro four-string model, those factors may change very slightly in one direction or the other, but they will seem far more extreme when you move from any four-string to a five-string bass – something we discuss in the “Five-String: The Cons” section below. Sure, you’ll gain access to more notes and more flexible hand positioning on a five-string bass, but will the trade-off for “more” be worth what you have to get used to as a result, and how will it impact your playing? So ask yourself: Do I need the extra string, or do I just need a better four-string bass?

Sometimes buckling down to get better at what you already know is better than jumping into something new, and sometimes having more note choices is actually a bad thing. When it comes to bass, the right note is far more important than the most notes. You may think that a five-string bass will act like steroids for your creativity and take you to some new level of greatness, but perhaps mastering your playing within the “limited” confines of a four-string bass is what you need instead. And that’s certainly way better than spending time onstage or in the studio worrying about where you are on the neck or overthinking whether you should play a note on the low-B string. The four-string bass is really all you need to lay down a tasty, economical groove and has more than enough range for you to play an innovative solo.

Four-String: The Cons

There’s nothing inherently wrong with a four-string bass, but if you’re a pit, studio or session musician who is regularly expected to transpose parts and deal with key changes, playing a four-string may not be enough to keep the gig. Of course, you could get a little extra low-end out of a four-string bass by adding a drop-D tuning machine or using an octave pedal in your signal chain, but those hacks still won’t get you below a low C, and even then, those lower notes still won’t sound tight. If the material you’re playing relies heavily on the extended low range, a four-string bass simply can’t compete with a five-string.

Five-String: The Pros

The biggest advantage of the five-string bass is its extended lower range. From the fretted low-E all the way down to the chest-imploding low-B, that fifth string provides a gateway for exploration into previously uncharted territory. The expanse down to the low-B is considerable — both felt and heard — and rewards you with thick and palpable low-end note choices that a four-string bass can only deliver via altered tunings or effect pedals that color your tone.

Photo of artist.
Nathan East with his signature Yamaha BBNE2 five-string bass.

Exciting possibilities open up on a five-string bass when you realize a song in C can now be played an entire octave below where you’d normally play it on a standard four-string. That type of sonic shift enables you to alter the entire character of a verse, a chorus, a lead section or even an entire song … and not just your part in it.

An additional bonus to having an extended lower range is that, as your bass patterns migrate lower, your sound will naturally carve out more isolation in the overall mix because your note choices won’t regularly compete with mid-range frequencies from guitarists and vocalists.

But perhaps the biggest benefit a five-string bass brings to the party is how that extra string can simplify the way you play your basslines from nearly every position on the neck. For an extreme example, think about the need to dramatically shift your hand position on a four-string bass to play a descending two-octave run. On a five-string bass there is no sweeping change of position — all it takes is a subtle shift down for the same outcome. The end result is more efficient hand positioning and less wasted energy, and with more note options available.

These are big upsides, but they come with some caveats too …

Five-String: The Cons

If you use a pick or play slap bass you’ll quickly realize that palm-muting the B-string is a necessity unless you like the incessant, rumbling drone of an open low-B. If you’re a finger-style player (as opposed to using a pick), you’ll likely rest your thumb on that bottom string as you play, but you’ll still need to be ever-mindful of muting it as you move around the fretboard.

And with that low-B string in mind, is your amplifier and speaker cab up to the task of reproducing these lower frequencies? Some bass amplifiers, cabinets and speakers aren’t adequately designed to actually reproduce the true fundamental frequencies of even a four-string bass’ lowest notes, and those deficiencies will be magnified as you plumb the lower range of a five-string bass. If your rig isn’t up to the task, you might be underwhelmed by an apparent lack of note definition. Even assuming your rig is actually capable of delivering the lower frequencies, you’ll need to stand slightly further away from it to actually hear things the way the low-end gods intended. (The laws of physics dictate that lower frequencies require longer sound waves, so it’s quite possible the audience will hear you better than you will.)

Perhaps more critical is the fact that you’ll invariably notice that most five-string basses feel different in your hands compared to four-string basses. For starters, some five-string bass designs rely on a 35-inch scale length to keep that low-B string tension taut (an inch longer than the 34-inch standard found on many four-string basses). But you’re more likely to notice that a five-string will either have narrower string-to-string spacing or a wider fretboard (especially as you move up the neck) to accommodate the B string. This also means that neck’s profile (its curvature and thickness measured from the exposed face of the fretboard to the back of the neck) may have different contours, may be slightly thicker, and may feel heftier. Depending on your personal taste and the bass in question, these nuances can be subtle or substantial, but these are all deviations from the basic four-string design that may require you to make frustrating refinements to your playing technique, particularly if you’re a slapper. It all boils down to what you’re used to and how comfortable you are adapting your playing to get what you want.

The most important thing to remember is that this doesn’t have to be an either/or decision: In a world where there are so many great four- and five-string basses to choose from, you can have one of each!

Be sure to check out Part 2: Active vs. Passive Basses

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha basses.

 

Two silver flutes side by side.

Genealogy of the Flute Family

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Woodwinds. 3 Comments on Genealogy of the Flute Family

The flute has its roots in ancient times, with a history that is perhaps longer than any instrument other than the recorder.

Let’s take a look at some little-known facts about this seminal woodwind.

The First Flutes Were More Like Recorders

The flute has its origins in the reed pipe. This works on the same principle as the grass whistles that children make by snapping off stalks of grass and blowing into them.

Transverse flutes (held horizontally like today’s modern flutes) made out of animal bones were used in Europe in the Paleolithic era. However, it was not until the sixteenth century, during the Renaissance period, that prototypes of today’s flute first emerged.

The term “flute” was originally applied both to pipe instruments held sideways (i.e., transverse) and those held vertically. This explains why, up until around the middle of the eighteenth century (the era of Baroque music), the word “flute” was commonly used to describe the vertically held recorder. To distinguish the transverse flute from the recorder, it was referred to in Italian as the flauto traverso, in German as the Querflöte, and in French as the flûte traversière — all of which mean “sideways held flute.”

Early flutes did not offer keys. Flutes in the Renaissance period had an extremely simple construction, consisting of a cylindrical body with an embouchure hole and (usually) six finger holes. They could also only produce certain semitones.

In the latter half of the seventeenth century, flutes with a conical body and a single key began to appear. With this mechanism, for the first time virtually all semitones could be played. Today this instrument is known as the “baroque flute.”

Theobald Boehm, a German wind instrument manufacturer, essentially created the modern-day flute, which he demonstrated at the Paris Exhibition of 1847. This instrument had a metal tube with numerous keys attached. With earlier flutes, it had been difficult to produce a good sound, and the intervals between the notes had been variable. Boehm’s instrument overcame these shortcomings and was a dramatic improvement over previous flutes. It included a lip plate — a curved, oval-shaped metal plate that is connected to the body of the flute by a component underneath it known as a riser. This was created so that a metal flute would have the same thickness as a wooden flute at this point.

The Piccolo

The piccolo is approximately half the length of the flute and uses the same fingering techniques. At first glance, the piccolo looks like a miniature replica of the flute. On closer inspection, however, various differences are evident. First, there is the material used for the body. While most flutes are made of metal, nowadays the majority of piccolos are made of wood. This is because the piccolo has a higher register, and metal piccolos can sound too piercing and therefore not blend well with other instruments. Second, the main tube of the piccolo is cone-shaped (conical), tapering off toward the tip. The flute used to be the same shape, until Theobald Boehm adopted the fixed-thickness cylinder in the nineteenth century, establishing this new profile. However, the tapered shape is more suitable for the register of the piccolo. Finally, there is the embouchure hole. The type of embouchure hole normally used on the piccolo today has no lip plate. All these features make the piccolo look like the flute of yesteryear.

The Flute Family

It is not unusual for a performer who plays the flute to switch to other members of the flute family: the piccolo, alto flute and bass flute.

As shown in the illustration below, the piccolo is pitched an octave higher than the flute and produces a brilliant, high-pitched sound. With a length of approximately 30 cm, the piccolo resounds loudly in the performer’s right ear when the instrument is played. The alto flute has a slightly gentler sound, while the bass flute boasts a total tube length of around 130 cm and is pitched an octave below the flute:

Diagram of the note range of the flute family.

Video Examples

Here are four videos that demonstrate the sonic differences between the members of the flute family.

First, Bach’s Solo Partita No. 2 played on the bass flute:

Next, Bach’s Siciliano on the alto flute:

Here’s Bizet’s l’Arlésienne performed on the flute:

Last but not least, the second movement of Vivaldi’s Piccolo Concerto in C Major on the piccolo:

This posting is adapted from the Yamaha Musical Instrument Guide.

For more information about Yamaha flutes click here.

For more information about Yamaha piccolos click here.

Living room setup with complete home theater setup.

Home Theater on a Budget, Part 4: Luxury System

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in TV & Movies.

If you’re ready for the ultimate in home entertainment, this final installment in our “Home Theater on a Budget” series is for you. Here are some helpful suggestions for stepping up to a luxury system — one that will not only provide you with endless hours of enjoyment but make you the envy of all your friends!

AV RECEIVER

AV receiver.
RX-A3080 AV receiver.

There are many options for high-end home theater receivers on the market but the most important factor in choosing the right one is knowing what you need. For example, if you’re looking for connectivity options galore, consider the Yamaha AVENTAGE RX-A3080 9.2-channel AV Receiver with MusicCast. It offers the ability to run Zone 2, 3 and 4 all at once, along with 4K Ultra HD functionality and multiple MusicCast features such as voice control with Amazon Alexa and wireless surround capabilities with Yamaha MusicCast 20 and MusicCast 50 wireless speakers. The RX-A3080 also includes Surround:AI that automatically optimizes the sound in real time and ESS SABRE DACs (Digital-to-Analog Converters) that cut down signal noise drastically for professional quality digital audio. While it’s true that some luxury receivers on the market offer similar functionality when it comes to the number of channels and technological capabilities available, each brand offers proprietary features that may or may not be a fit for you. Make sure you research thoroughly before buying!

MAIN SPEAKERS

Large floor-standing speaker.
NS-F901 floor standing Soavo speaker.

Luxury home theater speakers should offer superior audio reproduction and power to spare, as well as the ability to guide sound to your ears instead of off the walls. Yamaha NS-F901 floor standing Soavo speakers fulfill all these requirements and are distinguished for their stylish appearance and transparent sound when reproducing data-rich, high resolution audio sources.

CENTER CHANNEL SPEAKER

Horizontal speaker.
NS-C444 center channel speaker.

The primary function of a center channel speaker is to keep dialogue at the forefront without it getting lost in the surround mix behind things like gunshots, explosions and other ambient sound. A good option here is the Yamaha NS-C444 center channel speaker, designed specifically for home theater applications. It’s magnetically shielded and incorporates dual 5″ diaphragm cone woofers and a 1″ aluminum dome tweeter that utilizes an exclusive waveguide horn for improved imaging.

REAR SURROUND SPEAKERS

Two stereo speakers next to each other - one with the filter cover on; the other with the speaker and subwoofer exposed.
NS-333 bookshelf speakers.

To complete a 7-channel or 9-channel system, you’ll need two sets of rear speakers that can capture subtle elements like wind blowing or water rushing up from behind in your favorite action movie. The Yamaha NS-333 bookshelf speakers incorporate a two-way bass reflex design that integrates a 5″ Polymer-Injected Mica Diaphragm (PMD) cone woofer and a 1″ aluminum dome tweeter with an exclusive waveguide horn. When setting up your rear surround speakers, be sure to plan out where the wires will run — either above or below the floor or through the walls — and be sure to place them on a sturdy surface such as a speaker stand or bookshelf.

IN-CEILING SPEAKERS

In-ceiling speaker.
NS-IC800 in-ceiling speaker.

If you want the most from your home theater, you should consider adding in-ceiling speakers for height and even more subtlety. Yamaha NS-IC800 in-ceiling speakers feature a slim design for easy in-ceiling or in-wall mounting. They incorporate an 8″ blue PP (polypropylene) mica cone woofer for high performance mid-low sound reproduction and a 1″ fluid-cooled soft-dome swivel tweeter for pure high frequency with precise sound positioning. Whichever in-ceiling speakers you go with, bear in mind that it takes some effort to remove them once they’re installed, so make sure they’re durable and built from quality materials.

POWERED SUBWOOFER

Large square speaker.
NS-SW1000 subwoofer.

In a 5.1-channel system, the “.1” stands for having one subwoofer. But for an extra kick, why not boost your bass by having two subs? By providing dual subwoofer pre outs, the Yamaha RX-A3080 and all Yamaha AVENTAGE receivers give you the ability to run two subs with any setup. The Yamaha NS-SW1000 powered subwoofer is a good choice here since it provides 1,000 watts of digital power, plus a stable and accurate low range response — important in everything from fantasy movies to the rumble of engines in your favorite sci-fi film.

By upgrading your components to the very best on the market, you’ll be able to enjoy home theater like never before. If you’re setting up your own system without professional help, be sure to do your research thoroughly. A valuable resource can be the Yamaha AV Setup Guide, which provides step-by-step instructions for your AV receiver and system as a whole.

ACCESSORIES

Be sure to leave room in your budget for speaker wire, HDMI cables, speaker stands and any other accessories you may need for your system — an important tip even for home theater veterans.

After your new system is installed and set up, kick up your feet, press play on your favorite flick and get ready to pop the cork. You’ve reached the pinnacle of home entertainment excellence!

Check out the other installments in our “Home Theater on a Budget” blog series:

Part 1: Starter System
Part 2: Intermediate System
Part 3: Advanced System

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha AV products.

Fossil Ridge marching band performing

Case Study: Building a High School Band Program from Scratch

Written by Nicole Roberts on . Posted in Case Studies.

When Daniel Berard walked into his job interview at Fossil Ridge High School in Fort Collins, Colorado in 2004, he had a clear vision of how to start the band program from scratch. He pictured the program one, two, five and 10 years down the road and hoped the administration would buy into his plans.

“I laid out what I thought we might be able to do at Fossil Ridge, and that resonated with the people who opened the building,” recalls Berard, who had previously been a high school band director for 10 years before working toward his master’s degree in music education and instrumental conducting at Colorado State University.

Berard became a critical member on a core team of about a dozen individuals who opened the high school. Since the birth of the band program, he has striven for music excellence at Fossil Ridge as the performing arts department chair for the last 10 years and currently as the director of bands.

Then-principal Dr. Dierdre Cook wanted the band program to set the school apart from others, citing it as “one of the foundational cornerstones” for a successful high school. “I knew a marching band would be important, and I knew it had to be the right band director, and Dan Berard is the right band director,” she says.

The band program has about 180 students this year, but 13 years ago, it had only 20 students. Over the years, the school’s bands have won several awards. The Wind Symphony and Symphonic Band received superior ratings at state and regional concert band festivals, and the marching band has been a state championship finalist every year since 2005, winning the 2012 and 2013 Colorado Class 5A marching band championships.

Baby Steps

As the Fossil Ridge band program took life before his eyes, Berard says the first few years involved pumping blood into the group to get it up and running. “As we were getting going, we were just taking little baby steps along the way to make sure that every time we took a step forward, it was something that [the students and administration] could feel good about,” Berard explains. “Then we just built from there, slowly and methodically, kind of putting things in place.”

The three other high schools in the area had bands, but they did not really participate in marching activities, Berard says, so nurturing the band program in a community without a strong marching culture was the hardest part in the beginning.

To grow the marching arts at Fossil Ridge, Berard analyzed successful bands from across the country. “It’s matching what we wanted to do with what was happening from around the country and tailoring it to what our situation was going to be,” he says.

His firsthand observation of other groups helped him determine the structure of his rehearsals, how to keep students motivated and how to operate the chamber ensembles. Berard also pulled from his own personal experiences learning the value of patience and the business of band.

 

Gauging Success

Logistically at Fossil Ridge, the students are split into three sit-down bands — concert band, Symphonic Band and Wind Symphony — starting with the first day of school. These three bands combine to make up the marching band in the fall. After marching season, students continue playing in the concert bands for the rest of the school year and perform in several small ensembles during the second quarter. Color guard members continue their training through a spring dance program.

While the program earned several awards over the years, Berard says he does not solely use those accomplishments to measure the bands’ successes — he also gauges everyday accomplishments during practices and dress rehearsals. “There’s a lot of what the community sees as being really successful,” he explains. “[If] you win a couple of state championships or something for marching band, everybody thinks things are great, which it is, but from the inside, I see it a little differently. The growth of the program is [measured] by having kids rally around achieving this really, really high level, and that sets the standard on a daily level. It was great to do some of these high-profile performances, but what we do every day establishes our opportunity to do some of those bigger things.”

The little successes, says Berard, snowball into large successes. Two of those pivotal moments came in 2012 and 2016 when the Wind Symphony performed at the Music for All National Festival. Berard submitted an audition video on a whim in 2012, and the performance became the first “award” from a concert band standpoint. “That started this special climb because the kids really rallied around what that meant for them and the school,” he remembers. “They knew they would be performing with some of the very best groups in the country, and that just kind of elevated everybody. That group of students set a new standard for what they wanted out of the band program, and that really challenged me. I had to get a lot better because they wanted to get a lot better.” And when the symphony went back four years later, he says the performance set even higher standards for the program.

The Heartbeat of the School

Berard says several people have spurred the band’s success over the years, with the students and administration being the driving force. Cook, on the other hand, credits Berard — who she calls the “heartbeat of the school.”

“Those kids learn skills they wouldn’t learn from anywhere else, and he rallies kids to that level of excellence,” says Cook. “Dan moves it to the next level because he believes in the quality of the program and he believes in the talent of those kids, and he’s able to bring that out and have them be successful.”

The skills students learn in band go beyond the music and technical side of playing; they learn responsibilities and lessons that translate both on and off the field, according to Cook. Seeing band students working on homework while riding the bus is a common scene at Fossil Ridge High School because they understand responsibility. The music students have higher GPAs and college acceptance rates along with less disciplinary problems.

French horn and mellophone player Morgan Herrick understands firsthand how the program helps students grow musically and academically. “The competitive nature of band and how successful our band is kind of pushes you, especially as young high schoolers, because you realize how you have a part in the whole,” says Herrick, a May 2017 graduate. “It’s your responsibility as an individual to be a part of something bigger and to help the group. I think that’s a really good skill for people going into high school — to start learning right from the beginning.”

While band programs may be expensive, Cook says that the rewards outweigh the costs because they allow students to explore future opportunities, like college scholarships and university and military bands.

Creating a Legacy

Looking back on 13 years of the band program and how it all started, Berard calls the band’s success “magical.” The band met his 10-year goals in its seventh and eighth years, but maintaining this success could be even harder, he warns.

“Going from a 95 percent to a 96 percent is way harder than going from a 50 percent to a 90 percent,” explains Berard. “It’s that one percent that is almost impossible to get to. It’s that whole ‘good-to-great’ threshold.”

Embracing music technology and discovering different ways to keep students’ attention are just a couple of Berard’s current goals. With the foundation of the band now set, these “little” goals will eventually lead to the long-term health of the program and, Berard adds, hopefully create a legacy that will continue to live on.

Photos © 2017 Susan Horn and courtesy of the Fossil Ridge High School Band Parents, All rights reserved. 

 

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V4 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

What Is an Audio Interface?

Written by Mike Levine on . Posted in Recording. 8 Comments on What Is an Audio Interface?

Today’s computer-based digital audio workstation (DAW) software gives you more recording and music production power than a studio full of hardware from the pre-digital days. But despite all the functionality that such software provides, its sound depends heavily on a piece of external hardware called an audio interface.

Such devices offer the connectors you need to plug in microphones and instruments for recording as well as speakers and headphones for listening. They also typically provide metering and other important features. The more you understand about how interfaces work, and the kinds of features they offer, the better positioned you’ll be to make an informed buying decision.

Connecting with Your Computer

Modern audio interfaces connect to your desktop or laptop computer via a USB or Thunderbolt port (some older ones use different ports, such as PCI, PCIe or Ethernet). Most interfaces work with both Mac® and Windows systems; many are also compatible with Apple® iOS devices, although that usually requires an additional adapter.

Steinberg audio interfaces use the USB 2.0 connectivity format, which is supported by virtually all computers. Note that you can use a USB 2.0 interface on computers equipped with the newer USB 3.0 format because USB is backward compatible.

Connecting and Converting Audio

An audio interface acts as the front end of your computer recording system. For example, let’s say you connect a microphone and record yourself singing. The mic converts the physical vibration of air into an equivalent (i.e., “analog”) electrical signal, which travels down the connecting cable into the interface’s mic input. From there, it goes into the interface’s built-in mic preamplifier, which boosts the low-level mic signal up to a hotter line level — something that’s necessary for recording. (The quality of both the microphone and preamp have a significant impact on how good a recording sounds.)

Next, the signal gets sent to the interface’s analog-to-digital (“A/D”) converter, which changes it into equivalent digital audio data — a stream of ones and zeroes that travel through the USB or Thunderbolt cable into your computer. This data is then sent to your DAW or other recording software, where it gets recorded and/or processed with effects.

Almost simultaneously, the now-digitized audio that originated at your microphone — along with any other tracks you’ve already recorded for the song — get sent back from the computer to the audio interface over the USB cable, where it goes through an opposite quick change, carried out by a digital-to-analog (“D/A”) converter, which turns it back to an equivalent analog electrical signal. That signal is now available at the interface’s line outputs to feed your studio speakers, headphone output(s), or other line-level devices.

We’re saying almost simultaneously because it actually takes a few milliseconds (thousandths of a second) for the audio to go through all these changes, from the time you start singing to the time you hear it back. That slight delay is called latency — something we’ll look at more closely shortly.

MIDI Too

Most audio interfaces also offer MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) inputs and outputs, which allow you to connect a MIDI keyboard or other MIDI controller to your computer. The input(s) allow you to play software-based instruments (“virtual instruments”) that open as plug-ins (software add-ons) inside your DAW or as standalone applications. An interface’s MIDI output(s) makes it possible to connect an external MIDI sound source like a synthesizer or drum machine and have it “played” by MIDI data that you recorded in your DAW.

Rear view of product
The Steinberg UR22C rear panel, showing USB, MIDI in and out, and line in and out connections.

Sampling Rate and Bit Depth

If you’re shopping for an audio interface, you’ve probably come across the terms sampling rate and bit depth. Sampling rate refers to how often the A/D converter “looks” at the audio when converting it into digital data, usually described in terms of kiloHertz (kHz for short), where one kHz equals a thousand samples per second. Bit depth describes how long the digital “words” are that describe each of these samples. It may seem a little techie, but all you really need to know about these terms is this: The higher the number, the better the sound … but also the larger the file size.

Some interfaces support up to 24-bit 192 kHz audio, but that’s overkill in many cases. The vast majority of people recording today use settings of 24-bit 96 kHz, which provides plenty of quality with reasonable file sizes. By comparison, the audio standard for a CD is a lot lower: 16-bit 44.1 kHz.

Ins and Outs

The number of inputs and outputs varies significantly between different audio interfaces. Steinberg interfaces, for example, run the gamut from the UR22C, which offers two inputs and two outputs (and is therefore referred to as a “2 x 2” interface) to the 28 x 24 AXR4, which has 12 analog inputs and 8 analog outputs, as well as an additional 16 digital inputs and outputs in the ADAT Optical format so that you can gang other ADAT-equipped interfaces or mic preamp units to record more channels simultaneously. When recording large ensembles or bands with drums, even eight inputs may not be enough. Always try to envision the maximum number of inputs you’ll need for the recording you plan on doing. If you can, try to leave yourself a little room to grow, rather than just opting for the minimum sized unit that will work.

View of product.
The Steinberg UR44C 6 x 4 audio interface.

Most interfaces provide “combo connectors” for their mic input channels. These accept either XLR mic cables or 1/4″ line and/or instrument inputs, giving you added flexibility.

Closeup of product.
Combo jacks accept either XLR or 1/4″ inputs.

Audio interfaces also usually provide something called phantom power for the microphone inputs. This is a 48V electrical signal that is required by condenser microphones — a type of mic that’s very popular for recording. On some interfaces, phantom power can be turned on and off for individual channels, while on others it is switched for groups of channels at a time. (Click here to read our blog article explaining phantom power.)

In terms of outputs, almost all audio interfaces provide you with a stereo pair of 1/4″ line outputs, which can be used to feed your monitor speakers. Others give you additional analog outputs, which you can use for connecting to other hardware in more sophisticated setups.

There will also be at least one headphone port, which is typically 1/4″ stereo. Some interfaces, such as the Steinberg UR44C and AXR4, provide dual headphone outputs and allow you to send a separate mix to each. This is beneficial when recording multiple musicians because inevitably, the various players or singers will not all agree on the balance they want to hear in their headphones.

Latency

As discussed earlier, there’s a slight delay called latency that occurs because it takes the audio a number of milliseconds to travel through the interface input, into the computer, back out of the computer and appear at the interface output. During recording, that can be distracting, because you’ll hear your voice or your instrument coming back a little late, which can totally throw your timing off.

One way to deal with latency is to adjust the audio buffer (also known as “buffer size”) in your DAW to its lowest value. The buffer controls the amount of time the computer allows for processing and is measured in samples (64, 128, 256, etc.). The lower the buffer, the less latency. The tradeoff is that lower buffer settings put more strain on your computer, and that can result in clicks, pops and diminished audio quality.

Screenshot.
The audio buffer setting in Cubase 9.5.

A better way to circumvent latency — and without impacting computer performance — is called “direct monitoring” (sometimes called “zero-latency monitoring”), which is implemented on many audio interfaces, including all Steinberg models. It works like this: your interface sends a copy of your input signal (pre-computer) directly into the headphone output so that you can hear it in real time (with no latency) mixed with the tracks coming back from your computer.

View of product.
The UR22C Mix knob (third from right on the top row).

Some basic interfaces provide this feature via a simple switch that allows you to choose between the direct signal and the output of your host application, but in more sophisticated interfaces, such as the Steinberg UR22C, direct monitoring is implemented with a mix control knob that lets you adjust the ratio of the direct sound to the sound returning from the computer. Advanced models like the Steinberg UR-RT series even have digital processing (DSP) built in; all Steinberg interfaces offering this feature come with an app called DSPMixFx for controlling monitoring and adding effects from your computer, iPhone® or iPad®.

View of product.
The DSPMixFx app control panel.

Sound Quality

Remember, we’re talking audio interface, so sound quality is key. That’s why the most critical components in any interface are its converters and mic preamps. Steinberg interfaces all come equipped with top-of-range converters and Yamaha D-PRE mic preamps for consistently excellent sonics.

Older gentleman standing behind and leaning on a sound board.
Rupert Neve.

The Steinberg UR-RT2 and UR-RT4 interfaces take things up a notch thanks to the addition of Rupert Neve Designs transformers that can be switched into the signal path on every mic channel. A major designer of mixing consoles for more than half a century, Rupert Neve products are renowned throughout the recording industry. With these interfaces, you can add the legendary Neve sound to your home recordings.

 

An audio interface is more than just a necessary peripheral device. It’s the heart of your studio. Whether you’re buying your first one or replacing your current interface, be sure to do all the necessary research … and always get the best model your budget will allow.

Click here for more information about Steinberg audio interfaces.

Electronic keyboard.

Genos MIDI Recording, Part 1

Written by Gabriel Aldort on . Posted in Workstations.

This is the first of a two-part series on MIDI recording — a powerful feature offered by the Yamaha Genos arranger keyboard that allows you to quickly capture musical ideas as well as do complex multi-track recordings.

Before we get started, it’s important to understand the difference between the two MIDI recording modes offered by Genos. The first is called Quick Recording. This is great for capturing anything from one instrument (such as a piano) to creating a full-blown arrangement with up to 16 tracks playing back simultaneously. Whenever inspiration strikes, Quick Recording has got you covered.

The second mode is called Multi Recording — great for anyone who wants to build a song track by track. For example, let’s say you want to lay down a piano first, then add drums, then some bass, etc. We’ll be talking about this mode in Part 2 of this series.

Right now, let’s jump in and do some Quick Recording. For this first exercise, I’m going to recreate a real-world situation I find myself in more often than not, where I just want to sit down, play the piano and record an idea.

The first thing we’re going to do is to make sure that your Genos is set up to just play a single instrument — in this case, piano … but not just any piano! Instead, let’s go for the glorious CFX Concert Grand.

1. Begin by assigning the CFX to the Right 1 Part. To do this, you can either touch the Right 1 graphic on the screen and select the CFX from page one of the Piano category, or press the Voice button (the white backlit button located to the right of the jog wheel, next to the Style button):

Two examples of choosing from a dashboard, one is a touchscreen, the other are buttons.

Pressing the Voice button will take you to the same category and voice selection screen as if you’d used the touchscreen:

Display screen with CFX Concert Grand chosen.

2. Next, make sure that only the Right 1 Part is ON. (You could leave other Parts ON if you wanted to record layered or split voices, but for now let’s just stick with piano):

Dashboard buttons with one button lit.

3. Then double-check that the ACMP button is off (that is, not lit):

Dashboard with multiple keys lit.

When the ACMP button is lit, you generally won’t hear a single instrument across the full range of the keyboard unless your fingering mode is set to one of the “FULL” keyboard modes. (See my blog article “Mastering AI Fingered Mode” for more on this.)

4. Now that you’re set up with your single CFX Concert Grand, we’re ready to do some recording. It’s as simple as pressing the RECORDING button, located just to the right of the SONG B area on the left side of the panel:

Someone pressing the "record" key on dashboard.

5. You will now see the Song Recording Menu pop up on the screen. Go ahead and touch Quick Recording:

Someone choosing Quick Recording from options.

6. The main MIDI Quick Recording screen will appear:

Screenshot.

NOTE: If you like playing along to a Metronome you have the option of turning that on now by pressing the Metronome icon on the screen. Changing the tempo or even tapping a tempo in is achieved by the Tempo + & – buttons as well as the TAP TEMPO button, as shown below:

Dashboard with keys lit.

7. Now Genos is ready to start recording when you are — metronome or not. You don’t even have to hit any other button; as soon as you start playing, Genos will start recording.

Go ahead and record something — it doesn’t matter how long — and when you’re finished, press the Stop icon on the screen.

8. Now you can press the Play/Pause icon to listen back. Sound good? I hope so.

At this point, you can either choose to Save your song or try again. To save, simply press the save icon at the top of the screen:

Screenshot.

9. Finally, you get to choose where you want to save your song: to the internal User memory, or to a USB device. (Note: A compatible USB drive must be inserted into one of the “To Device” ports in order to save to a USB drive.) Select either the User icon or the USB1 icon and a name selection screen will appear, allowing you to name your song:

Screenshots.

Simply type the name of your new masterpiece into the character field. You can even assign it a cool icon by pressing the Icon icon (see what I did there? ;-)) and then selecting from the pages of unique icons available to you. I’m going to go with the sunglasses:

Screenshot.

After you’ve named your song, press OK (you may have to press it twice if you’re in the Icon Select screen) and voila, your new masterpiece is named and saved. At this point, you can confidently power down your Genos and not worry about whether or not your song has been saved.

Screenshot.

If, however, you decide that your newly recorded song is not to your liking and you’d like to try again, simply touch the Rec button on the screen and this message will appear:

Screenshot.

By selecting Continue, you’ll basically go back to the beginning: It’s as if you’d just pressed the RECORDING button for the first time. On the other hand, if you touch Cancel, you’ll have the opportunity to Save and Name your song as just described.

Note that this exercise was just focused on recording a single part — in this case, piano — but you can also capture splits, layers and even full Style playing in Quick Recording mode by following the same recording steps.

All photographs courtesy of the author.

 

Click here for Part 2, in which we discuss Multi Recording mode.

Click here for more information about Yamaha Genos.

Resources for Student Recruitment and Retention

Written by Marcia Neel on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

One of the hallmarks of successful music educators is their desire to continually seek out ways to “build a better mousetrap.”  For example, they look for new rehearsal and conducting techniques, innovative ideas to reach others through advocacy and more effective strategies to enhance recruitment and retention for their school’s music education programs.

These and other topics have been addressed in resources provided by the Music Achievement Council (MAC), a not-for-profit organization sponsored by the National Association of School Music Dealers (NASMD) and the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM). The MAC resources presented below have been created by teachers for teachers to help with recruitment and retention. They are available on the NAMM Foundation Resources for Educators website. The “First Performance Concert” book costs $45 while the rest are available as free downloads:

1. First Performance: A Demonstration Concert for Beginning Instrumental Music

Available for beginning band or orchestra, these “First Performance” materials help students demonstrate what they have learned in a short 30-minute concert to be presented within the first six to eight weeks after picking up their instruments. The package features sheet music, programs and a script that can be read by the school principal, a band parent or other invited emcee.

The timing of “First Performance Concert” creates excitement for parents and students alike, inspiring young musicians to practice more because they have quickly learned the satisfaction of a well-prepared show.

To further encourage retention, you can involve high school students as ushers, hosts or guest performers. In the case of band, a surprise appearance by the high school marching ensemble just prior to the conclusion of the show might be an impactful way to provide beginners and their parents with the “long view” of the music education program.

2. A Practical Guide to Recruitment and Retention

One of MAC’s most successful resources, this booklet compiles ideas and practices of music teachers, music dealers and the music products industry, including the following two key concepts:

  • Don’t miss any prospective students
  • Don’t try to avoid dropouts — rather, strive to improve retention

3. Tips for Success: Guide for Instrumental Music Teachers

This guide covers 24 topics that fall under four general areas: The Classroom, The Business Side of Teaching, Telling the Story and Supporting Music Education. Many tips include supplemental videos from directors who explain how they have implemented the specific concepts.

4. Bridging the Gap Between Middle School and High School

The transition from middle school to high school has been repeatedly identified as being the most crucial period in retaining students. The key to successful retention is action.

This publication provides strategies that directors, parents, principals, music supervisors and even the students themselves can implement to create a more seamless changeover as musicians advance from middle school to high school programs.

5. Bonus: Be Part of the Music

In addition to the tools provided by MAC, check out the Be Part of the Music website created by Scott Lang. This collection of written content and video materials provides information for students and educators segmented by band and orchestra as well as by middle school and high school.


cover of the 2017v4 issue of SupportED featuring the Boston Brass

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V4 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

5 Tips to Build a Band Program from Scratch

Written by Nicole Roberts on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

In the blog post, Case Study: Building a Band Program from Scratch, we learned how Daniel Berard built successful concert and marching bands at Fossil Ridge (Colorado) High School. Here is how he did it.

Tip 1: Focus on People First

When band directors first enter the music field, they believe that their primary focus is to teach music, Berard says. While that is part of the job, he says, band directors should always focus on the students and band staff before the music. “It’s about the people in the room first,” Berard says. “The music will get there once the people are taken care of.”

Tip 2: Start with the End in Mind

Have a plan and a vision for the band and try to meet the goals set in that plan. Berard looked at other successful bands to find strategies he could implement. “We could draw from these great band programs and find out what was really working and incorporate it into something here.”

Tip 3: Success and Setbacks are Two Sides of the Same Coin

Band directors should remember that both victories and failures drive a band. When the band or particular students experience success, make sure to celebrate, Berard says. However, when tough decisions need to be made, the best policy is to stay fair and firm.

Tip 4: Seek out Colleagues and Mentors

Berard understands that it’s terrifying to ask for an honest opinion, especially one that a director doesn’t want to hear. But he says that the advice of others will help the band and director improve.

Tip 5: Be Engaged in the School Community

The band is just one piece of the whole school system, and Berard says it’s important to support school-wide goals. As the performing arts department chair, he collaborated with the school’s administration team. “Try to get involved in those bigger-picture educational leadership discussions,” he says. “If the discussion is about making changes to the bell system, try to be engaged and figure out how that’s going to affect the science class just as much as how it’s going to affect the band class. Then, you can see how all those pieces have to fit together instead of always arguing just for your little piece of the pie.”

photo © 2017 Courtesy of the Fossil Ridge High School Band Parents, All Rights Reserved 


cover of the 2017v4 issue of SupportED featuring the Boston Brass

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V4 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

8 Tips for Sight-Reading Success

Written by Stacy N. Hackett on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

The key to sight-reading success? Consistent daily practice.

“Sight-reading is a skill any musician can acquire,” says Michael Burritt, professor of percussion and chair of the woodwinds, brass and percussion department at Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. He notes that musicians will need to learn new music throughout their lives and must be able to pick up the nuances of the music quickly. “It’s an important skill, and musicians are called to do it more often than they realize.”

Dr. Charles R. Jackson Jr., part-time assistant professor of music at Kennesaw (Georgia) State University,  agrees, emphasizing that the process is just as important for the full band as it is for individuals. “Just a few minutes every day, enough to play a few measures of new music, can help an ensemble become very confident and comfortable with the sight-reading process.”

Burritt and Jackson share their tips for guiding music students as individuals and in entire ensembles toward sight-reading success.

Tip 1: Start Young

Jackson recommends making sight-reading a daily part of rehearsal starting in middle school. “As early as 6th grade, if not earlier, sight-reading has to become part of a band’s daily rehearsal schedule,” he says. “Daily sight-reading practice then becomes a normal way of musical life for the students.”

Introducing regular sight-reading at this stage also helps build confidence in young musicians. “There’s no apprehension in a competitive setting because they have over-prepared ahead of time,” Jackson explains. “Students introduced to the concept as young musicians don’t consider sight-reading difficult because they are challenged early on.”

Tip 2: Tighten the Nuts and Bolts

Teach students to dissect all aspects of the music — the “nuts and bolts,” Burritt says. This process includes reading through the notes (including any rests) and noticing any key changes, time changes, accidentals, dynamics or other markings.

“Ask your students to look at the terrain of the music and to try to hear the music in their heads before they play it,” Burritt recommends. “They should ask themselves: ‘How is the music going to sound out loud?'”

Tip 3: Write It Down

Reinforce visual learning with written exercises. Jackson has used rhythmic analysis worksheets with his students with consistent success. “We would work daily on the worksheets, studying two measures at a time,” Jackson explains. “The students would indicate beats, notes and rests with up and down arrows or numbers. The approach encompasses all types of learning styles.”

Tip 4: Scale to New Height

To recognize key signatures during sight-reading exercises, you need to practice all of the scales — even the ones that may seem difficult.

Introduce the scales in chromatic order. “It helps encourage confidence in young musicians to build the scale cycle chromatically [C, C#/Db, D, D#/Eb, E, F, F#/Gb, G, G#/Ab, A, A#/Bb, B],” Jackson says. “Then when students are presented with a piece in the key of B, they don’t consider the music difficult.”

Tip 5: Tap the Rhythm

When they read through the music for the first time — before they pick up their instruments — have the students tap the beat with their feet. “This helps the students internalize the sense of pulse,” Jackson says. “Essentially, they become the metronome.”

Another benefit? “They learn to tap in phase with their neighbor, so all the students are in phase with each other,” Jackson says.

Tip 6: Play With Friends

Regular sight-reading as part of a duo or small group helps musicians absorb the music more quickly. “When you play by yourself, you can stop and start whenever you want without impacting other musicians, but when you play with someone else, you have to keep going,” Burritt says. “It forces you to look two, three or four beats ahead. Plus, it makes sight-reading more fun.”

Tip 7: Be Dynamic

When judging sight-reading performances at festivals, Jackson sometimes encounters bands that have great balance and technical ability — yet the music lacks expression. He attributes this problem to an ensemble paying little attention to dynamic contrast during sight-reading practice.

“I compare it to a painting done in black and gray tones — how much better would it look in color?” he says. “Music is all about expression. Those changes in expression noted on the page are part of the music. The band has to make it sound like music.”

Tip 8: Practice, Practice, Practice

And finally, because it bears repeating: practice, practice, practice. As Burritt says, “The key to sight-reading is to practice it on a regular basis, to make it a consistent part of daily [routine].”

closeup of hands playing a keyboard

Bonus Tip: Keyboardists: Don’t Look Down

 

Keyboard percussionists and pianists face a unique challenge when sight-reading. They must resist the urge to look down at their hands. “It is a learned skill to not look at the keyboard while learning new music,” says Michael Burritt. “Keyboard percussionists must learn to play by feel.”

Repeated practice of this technique helps such musicians develop the muscle memory to read music without looking down at the instrument. “You have to trust your muscle memory,” Burritt adds. “Your ear will tell you where to go, high or low. Just keep playing.”


cover of the 2017v4 issue of SupportED featuring the Boston Brass

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V4 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Lessons Learned from Past, Present and Future Festivals

Written by Marcia Neel on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

As we prepare for upcoming festival performances, we must remember that this is all about students attaining full facility of the skills required to become independent music-makers within the framework of the ensemble.

To borrow from “A Christmas Carol,” Charles Dickens‘ famous holiday tale, let’s focus on festivals past, present and future.

Festivals Past

All performances reflect the skills taught up to that point in time. In fact, festivals are the very definition of a “performance assessment.” Ensembles that demonstrate quality tone production do so because they learned the techniques required to produce that sound consistently. Those that play with proper blend and balance have been taught how to make appropriate adjustments by way of their acquired listening skills.

So why do we still hear festival performances where students do not demonstrate these qualities? Is the music too difficult? Is the director still working on developing his pedagogical bag of tricks? What can be done to ensure a more musical and impactful performance?

Festivals Present

The most memorable performances occur when our students are completely prepared and all that remains is to enjoy the moment. What does this mean for the director?

Directors must prepare students to perform with absolute confidence as individuals and as members of the ensemble. In other words, students know that they are ready because they already own it!

The festival performance should bring fulfillment to our students as music-makers and joy to the audience as the beneficiaries of an inspirational performance.

Festivals Future

The best directors continually improve their teaching skills to provide their students and future students with more comprehensive and enriching musical experiences. Whether competitive or not, adjudicated performances provide us with just this type of helpful assessment.

The festival assessment can serve as a prescription to help identify our own professional development needs and set the course for learning strategies that will result in higher quality performances in the future.

With musical growth comes a deeper understanding, commitment and passion for the art of producing the pinnacle performance and this is our target — music-making at the highest level.

 

 cover of the 2017v4 issue of SupportED featuring the Boston Brass

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V4 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

3 Teaching Tips from the Boston Brass

Written by Elizabeth Geli on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

In the blog post, Boston Brass’ Quest to Educate Young Musicians, the members of the Boston Brass shared that education is essential to their mission.

Here are some tips that the Boston Brass members like to impart to music directors during their many clinics.

Listen to the Pros

Play recordings of professional musicians as often as possible, perhaps during the beginning of class or as students are putting together their instruments.

“It only needs to be three minutes or so of different soloists on [different] instruments each day,” says horn player Chris Castellanos. “Students need to listen to professionals just as athletes watch pros on TV all the time.”

Breathe

Incorporate “The Breathing Gym” or other breathing exercises into your rehearsal routine.

“It kind of calls the meeting to order, and everybody gets on the same page,” says trumpet player Jeff Conner. “You’re breathing the same way, everybody’s dialed in, and they’re all concentrating. They’ve gotten the tension out of their bodies, and now they are ready to play their instruments and ready to rehearse.”

Encourage Chamber Groups

With Boston Brass being a chamber group itself, Conner says that he and its members always try to encourage band directors to incorporate chamber music into their music programs.

“It’s invaluable, [and] it makes the larger ensemble better,” Conner says. “It’s something that doesn’t necessarily have to be the responsibility of the band director, but it can be duets, a jazz quartet, anything. Playing in small groups is just a great thing for students to be doing.”

Photo by Rob Shanahan for Yamaha Corporation of America 

 

cover of the 2017v4 issue of SupportED featuring the Boston Brass

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V4 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Boston Brass

Boston Brass’ Quest to Educate Young Musicians

Written by Elizabeth Geli on . Posted in Educator Profiles.

As you might have guessed, the Boston Brass is a brass quintet originally formed in Boston.

What you might not have known is that more than performing with a unique blend of broad repertoire and boisterous fun, the group’s first goal is to help educate as many young musicians as possible.

“If there’s a day that goes by that we don’t teach or do a clinic, it feels like it was empty,” says tuba player Sam Pilafian. As the ensemble travels around the world giving performances, its members make plans to include as many clinics, master classes and guest artist concerts as possible. “We are on the road 180 days a year,” explains trumpet player Jeff Conner. “Part of our mission is to leave as big a footprint as we can wherever we are with music education.”

Reverence for music teachers is coded in the group’s DNA. In every performance, the Boston Brass asks all past, present and future music educators to stand for a round of applause. “[At] every concert, no matter where we are in the world, I … always say that I would not be on stage if it were not for my middle school and high school band directors,” reports Conner. “And I think all of us in the group have had these experiences.”

Horn player Chris Castellanos always recognizes his mentors. “I was fortunate to have a great band director in Las Vegas named Ed Jackson,” says Castellanos. “He always made it a point to challenge us with fun assignments. He turned practicing into a game, which in turn got a lot of kids interested who would’ve otherwise not practiced at all.”

Joining Forces

In 1986, Conner founded the Boston Brass — modeled after the Empire Brass — while he was a student at Boston University. Thirty-one years later he’s the only original member and the only one that actually lives in Boston. Yet Conner stresses the group has no leader. “What’s unique about the group is we’re all equal partners,” he says. “That’s something that we really think works best.”

In addition to Conner, Castellanos and Pilafian, the group includes trumpet player Jose Sibaja and trombone player Domingo Pagliuca. Thanks to today’s technologies, they often write, arrange and rehearse music remotely, then arrive at their next location a day early in order to rehearse for a full day before performing or teaching.

“When we’re in real time, it’s a pleasure, and a lot of the gist of what has to happen has happened,” says Pilafian. “We combine the digital life with seeing each other live, and then you have two families: Boston Brass and our real families.”

Serving All Students

members of the Boston Brass speaking in front of a room full of music students at a clinic

To prepare for clinics, the group likes to communicate with band directors in advance whenever possible. This early planning makes the clinics more dynamic and tailored for specific students. “We will be in touch with the director ahead of time, and we’ll ask them: ‘What would you like for us to cover during the course of the clinic?'” explains Conner. “[If] they have a specific need, we will definitely address it. We are very flexible.”

Sometimes just hearing a clinician say something — even when their director has said the same thing for weeks on end — can be the best way to reach the students. “They pay just a little bit more attention, or it’s delivered in a different accent, or they hear it on a different level, and they run with it right afterward,” says Pilafian. “Sometimes it’s simply the change of scenery that causes the breakthrough.”

All five members of the Boston Brass participate in the clinics unless they are in residence for a longer period of time, when they may break into more specialized workshops. Their clinics apply to all musicians of all types and levels, from elementary school to college as well as adult community groups.

The Boston Brass makes sure to tell the directors that all members of their school or organization are welcome. “Our clinics aren’t brass-specific, so everything we talk about is for all musicians,” Conner says. “We always let the directors know that … if they want to have orchestra students or choir students, they are welcome as well.”

Sometimes the quintet even gets to participate in halftime shows. The Boston Brass played with the James Madison University Marching Royal Dukes in Harrisonburg, Virginia, on its high school band day earlier this season. “There were [more than 1,000] people on the field, 750 of them were high school students, and we did two clinics for all the players; [the clinics] were so big that we had to put them in a basketball arena,” Pilafian says. “That’s satisfying. That feels like a great day’s work that we got to touch that many people and influence that many people. That felt good flying home on the day after that game.”

For Your Lungs and Ears

In addition to the director’s requests, some of the most common topics covered in the Boston Brass clinics include breathing technique, increasing sound, breaking down rhythms and improving dynamics. Pilafian is coauthor of the popular, Emmy-winning “The Breathing Gym” exercise book and DVD, so that is one of the pillars of the Boston Brass’s teaching and playing.

“We’re a living lab of ‘The Breathing Gym,’ and so it’s one of the things we spend a lot of time doing,” explains Pilafian. “It makes the band sound better and only takes three to five minutes. It’s addictive because you’re getting better.”

The Boston Brass always encourages students to listen to professional musicians as much as possible. “Have an open ear to all music and listen to music played by a professional that performs on your instrument,” says Pagliuca. “You will grow as far as your ears grow. The more you listen to great music, the better you will be as a musician.”

Generations of Perspective

members of the Boston Brass at a teaching clinic

The group’s respect for educators came full circle four years ago when Pilafian decided to join as a member of the group after his retirement from teaching in colleges. “I’ve known Jeff since he was a teenager, and he fell in love with brass chamber music,” Pilafian says. “He built this incredible career for the group, and I didn’t realize he was building my retirement at the time, but that’s what happens.”

For Conner and the other Boston Brass members, performing with Pilafian is a dream come true. “It’s incredible,” says Conner. “I never would have imagined that Sam would be playing in the quintet when he was coaching us as students 30 years ago at Boston University.”

Pilafian enjoys the unusual arrangement. “It’s your job as an older professional to stop treating students like students when they become great and acknowledge the fact that they’re now your colleagues,” he says. “We’ve got years and years of experience, but we have generations of perspective on the same piece of music, so we’re all learning from each other.”

Top photo by Rob Shanahan for Yamaha Corporation of America

Photos courtesy of Boston Brass

 

cover of the 2017v4 issue of SupportED featuring the Boston Brass

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V4 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

How to Choose the Right Mouthpiece

Written by Matt Kerns on . Posted in Winds.

I worked in a music store for many years, and one of the most common requests we’d get from customers was help with picking a mouthpiece. The conversation would often include something like this: “I need a new mouthpiece. I want something that let’s me play higher … and sound really good!”

Admirable goals, to be sure, but finding a single mouthpiece that gives you range, volume and good tone quality all at once is probably a bit too much to expect. This is mostly due to the physics of how mouthpieces work — the things that make it easier to play high notes also generally tend to sacrifice your tone quality.

The conversation continues with the customer saying, “My friend has this mouthpiece that’s awesome. He can hit a (insert impressive note here) with it!”

Any experienced brass player is probably hearing warning bells right about now. Just because someone else has success with a particular mouthpiece doesn’t mean that same mouthpiece is going to work well for you. After all, your jaw is different, your teeth are different, the muscles in your lips and mouth are different, even the texture of your skin and the shape of your nasal cavity are different. All of these things influence how a mouthpiece feels and responds, so what works for someone else may be a terrible choice for you. It’s sort of like trying on shoes — the shoes that a star basketball player wears probably aren’t going to make you jump any higher, assuming they even fit your feet at all!

So how should you go about picking a new mouthpiece? Knowing what someone else is playing can give you a good starting point for your search, but to find the right fit for you there’s really no substitute for simply trying things out. Here are some tips and suggestions that come from my own experience helping hundreds — if not thousands — of players in their quest to find a perfect mouthpiece over the years.

What’s the Most Important Thing You’d Like to Change?

It’s OK to want to play higher and louder and with a good tone, but the truth is you’re probably going to have to compromise at least a little to find the right balance of characteristics. If hitting that D above the staff is what’s really important to you, then go into your search knowing that’s your main goal. Or perhaps you really want to improve your endurance so you’re still playing strong after a two-hour rehearsal, or get a warmer and fuller sound, or find a mouthpiece that helps your flexibility and articulation. Different mouthpieces can assist with all of these things, but if you know what’s most important to you from the start you’ll be able to focus on the right characteristics and find a good fit faster.

Don’t Be Afraid to Try a Few Different Sizes/Models

Trying a range of different sizes to compare differences can be helpful, especially if you’ve only ever played on one mouthpiece before. If you’re fortunate, you’ll be able to work with a music store that has a variety of different mouthpieces available for you to try (and experienced employees to guide you in your search). Even if you don’t have a music store near you, you may be able to try different mouthpieces from other players in your band, or your band director might have a few different sizes you can experiment with. (Just be sure to clean any mouthpieces you borrow — you definitely don’t want to spread germs around!)

Bring Your Instrument and Current Mouthpiece to Compare

This may seem obvious, but you’d be surprised how many people go shopping for a new mouthpiece and leave their instrument at home! Sure, you can borrow a horn, but how will you know if what you’re feeling/hearing is because of the new mouthpiece or because of the instrument? Also, if you have your current mouthpiece with you, you can quickly compare the new against the old so you don’t have to rely on memory (“I think that feels better, but I’m not really sure …”).

Play a Variety of Different Music and Passages

Sure, go ahead and see if you can hit a few screamers, but also play some slow, soft passages as well as something with a lot of moving notes and fast articulations. Have some tough music that you’re working on right now? Bring that along and try playing it, too. Traditional warm-up exercises and études also work well for this. Get a good feel for how the mouthpiece responds in a variety of different situations that reflect what you’re really playing. The “boring” stuff is just as important as the higher, faster, louder stuff.

If in Doubt, Go for Comfort

There may be specific situations where getting a mouthpiece that feels difficult to play might be appropriate (such as if you’re trying to build your endurance, or if you’ve been using a cheater mouthpiece and need to fix your embouchure). However, choosing the mouthpiece that feels the most comfortable for your style of playing is usually a safe bet, which makes it even more important to try mouthpieces using your own instrument with real music that you actually play. After all, squeaking out an extra note or two doesn’t matter if you’re worn out in just five minutes!

Listen to Your Private Teacher or Coach

Maybe this should be higher on the list, but I’m putting it last for emphasis. If you have a private teacher, or are working with a coach, listen to what he or she suggests. If your teacher is available to assist you with the actual mouthpiece tryout process, that’s even better! Private instructors are going to have a tremendous amount of knowledge and insight into how you play, and they may make recommendations to correct a specific issue or guide you toward a particular sound. Don’t second-guess what they tell you just because you read something different on the internet!

Remember, it’s fine to use other people’s opinions and experiences as a starting point in your search, but ultimately, the mouthpiece needs to fit you!

Rows of knobs on a sound mixing board.

Aux Sends and Returns

Written by Steve La Cerra on . Posted in Live Sound. 4 Comments on Aux Sends and Returns

In the first of our two-part series on using reverb and delay, we touched briefly on aux (short for “auxiliary”) sends and returns. In this article, we’ll take a closer look at these important controls.

Aux Sends

When doing live sound, microphone inputs are typically sent to the left/right or main mix. This makes a lot of sense because we want to hear those sounds in the PA system. However, there are times when you may also need to send a signal somewhere else — like, for example, to an effects processor such as a reverb or delay unit. That’s the primary purpose of an aux send. Aux sends are sometimes labeled with different names such as “effects send,” “FX send,” MON (short for “monitor”) or even “foldback,” but they all work the same way: They serve as a secondary output from a channel that routes the signal to a place other than the main left and right speakers.

Depending upon the mixer, aux sends may be “internal,” meaning that they send a signal to an onboard effects processor like the one in the Yamaha MG10XU. In other cases, aux sends are “external,” meaning that they feed signal completely out of the mixer to another device altogether. In the case of the latter, there will be physical output jacks on the mixer (usually on the rear panel) that enable you to connect whatever external devices you want to receive this signal.

Suppose you want to add reverb to a vocal microphone that’s plugged into your mixer. The channel it’s connected to is already feeding the vocal to the left and right speakers. It would be silly to take the left and right outputs from the mixer and connect them to a reverb unit because (a) it would be impractical, and (b) you’d get reverb on every channel — probably not a good thing. This is where an aux send comes in.

You’ve probably heard the term signal flow. It’s particularly apt because it implies that an audio signal is like water. Using this analogy, you can think of a mixer channel as the main pipe — the one that takes the signal from the vocal mic to the left/right mix. An aux send is like a small “tap” used to divert a bit of the signal — just like a plumber uses a valve and piping from the water main to get water into your kitchen … although, of course, once that valve is added, it can be connected via piping to anywhere in the house. It’s the same with an audio signal. Just like the valves on a water main, one channel can feed many aux sends.

Let’s take a look at a simple example. The illustration below shows part of a channel in the MG10XU. You can see at the top that there is a knob labeled FX. This is an aux send dedicated to the mixer’s internal FX processor. When you turn up this knob, signal from the channel is routed into the mixer’s internal FX. The main LEVEL knob (the one on the bottom) still controls the amount of signal going to the left/right mix. If we turn up both knobs, the signal from that channel goes to two places at the same time.

Diagram showing settings.
MG10XU channel.

It’s important to realize that the channels on a mixer share aux sends. For example, all of the channels on the MG10XU have access to the same FX processor “bus.” (A bus is an audio path that brings multiple signals to the same place at the same time — just like a city bus takes a lot of people to the same work location in the morning.) Even though all the channels share the bus, you use the aux send knobs to independently control the amount of effect for each individual channel.

Using Aux Sends to Create Monitor Mixes

As mentioned previously, some mixers have output jacks for the aux sends, allowing you to send signal to external devices. These devices could be effects processors … or they could be stage monitors.

As shown in the illustration below, the Yamaha MGP12X offers four different aux sends, each with a separate TRS output on the rear panel of the mixer:

Diagram of knob settings.
MGP12X aux sends.

To set up an onstage monitor for, say, the lead singer, simply connect a cable from the MGP12X Aux 1 Send output jack to the input of a powered speaker such as the Yamaha DBR10:

Diagram.
Aux out to onstage monitor.

When you then turn up the Aux 1 knobs on different channels, they “get on the bus” and go to the Aux 1 output jack, then to the monitor:

Diagram.
Aux send bus to onstage monitor.

If your mixer has multiple external aux sends, you can create separate monitor mixes for different musicians, as shown below:

Diagram.
Aux send busses to multiple onstage monitors.

Aux send 4 on the MGP12X is labeled “FX” and is typically used to feed external effect processors such as a digital delay or reverb:

Aux send bus to external effects processor.

As we’ll see shortly, the processor’s output must be connected to an aux/effects return or a spare input channel in order to add it back into the signal path.

Pre-Fader vs. Post-Fader

If you’re paying attention, you may have noticed that some aux sends have the word PRE next to them. This refers to whether the send is taking its signal pre-fader (i.e., before the fader) or post-fader (after the fader).

What’s the difference? Let’s go back to the water analogy. Imagine there’s a valve that turns the water on and off in your kitchen. If you turn off that valve you will never get any water from the kitchen faucet. If you crack open that valve just a little bit, you only get a trickle of water from the kitchen faucet. If you open the valve all the way, you can get a strong flow of water from the faucet. That’s how a post-fader send works. The valve is the fader, and the faucet is a post-fader send. If you shut off the fader (the valve), the send (the kitchen faucet) doesn’t work anymore.

Thankfully, the valve in your bathroom is in a different place. It’s before the kitchen valve, so even if you shut off the kitchen valve you still have water to shower with. That’s how a pre-fader send works. Even if you lower the fader all the way down, you can still turn up a pre-fader send.

So why have both?

Generally, post-fader sends are used for effects, so that when you raise or lower the fader, the effect send level is also raised or lowered. In other words, the effect stays in proportion to the “dry” sound.

Pre-fader sends are usually used for monitor (or headphone) mixes so that when you raise or lower a channel in the left/right mix, the monitor mix does not change. This is important because a musician may want their monitor mix to be different from the mix that the audience hears. A musician might, for example, hear enough guitar from a loud onstage amp and not need it in their monitor, but you still might need to put a little bit of guitar in the PA system for the audience to hear it clearly.

Sometimes an aux send can be switched to be pre- or post-fader (for example, Aux 2 on the Yamaha MGP12X), making it usable as either an effects send or a monitor send. However, most of the time sends are “fixed” to either pre- or post-fader and you can’t change that — so you’ll want to choose carefully which you use for effects (again, usually post-fader) and which you use for monitors (usually pre-fader).

Finally, most aux outputs have a Send Master knob that controls the overall level of the bus, making it easy to adjust the volume of the mix without disturbing the balance between the different channels:

Diagram.
MGP12X aux sends masters.

Aux Returns

Of course, after you send signal into a processor (whether it’s an internal one or an external device), you still have to bring it back (return it) to the left/right mix so that you can hear the effect. That’s the purpose of an aux return (sometimes called an effect return or FX return), which you can think of it as being a kind of mini-input. In some cases, it may have only a knob for level and an on/off switch, as on the entry-level Yamaha MG10XU mixer. Here, all you have to do to hear the effect is raise the FX RTN LEVEL knob:

Diagram.
MG10XU FX RTN
(FX Return).

Contrast this with the FX return on the more advanced MGP12X:

Diagram.
MGP12X FX Return.

Here, a fader is used for more accurate level control, plus there are on/off and bus assignment switches (we’ll discuss these in a future Tools of the Trade blog posting) and three Aux Send knobs: Aux 1, Aux 2 and Aux 3. Yes, these aux send controls enable you to send the FX return itself into any or all of the three different aux sends. Sound crazy? Not really. This configuration allows you to add effects into the monitor mixes — a really nice feature for singers who like a bit of reverb or echo in their monitors.

Note that aux returns can also be used as spare inputs. If you have a smartphone, tablet or computer at your FOH (Front Of House) position that you want to use to play music in-between sets, an aux return is a good place to connect it since it leaves all your input channels free for microphones or instruments onstage.

 

Check out our other Tools of the Trade postings.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha mixing consoles.

Man playing electric guitar.

Crafting Your Signature Guitar Sound

Written by Robbie Calvo on . Posted in Electric Guitars.

Musicians are often gifted with additional creative talents such as fine art painting, photography and/or graphic design. We can use these skills to produce our own gig posters and to build websites and social media platforms — all of the essential marketing tools that we need to promote our music.

The author seated in an ornate hallway with his guitar.

I’m trained as an interior designer and decorative painter and have always drawn, painted and designed my own marketing materials. I’ve learned how to publish my own websites and take compelling photographs, as well as how to use color to build brand recognition as an independent artist on my YouTube, Instagram and Facebook channels. Most importantly, these skills ensure that my career is not misrepresented by outside sources.

The instruments, amps and pedals we choose to create our music are all extensions of our brand too. Guitar shapes, styles and colors often suggest the genre of music we play, and while the amps and pedalboards we use for live performance sometimes vary from studio session rigs, the overall tones they produce should nonetheless support the sound of our brand. For that reason, I like to think of these elements as “sub-brands” of our global artistic vision.

I workshop with a lot of guitar players who are still searching for that elusive individualistic tone, and my advice to them is to understand who you are first. When you know who you are and what your vision is, you can go about achieving it. Choose instruments and gear that support your vision … and not by what it says on the headstock!

I’ve chosen to play Yamaha Revstar guitars through a Line 6 Helix® processor for my studio sessions, live gigs and workshop clinics, not because they “give me” my sound but because they support my tonal brand and are faithful conduits for my musical voice. The fact that they look and sound cool is an added bonus!

Three electric guitars lined up.

The “Cafe Racer”-inspired Revstar guitars sport hand-rubbed flame maple top finishes and brushed nickel hardware for a retro-modern appeal. Not only does this blend well with my image and style of music, I’m inspired by how the guitars feel and sound when I play them, making them the perfect conduit for my creativity.

So if the products we use, the clothes we wear and our social media marketing presence are all part of our universal brand, shouldn’t our guitar playing style, phrasing and tone represent the same trademark standards?

We all have the opportunity, as individuals, to forge our own musical brand … and only part of that comes from the use of particular guitars, amps and pedals. In my opinion, most of our tonal identity actually comes from within: our touch, note choices, chord voicings and rhythmic phrasing.

At my workshops, I discuss and demonstrate a series of conceptual ideas that I believe can help you develop your own personal musical brand, style and voice on the guitar. Here’s a video that will allow you to explore some of those ideas.

The Video

Let the Chords Do the Work

The chord progression in the backing track to this video is quite straightforward: D – Bm7 – G – D, with two measures (bars) on each chord. This creates an eight-measure progression that resolves nicely to the tonal center of D major (D Ionian).

Over these chords, I’m playing notes from the D major scale and, initially, I’m simply repeating the same melodic phrase. Despite the repetition, you’ll notice that the melody takes on a new flavor each time the chords change. I call this “letting the chords do the work.” Even though the melody notes are the same each time, their relationship to the underlying chord varies and thus produces a different musical emotion. This is a great way to construct a solo and create a memorable experience for your audience.

Motifs

Motifs are simple melodic phrases that are played repeatedly. In pop music these are often referred to as “hooks.” There are tons of them in this demo — musical ideas that I recap to produce familiarity for the listener. I often tell guitar players to stop throwing away their ideas when they improvise and try developing simple motifs that can be phrased and re-phrased.

Phrasing

Phrasing is the rhythmic delivery of your melodic message. You can successfully replay the same notes over and over again by changing their rhythmic aspect, or even by simply starting the phrase in a new location within the bar.

Check out the video again and focus on where I place phrases within each bar. On my opening line I start the phrase on the downbeat of 1; then, when I repeat the motif over the next two chords I start the phrase on the upbeat of 1. This is called melodic/rhythmic displacement, and it often has the added benefit of making your licks sound cooler too!

Keep listening and you’ll hear me dramatically change where I place the phrases each time as I move through this solo. I’m getting as much musical mileage out of my phrases as possible by letting the chords do the work and by manipulating the note values each time.

The Wrap-Up

These are just a few creative ways to develop your musical identity and craft your signature sound. Don’t rely on your gear to provide the marketing magic: Let your creative approach to performance be the key to standing out in the crowd.

Photographs courtesy of the author.

Check out Robbie’s other postings.

Stage Fright

Written by Anthony DeCurtis on . Posted in Brand.

I’ve written about popular music for nearly forty years, and performance is perhaps the subject that excites me most about it. I’ve always been fascinated by the transformation that occurs when someone takes that last magical step onto the stage, whether in a club, a theater, an arena or a stadium. Once at a U2 show in Albany, NY, I was talking to Bono backstage, and he suddenly said, “Walk with me for a minute.” I thought to myself, Where are we going? Isn’t the show starting soon? Then he stopped talking, gave me a quick hug, said “Great seeing you!” and ran out onto the stage in front of a roaring arena crowd.

Picture of Lou Reed with his name overlaid.

“How does he do that?” I wondered. How do you go from having a casual conversation to leading a band and whipping an audience into a frenzy? Well, recently, I’ve had the opportunity to find out, albeit on a much smaller level. When I published a biography of Lou Reed in 2017, I received many invitations to speak. Often those invitations were accompanied by a request that I also try to line up musicians to play some of Lou’s songs. Graciously, Suzanne Vega, singer-songwriter Richard Barone and guitarist Jeff Ross (who played with Lou on Street Hassle and Take No Prisoners) all agreed to perform when I launched the book at an event at the 92nd Street Y in New York City. We met for a rehearsal the day before the event, and I made a surprise request: I wanted to join them onstage.

I hadn’t really sung in public since my high school band played a church auditorium back in the Sixties. But I can carry a tune, and let’s face it, you don’t exactly need to be Pavarotti to make your way through a Lou Reed song. I’d missed some chances over the years to do something like this because I was too shy or too scared. As with so many things in life as you get older, I thought, if not now, when? After that, we were a band.

At the Y we traded verses on “I’m Waiting for the Man” and “Walk on the Wild Side,” and I sang background on the four other songs we performed. The audience loved it, and I’d been bitten by the bug. A few months later, Richard invited me to sing “I’m Waiting for the Man” with him, Jeffrey Gaines and Steve Addabbo at World Café Live in Philadelphia. Then the Andy Browne Troupe offered to back me up on a full set of Lou Reed songs at the 529 Club in Atlanta. I immediately said yes, but as the date approached, the prospect of singing lead on fifteen songs backed by a nine-piece band was terrifying. Just putting together the set list had been an education. I started by doing what I always have done: think like a critic. I need to represent every phase of Lou’s career responsibly, I told myself. And — heaven forfend! — I certainly didn’t want to rely exclusively on Lou’s best-known songs; my selections needed to be much cooler than that.

When I began rehearsing, however, all my criteria boiled down to exactly one: How well can I sing this song? That was the first of many lessons I learned about the difference between being a performer and being a critic. Nobody was going to stand in the audience and think, “That vocal sucked, but what a clever song choice!” The show was either going to work, or it wasn’t. Consequently, no matter how important a song was, if I couldn’t do a good job of delivering it, it was off the list.

Large band on stage.
Channeling Lou with the Andy Browne Troupe at the 529 Club in Atlanta.

I wasn’t coming to Lou’s music cold, of course. I knew him personally, wrote about and interviewed him many times, and spent more than three years working to piece together his life story. But singing his songs has profoundly deepened my appreciation for his artistry. He often doesn’t sound as if he’s doing much as a singer, but when you try to get inside his songs and replicate his performances, you realize how much intelligence and restraint go into making it seem that easy. Musicians in bands I’ve written about over the years about have joked endlessly with me about the pretensions and extravagant expectations of their lead singers. But doing it has taught me so much about the confidence you need to get up there and be the front man. It’s a rush like nothing I’ve ever felt, but also a risk. Feeling that exposed is no joke. For all that musicians complain about the perils of LSD — lead singer’s disease — bands ultimately look to the singer to define the performance. It quickly became clear to me that the more energy I put into my delivery and the more I responded to what the players were doing, the stronger they kicked in behind me.

Man singing on stage.
Performing at The Shrine in Harlem.

But the biggest rush is the camaraderie you feel with the band — and the power they give you. The first time I was backed by a full band was at the Four Quarter Bar in North Little Rock, and when they leaned into the opening of “Sweet Jane,” I got so excited I almost forgot to sing! I quickly focused, though, and learned how self-assured a great band can make you feel, how much you want to step up to meet their standard.

This may sound immodest, but the fact of the matter is that the Andy Browne Troupe and I killed at that show in Atlanta. Sure, I slipped up here and there, but I learned how to trust that the band would catch me — and at the same time push me to keep going even harder.

Believe me, I’m not quitting my day job. I know where my true talents lie. But the confidence I’ve gained as a result of these experiences is yet another gift that music has given me — a gift I never anticipated, and one that’s proven as valuable to me off the stage as on it.

Photos courtesy of Little, Brown; Lucy Browne; and Dmitry Kiper (@dmitrysea).
A couple cuddling on couch watching a volcano erupt in a movie on the large flat screen.

Dolby Atmos® Is Coming to Apple TV® 4K

Written by Joy Frye on . Posted in TV & Movies.

Movie lovers rejoice! Apple TV® 4K now features Dolby Atmos®. Apple shared the exciting news at its 2018 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), noting that iTunes® would be carrying a huge selection of Dolby Atmos movies — a major enhancement to the nation’s fourth most popular streaming service.

Dolby Atmos is, of course, widely used in movie theaters. Many blockbusters, including Avengers: Infinity War and Incredibles 2, use this object-based audio technology to create sound effects that totally envelope you, making movie watching a thoroughly immersive experience.

How does Dolby Atmos translate to your home theater environment? Here are four reasons to be excited:

1. Most popular movies are in Dolby Atmos. In addition to past and present hits, a slew of theatrical releases now feature Dolby Atmos. Check out the release calendar on the Dolby website.

2. It’s more approachable than you’d think. You don’t need a room full of speakers to benefit from Dolby Atmos. (But you do need a Dolby Atmos-capable AV receiver such as a Yamaha Aventage model or a sound bar such as the Yamaha YSP-5600.) Whether your home theater is an AV receiver with nine speakers and a subwoofer, or just a sound bar, Dolby Atmos adjusts soundtracks to get the most enveloping surround sound from your speaker configuration.

3. It’s more than movies. Dolby Atmos content is available on Blu-ray Disc™, streaming services (soon including Apple TV) and video games, including popular games such as Gears of War 4 and Overwatch. Its combination of advanced spatial precision and immersive 3D surround sound lets you hear enemies approaching from behind you and soaring overhead, making your gaming experience more real than ever. Click here for a list of video games that support Dolby Atmos.

4. Existing content gets a boost too. Even your existing content that isn’t developed with Dolby Atmos will sound better, thanks to a new surround upmixer in Dolby Atmos AV receivers, which expands channel-based content created for stereo, 5.1- and 7.1-channel systems.

To take advantage of Dolby Atmos at home, all you have to do is connect your Apple TV 4K to a Dolby Atmos-capable AV receiver or sound bar for audio decoding.

Technological advancements are bringing the home theater experience closer to the movie theater experience than ever before, just without the sticky floors and the guy texting next to you!

 

Yamaha brought this game-changing technology to home theaters with the first sound bar to feature Dolby Atmos, the YSP-5600. In addition, all Yamaha AVENTAGE AV receivers feature three-dimensional surround sound decoding with Dolby Atmos.

To learn more about the technology behind Dolby Atmos, see our blog article “What’s So Good About Dolby Atmos® and DTS:X™?”

A view of a vibraphone from the front.

Vibraphone Lessons with Rusty Burge, Part 3: Basic Jazz Voicings

Written by Dr. Dave Gerhart on . Posted in Percussion.

Here’s the third and final installment in our series of video lessons on vibraphone performance technique by Yamaha Performing Artist Rusty Burge.

Unlike the piano, the vibraphone player only has four mallets to create jazz voicings when comping chords. The young improviser must learn these foundations of voicings and voice leading to be able to successfully comp chords during solos. In this video, Rusty introduces basic jazz vibraphone voicings:

We suggest you begin with a two-note voicing. In this video example, Professor Burge uses the 3rd and 7th note of the chord. Once you are comfortable playing the 3rd and 7th notes of the chord, add a third note and then eventually the fourth note. (The video provides a number of accompanying musical examples.) Once you are comfortable playing the voices in all 12 keys, practice alterations to the dominant chord to add more color to the voicing, as shown in the video.

Rusty Burge is Professor of Percussion at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and is also a member of Percussion Group Cincinnati, with whom he has performed extensively throughout North America, Europe and Asia. He was formerly principal percussionist with the West Virginia Symphony and plays extra with the Cincinnati Symphony. Burge received his undergraduate degree from the Eastman School of Music and a master’s degree from CCM, where he teaches percussion and jazz vibraphone in addition to directing the CCM Steel band. He has performed with Peter Erskine, Ted Nash, Rich Perry, Dave Liebman, Rufus Reid, Steve Allee, Roland Vazquez and Michael Spiro. His new book, Method for Vibraphone, will be released this coming fall.

Click here for Part 1 in this series: Pedaling Technique and Grips.

Click here for Part 2 in this series: Using Patterns in Improvisation.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha vibraphones.

Hand poised with finger extended above a laptop keyboard ready to press a key with the sun going down in background.

Good Morning, Good Morning

Written by Shelly Peiken on . Posted in Creativity.

There’s a specific time of day when each of us is most focused and prolific. Knowing your personal optimum time will serve you well, especially if you’re a writer — a writer of music, lyrics, books, journals, blogs, anything.

Woman sitting on a deck with a cup of coffee and her guitar.

For me it’s MORNING MORNING MORNING. While my brain is calm and clear. Before that little voice in my head starts bossing me around and the clutter of extraneous thought accumulates. Thoughts such as:

  • I wonder if these eyelash extensions are working for me?
  • I’m so tired of throwing money away on bad watermelons
  • I can’t believe he didn’t consult me before he “machete’d” my bangs
  • What’s the weather like? Where am I? What year is it?

Ya know — life.

This clutter is to my brain as plaque is to my teeth.

The ideal order of all-things-morning for me (after a few minutes of enjoying the ceiling fan whirling overhead) goes like this:

  • Slippers or Clogs?
  • Coffee (with 1% milk microwaved for exactly 60 seconds)
  • NPR
  • Play a round of Words With Friends with my buddy Kevin Cronin

Then I glide into my office and fire up the laptop. I tap for about an hour. A lyric. A blog. Whatever needs release.

As soon as there’s a lull in enthusiasm I remind myself to STOP. Because sometimes I forget that in extending that first hour, I pass the point of optimum productivity.

Protein shake? Yes, please, at least on weekdays. Yogurt +  banana + coconut water. That’s it. I don’t need other stuff. There’s too much kitchen choreography involved in chopping parsley and juicing apple cores. Having the same breakfast five days a week saves me the three minutes involved in making a decision about an alternative. Time is precious. There’s never enough. Especially on days when I’m inspired. Eggs are something I save for the weekend.

Then … to the gym I trudge. It’s a hate/love thing in that order. I dread having to allocate the hour, but it doesn’t take long before I remember that movement helps digest work (and protein shakes). The “love” part is when I’m finished — when I return to my computer and realize everything is flowing more freely. Thank you, treadmill. It’s all your fault.

Next … errands. I suggest doing the one you’re resisting the most first, lest the procrastination hold you back in more ways than one. If you have no errands (who has no errands?) then go for a drive. If you live in a city, go for a walk. In other words, give your brain a break.

The irony is that our brain is working extra diligently during the break. I’m no psychologist but I’ve been writing long enough to have noticed. When I pull back into my driveway I’m searching madly for a receipt on which to scribble details that emerged from within while sitting at a red light: a superior verb, a rhyme I hadn’t considered before I left the house. It’s the letting go. I’m sure of it.

Hand poised with finger extended above a laptop keyboard ready to press a key with the sun going down in background.

Soon it’s time for shutting down. Hey, a girl’s gotta rest.

There are tons of us who would reject the morning as their creative sweet spot in favor of the mid-afternoon, following a cat nap. Good luck to you. That’s when I’m thinking about my martini.

Others would prefer the evening — after all the chores are done, dinner dishes washed and school lunches packed. Good luck to you too. That’s guilty pleasure TV time for me, followed by a bubble bath, after which I go directly to sleep so I can rise again at 6 a.m. and start again.

So these are my Words of Wisdom for the month: Pay attention to and honor thy mental peaks and valleys. And if you have the freedom to do so, arrange your schedule around them. You’ll get more done and have more fun doing it.

That’s it for now. 5 p.m.? I’m ready for my cocktail, Mr. DeMille.

Talk to you in the morning.

 

Check out Shelly’s other postings.

 

Man playing an acoustic guitar in front of a wall with a variety of guitars.

A Brief Guide to Acoustic Guitar Tonewoods

Written by Mac Randall on . Posted in Acoustic Guitars. 7 Comments on A Brief Guide to Acoustic Guitar Tonewoods

The best acoustic guitars are made out of wood. This remains as much a truism in the 21st century as it was in the 18th, despite huge recent advances in the development of alternative guitar materials (particularly carbon-fiber). There are three reasons why:

  1. Wood resonates better
  2. Its tone improves with age
  3. It looks good

Although what constitutes a great-sounding (and great-looking) guitar comes down to personal taste, there is general agreement on what the best tonewoods are for acoustic guitar making. In this article, we’ll take a look at four key wood families — spruce, rosewood, mahogany, and “exotics” like bear claw spruce, cocobolo and koa — and talk about how Yamaha makes use of each of these.

Spruce

This evergreen, found in northern temperate regions of the globe, is literally top choice: the ideal wood for the soundboard, or top, of an acoustic guitar. Its look — light in color, even in grain — is appealing though somewhat plain; what sets it apart is its beautiful tonal properties. Acoustic guitars made with spruce are an excellent choice for a player with a softer touch as they respond well to that kind of touch — they don’t sound quite as good when played aggressively.

Sitka spruce, from Canada and Alaska, and Engleman spruce from British Columbia get especially high marks from the luthiers at Yamaha. Sitka is slightly harder than the average spruce, while Engleman is somewhat softer, but both are prized for their distinctively rich mid and low range. Ezo spruce from Hokkaido, Japan, is also highly regarded, but depleted resources have made it hard to obtain new supplies.

Rosewood

Named for its distinctive sweet smell, rosewood is hard but porous and a natural choice for the back and sides of an acoustic guitar. It has the double advantage of looking gorgeous (it comes in an astonishing range of browns and purples) and sounding rich, warm and loud. Rosewood provides great mid-range as well as deep bass and bright treble. It also offers rich overtones and a high “response rate” that makes for a sharp attack and a lot of resonance.

Unfortunately, its popularity has led to near-extinction in some parts of the world. Brazilian rosewood, a luthier’s favorite for generations, is now listed as an official endangered species, meaning that no new supplies can be made available for sale and international trade of any sort is heavily restricted. Yamaha uses its remaining stock of this wood very selectively; favored alternatives include Indian and Honduran rosewood, which tend to be more purplish with coarser grain markings.

Mahogany

This hardwood is the most commonly used wood for musical instruments because it’s durable, easy to work with and wonderfully resonant (though it doesn’t have the sonic brilliance of rosewood). Like rosewood, it’s employed principally for guitar backs and sides, as well as fingerboards and bridges, though all-mahogany models are not uncommon.

Mahogany produces a strong, earthy midrange tonality with subtle overtones, making for a sound that is often described as “non-abrasive.” Mahogany top guitars are great for playing blues and are also an excellent choice in situations where you are playing with other instruments, since they cut through so well.

The Cuban, Honduran, and Mexican varieties of mahogany are all classified as being “at risk but not presently threatened with extinction.” International trade of these is regulated accordingly, making them more expensive. In keeping with its aim to be environmentally responsible, Yamaha makes very little use of these woods; its luthiers currently instead favor mahogany from Africa.

The coupling of a spruce top with rosewood or mahogany back and sides is a tough combination to beat, because the results consistently sound so good. However, other options arguably have more visual appeal: North American flame maple, for instance, as well as figured ash, bubinga, and the following “exotics.”

Exotics

Bear claw spruce may not look all that exotic at first glance, but what puts it in this category is its rarity. Basically, it’s spruce with stretch marks, caused by particularly slow and/or stressful tree growth conditions. Some players love these unusual patterns, while others find them visually distracting. The tone of bear claw, which has been used in limited-edition versions of A Series acoustic-electric guitars by Yamaha (such as the A3R BC and AC3R BC), is pretty much what you’d expect from spruce: clear and powerful.

Cocobolo, a dense hardwood from Central America, is stunning in its figuration and color range (from red to black). It also produces a deep sound, with a quick attack and lengthy sustain. Though not often used by Yamaha, it’s become a popular wood for acoustic guitar backs and sides.

Koa, another extremely dense wood, comes from Hawaii and therefore is never in huge supply. Its striking golden color and strong grain markings make it unique and equally good for guitar tops, backs and sides. Its sound is well-balanced but on the soft side — best suited to finger picking. For this reason, guitars made with Koa are geared more toward a living room than a large stage.

Koa is one of those woods that sounds better with time. A guitar with a Koa soundboard will start out life with a very bright sound. But as it ages (the more it is played) it will mellow out and become richer and warmer sounding, with more emphasis of midrange tones.

Yamaha has produced three Koa acoustic guitar models to date, all of them limited-edition: the CSF-100K parlor guitar, of which only 100 were made roughly 15 years ago; the original A Series A4K dreadnought and AC4K concert, introduced more than five years ago; and the new all-solid Hawaiian A4K and AC4K, which will be limited to 150 pieces in the U.S. market:

Two acoustic guitars.

Of course, the wood itself — purchased from the world’s best suppliers — is only one element that distinguishes Yamaha acoustic guitars. For example, because Yamaha owns all of its production facilities, it can store wood in its own climate-controlled space without having to outsource the crucial drying phase. Kiln use is minimal; most wood for Yamaha guitars is instead subject to two different but related natural processes: aging, to cut down moisture content; and seasoning, to stabilize the wood. The end result is a guitar that sounds as beautiful as it looks.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha acoustic guitars.

DonorsChoose Helps Provide Quality Music Education

Written by John Wittmann on . Posted in Funding.

In my more than 30 years working in music education, I have observed a great deal of change. However, one constant is the overwhelming impact that music teachers have on the overall success of their students.  The positive influence a good teacher can have on students’ daily lives is undeniable. Regardless of socioeconomic status or school district, it is clear that students who participate in high-quality music programs score higher on reading and spelling tests.1 We also know that students who study music tend to have larger vocabularies and more advanced reading skills than their peers who do not participate in music lessons.2 There are a whole host of benefits to a quality music education, including building a sense of identity, preserving or restoring social capital, and strengthening social networks in communities.3 In a perfect world, our nation’s public school music teachers would be uniformly well-funded, but unfortunately that is not the case.

DonorsChoose: Crowdfunding for Teachers

Research shows that music teachers are spending roughly $1,000 annually out of their own pockets to fund their classrooms and improve the experience of their students. One important resource that can ease their burden is the online teacher-led crowdfunding site DonorsChoose.org, which has been accessed by one in four teachers in the United States. Yamaha has set up a matching offer to help music teachers buy the supplies they need to provide quality music education to all students, regardless of zip code or ability to pay.

Seeing the Impact Firsthand

drum head that says

Not long ago, members of the Yamaha Band & Orchestral team visited a classroom in McKees Rocks, PA, just outside of Pittsburgh. There, they met Mrs. Suellen Engelhard, who teaches general music and band classes to high-energy middle school students at Sto-Rox Junior Senior High School. More than three quarters of her students come from low-income households. They regularly deal with violence and rough situations outside the classroom, so music class is a place they come to connect with their passions and build important friendships.

The school’s band room was equipped with a variety of inherited instruments that were very old and in disrepair — some to the point of being unusable. Mrs. Engelhard was buying the reeds, drumheads and other accessories herself, but with limited funding from her school district, it was becoming a challenge to keep up. Through our partnership with DonorsChoose.org, Yamaha found a way to fund some of the school’s basic needs and provide new and improved ligatures, mallets and reeds, all of which would make those instruments playable again.

How You Can Help

Yamaha is honored to be able to support music teachers whose efforts make a huge difference in the lives of our nation’s young people. You can make a difference in your own community and change the lives of young people through music. Take a look at the projects on DonorsChoose.org to see how a small contribution can make a world of difference, right in your own backyard.

Watch Mrs. Engelhard’s story:

 

1 Hille, Katrin, et al. “Associations between music education, intelligence, and spelling ability in elementary school.” Adv Cogn Psychol 7 (2011): 1–6. Web.
2 “Statistical benefits of music in education.” Arete Music Academy.
3 Arts in Aging report from the National Endowment for the Arts. http://www.cms.msu.edu/docs/BenefitsMusic-Adult.pdf.

Set of 4 drums viewed from front.

Tuning Tips for Marching Percussion

Written by Troy C. Wollwage on . Posted in Marching. 1 Comment on Tuning Tips for Marching Percussion

Marching percussion is one of the most demanding categories of instruments in terms of equipment wear and tear. Because they are primarily used outdoors, well-tuned drums are necessary to allow the maximum projection of sound. In addition, a conscientious schedule of regular maintenance and tuning will extend the life of each instrument. The pitches recommended in this article serve as a reference for achieving superior projection and tone quality.

Find the right pitch for your drum and keep it there. Don’t get into the habit of tightening the drumhead every time you play it, and remember: It needs to be tuned, not necessarily tightened. Even though new heads require a short break-in period, modern materials are extremely resilient and tend to hold pitch longer if they are always returned to the desired pitch at every session. Stay consistent and check the drum pitch often, especially when the head is new. Far better to check the head daily and make small adjustments than to wait a week and make a large adjustment in tensioning.

Finally, change heads when the tone has gone “dead,” not just when you break them!

Maintenance Tips

  • Keep tension rods lubricated with lithium grease, petroleum jelly or a premium valve oil. Carefully remove exposed lubricant, as it can attract dirt and damage threads. Replace worn or lost nylon and metal washers.
  • Lubricating wood bearing edges with a thin coat of paraffin or cork grease will ease high-tension tuning and help prevent moisture from seeping into the shell.
  • Pre-tighten each tension rod with your fingers only. With a drum key, use a crisscross tuning sequence for plastic heads and a clockwise procedure for Kevlar® heads to properly seat the head. Tighten each rod, no more than one full turn at a time, until the drum is brought into its proper range.
  • Fine tune the head to the same pitch in front of each tension rod.
  • Change heads at the end of practice and let them sit overnight before you play on them again.
  • Practice with well-tuned drums. Don’t wait until a performance to tune.
  • Cover all your drums during rehearsals with marching drum covers to prevent scratches that can occur when learning your drill movements.
  • Cases must be used when transporting or storing your drums. Don’t keep sticks, music folders, carriers or other objects in the case. They can cause damage to the heads and shell!

Marching Snares

A Kevlar or a plastic, dotted batter (top) head is recommended, along with a plastic bottom head. Make sure to check often for loose tension rods especially on the bottom side; gravity guards can be used to prevent neglected tension rods from falling out. Tune each individual snare strand to a uniform pitch using a “plucked string” method:

  • Adjust the individual strands at the butt place with a screwdriver.
  • Turn clockwise to tighten and counter clockwise to loosen individual strands.
  • Use the vertical control knobs to get the snares flush with the bottom head at the bearing edge.
  • Then, while playing the batter head, use the horizontal control knob to gradually tighten the entire snare unit to a crisp articulation.
Single drum for playing while marching.

Marching Toms

Pinstripe heads without dots are recommended. Marching toms in a set are usually tuned a minor third apart to give a feeling of melodic movement between drums. These instruments tend to attract more dirt since they have no bottom heads, so keep marching tom guards on the bottom edges of all drums to protect them.

Set of two marching drums.

Marching Bass Drums

Smooth white heads are recommended for bass drums, as they produce the most desirable fundamental tone and are visually effective in drill patterns. Bass drums in a set are usually tuned a minor third to a perfect fifth apart to give a feeling of melodic movement between drums. If you need to eliminate unwanted overtones and ring, apply a length of Yamaha Sound Impact Strips™ around the perimeter of the bass drum head.

One bass drum for marching.

There are limitless combinations of pitches and tuning variations for marching drums, with endless ways to muffle and dampen them. All depend on the style of the ensemble and personal preference, but carefully planned tuning and dampening are critical to the development of your percussion section and can help increase the musical effectiveness of the entire marching ensemble.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha marching drums.

Click here for more information about Yamaha marching drum accessories.

Graphic showing musical notes being processed and organized by someone's brain.

Yanny vs. Laurel: Perception Is Reality

Written by Howard Massey on . Posted in Creativity.

In a previous posting, I discussed the physical aspects of how a sound is created. This month, I want to talk about the other half of the equation: the way we perceive a sound.

Graphic design.

Most of us are familiar with optical illusions — visual anomalies that seem real, but are in fact just trickery. Two examples that are part of our everyday lives are television and movies, both of which are actually a series of still pictures moving so fast that we perceive motion that isn’t actually there. Or check out the image on the right. Does it seem as though some of the black and dark gray circles in the middle are moving? They’re not. This isn’t an animated GIF, or a video: it’s just a plain old JPEG. But due to the physiology of our eyeballs and optic nerves, many people will swear that those circles are pulsating.

There’s an argument to be made that if you see motion, then there is motion, even if the facts say otherwise. It’s a hypothesis that can be summed up in three words: Perception is reality.

Or are only facts reality … even if your perception says otherwise?

I happen to suffer (well, “suffer” is really too strong a word) from a mild form of something called deuteranomaly — a fancy word for the common affliction of being red-green color blind. Most brown objects appear green to me, and a lot of green objects appear beige, brown or even black, depending upon how light or dark they are. This has been the source of endless debate with my Significant Other, who once stopped me from purchasing what I believed was a cool-looking mint green car on the grounds that she wouldn’t be caught dead riding around in a vehicle she described as being painted a “nauseating shade of putty.”

Yet that car was green to me, despite what S.O. (and, according to her, the rest of the world) thought.

Side by side blocks of different colors.

So was it a cool shade of lime green, or a nauseating shade of putty? The battle rages on. But the point is that the eye can definitely play tricks on the brain. Did you know the ear can, too?

Sure you do, at least if you expressed any interest in the Yanny/Laurel meme that was consuming social media not long ago. In case you were hiding in a cave, here’s what the fuss was all about:

What did you hear? “Yanny”? Or “Laurel”?

If you listened to it on your smartphone or earbuds, you probably heard “Yanny.” But if you listened on a reasonable quality speaker — even a small computer speaker — you most likely heard “Laurel.”

What the heck is going on here?

Let’s take a look at the facts. This was actually a recording of an actor saying the word “laurel,” created for the dictionary entry of the same name on the vocabulary.com website. However, if you listen to the high frequency content in the recording alone — which would happen when listening on earbuds or poor-quality speakers incapable of reproducing low frequency content — it sounds eerily like the word “Yanny” instead. (Whoever this Yanny guy actually is.)

Don’t believe me? Check out the New York Times online tool that lets you literally dial in the point at which Laurel magically changes to Yanny. (There’s also a good explanation there about how this whole craze likely got started.)

This is a great example of an auditory illusion. Another famous one is the Shepard Tone, named after cognitive scientist Roger Shepard. This is a sound consisting of a series of simple sine waves (pure tones with no overtones) an octave apart but with the bass pitch moving upward or downward. It creates the illusion of a tone that continually ascends or descends in pitch, yet ultimately seems to get no higher or lower — an endless scale that in some people induces queasiness or even headaches. If you’re as much of an auditory nerd as composer Hans Zimmer (who famously used Shepard Tones to great effect in the film Dunkirk to create the sense of ever-increasing intensity across intertwined storylines) and you feel like playing around with this on your own, you can find a way cool interactive online ST generator here.

Neuroscience has proven that our auditory (and visual) perception is affected by a wide range of factors. We may think we perceive the world around us as it really is, but our brain is actually a massively complex filter, and every brain is wired slightly differently.

In other words, hearing occurs in the ear, but listening occurs between the ears. Take that into consideration the next time a parent or a friend gives you a hard time about the music you are passionate about … or the next time you feel like disparaging the tunes that they love.

 

 Check out Howard’s other postings.

Living room setting with two chairs facing a large flat screen with home theater equipment, including receiver and surround sound speakers.

Home Theater on a Budget, Part 3: Advanced System

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in TV & Movies.

Creating a quality home theater system requires research, dedication and planning. The first two articles in this series, Home Theater on a Budget, Part 1: Starter System and Home Theater on a Budget, Part 2: Intermediate System, offer tips and guidelines for those looking to create a quality system at an affordable price. This installment kicks it up a notch.

AV RECEIVER

AV receiver.
RX-V585 AV receiver.

There are plenty of reasons you should upgrade your receiver, but perhaps the most important is having more options. The Yamaha RX-585 AV receiver with MusicCast offers plenty of them, including a Zone B that lets you run a 5.1-channel output while mirroring that sound in a second zone and simultaneously maintaining stereo sound.

MAIN SPEAKERS

Large vertical speaker.
NS-555 floor standing speaker.

The quality of your main speakers are critical to any advanced system. Yamaha NS-555 floor standing speakers fit the bill in terms of both sound and physical size. Each speaker stands at just over three feet high, with a three-way bass reflex design ideal for home theater. Their waveguide horn also helps guide sound to your ears instead of reflecting it off the walls, which greatly improves the sense of directionality you experience.

CENTER CHANNEL SPEAKER

Horizontal speaker.
Yamaha NS-C444

You’ll want to complete the front end of your advanced home theater system with a center channel speaker designed for home theater applications. A good choice is the Yamaha NS-C444 center channel speaker. Its advanced design allows you to hear dialogue clearly without it getting lost in the surround mix behind things like explosions and car chases.

REAR SURROUND SPEAKERS

Two stereo speakers next to each other - one with the filter cover on; the other with the speaker and subwoofer exposed.
NS-333 bookshelf speakers.

For your rear surrounds, the Yamaha NS-333 bookshelf speakers are a good option. They offer a two-way bass reflex design similar to the NS-555 that picks up the nuances of any film or TV show and let you clearly hear subtle elements like footsteps coming up from behind in your favorite horror movie. If you’re using a MusicCast AV receiver such as the Yamaha RX-V585, consider using MusicCast 20 or MusicCast 50 wireless speakers as your rear surrounds so you can enjoy 5.1 sound without the hassle of running speaker wires through the floor or walls.

POWERED SUBWOOFER

Small square speaker.
Yamaha NS-SW100

Beef up your bass with the NS-SW100 powered subwoofer. Its design features Advanced YST II (Yamaha Active Servo Technology II) for stable and accurate response of everything from the rumble of action movies to the low notes in your favorite movie musical or live concert film.

If you’re setting up your own system without professional help, be sure to check out the Yamaha AV Setup Guide app, which provides step-by-step instructions for your AV receiver and system as a whole.

ACCESSORIES

Don’t forget to leave room in your budget for speaker wire, HDMI cables, speaker stands and any other accessories you may need for your system.

Once you’re done setting up, make the most of your home theater by dimming the lights and putting on a great flick. If it’s a tear-jerker, don’t forget the tissues.

Part 4 of our “Home Theater on a Budget” series, covering luxury systems, can be found here.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha AV products.

A man with a service dog standing next to another man in a park. Both men are holding acoustic guitars.

Music to the Rescue

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Sustainability.

National PTSD Awareness Day is observed annually on June 27 to recognize the effects post-traumatic stress has on the lives of those affected by it, including roughly 800,000 veterans.

For years, Vietnam veteran Dan Van Buskirk wanted to learn to play guitar. But something was stopping him: the lasting effects of combat, in the form of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), which he felt would make it difficult for him to succeed.

Then one day in 2007 he met local Milwaukee guitar instructor Patrick Nettesheim and began fulfilling his dream. After only a few months of working together, the two men realized that guitar lessons were opportunities for both self-expression and positive human interaction.

Thus was born a unique organization called Guitars for Vets.

Two men seated with acoustic guitars.
Guitars for Vets co-founder Patrick Nettesheim (right) teaches Gary, the organization’s very first student, how to play guitar.

“When I first started playing,” Dan says, “I couldn’t sit still for five minutes. But just practicing the chords brought out a harmony in holding the guitar close to my chest. It felt good to my soul and it helped me sit longer and longer and longer. It’s like a very sweet meditation.

“We wouldn’t practice discord on a musical instrument,” he adds. “We practice harmony, and as we practice harmony on a musical instrument, we practice it in our lives. Music can bring peace and kindness and compassion. And that helps replace the fear and distress and anxiety that comes from being a survivor of a war.”

Many veterans not only have physical disabilities but suffer from depression and other emotional after-effects of their military service. Some become homeless or even commit suicide. The aim of G4V is to help vets on their journey to recovery, with individual and group music lessons, as well as free guitars, serving as the catalyst. Over the past seven years, the organization has expanded greatly, with 80 chapters established in 40 states and a staff that currently includes over 300 volunteers.

Upon completion of ten individualized lessons, each student is awarded a guitar pack — including a new Yamaha acoustic guitar — completely free of charge. Since becoming a proud sponsor of Guitars for Vets in 2010, Yamaha has provided over 2,000 such guitars. Graduates describe the instruments they receive and the music they learn to play as a way to ease their pain, give them focus, build their self-esteem and strengthen their sense of purpose.

Young smiling woman holding an acoustic guitar over her head.
G4V graduate Nancy Ruiz holds aloft her newly awarded Yamaha guitar.

This year, to celebrate National PTSD Awareness Day, students and graduates of the G4V Nashville chapter presented a free event at Nashville’s Benchmark Bar & Grill. They were joined onstage by guest guitarists Ali Handal, Sonny Moorman, Bobby Tomlinson and Isaac Matthews. Also taking part were G4V co-founder Patrick Nettesheim and Yamaha Corporation of America president (and avid guitarist) Tom Sumner.

Band playing music.
Tom Sumner (second from left) joins Patrick Nettesheim (far right) and G4V graduates on the Nashville stage.

“We started as just two guys with guitars visiting our brother and sister veterans in a Milwaukee VA hospital, and since then hundreds of us have found the strength to band together across the country,” says Nettesheim. “Joining forces with Yamaha has greatly extended our reach, giving us the resources to support more chapters and bring relief through music to more veterans.” Proof positive that music can indeed perform miracles!

Photographs courtesy of Andrew Feller, Levi Pervin and Guitars for Vets.

 

Click here for more information about Guitars for Vets.

Yamaha Smart Pianist App Version 2.0

Written by Craig Knudsen on . Posted in Digital Pianos.

The Smart Pianist app was first introduced in the summer of 2017, alongside the debut of the CSP Clavinova — the first new Clavinova line in over 30 years. Unlike previous Clavinova models, the CSP is intended to be primarily operated with Smart Pianist, since there are few buttons on the instrument itself.

One of the most appealing features of Smart Pianist is the way it gives players the ability to operate their instrument with a device that everyone is already familiar with: their own smartphone or tablet. Even though many Yamaha instruments have the benefit of actual tactile buttons on their panels (important for live performance and ease of use), being able to control the instrument with a smart device is very compelling for many people. That’s why the decision was made to expand Smart Pianist compatibility to a large number of Yamaha digital and hybrid pianos beyond the CSP Clavinova.

Smart Pianist version 2.0 (available from the Apple app store and from Google Play) works with newer model CLP Clavinovas, SILENT Pianos™, TransAcoustic Pianos, AvantGrand, P-Series digital pianos and some Arius YDP Pianos, in addition to the CSP. The only requirement is that the Yamaha instrument’s firmware must also be upgraded to version 2.0.

Version 2.0 of the app does many things, as we will see shortly.  However, one thing it does NOT do is add additional content to the musical instrument. In addition:

  1. It does NOT add new Voices.
  2. It does NOT add new Styles.
  3. It does NOT add additional Songs.

Voices, Styles and built-in Songs are various types of content built in to the hardware of the instrument. For example, the CFX and Bösendorfer sounds in your Clavinova are contained in the ROM memory within the instrument — they are not in the app. Smart Pianist simply gives you the ability to control those sounds.

The Smart Pianist app is “smart” in that it knows what instrument it is connected to, adjusting itself to only display and operate the content and features that are contained within that particular instrument:

side by side screens of Smart Pianist app.

In addition, since a CLP Clavinova does not contain any accompaniment styles (as does a CSP), the Style option magically disappears in Smart Pianist:

Screenshots of app showing difference.

New piano-centric features like the Aliquot Resonance and Body Resonance found on CLP instruments (and not on CSP ones) do appear, complete with new high resolution graphics and explanations:

Screenshot showing piano room setting.

Another benefit of Smart Pianist is consistent operation, despite the fact that each instrument has its own unique user interface. Note that when the app is connected to instruments that have built-in controls, the physical buttons themselves are disabled. (“Communication” appears in the screen of the instrument to indicate this.) However, you can easily disconnect Smart Pianist at a moment’s notice by pressing a convenient EXIT button on the instrument’s front panel:

Photo of control panel.

Although Smart Pianist does not add content, it does add extended functionality to non-CSP instruments. The most ground-breaking feature — and one that I explored in detail in a previous blog article — is its Audio to Chord technology, which evaluates the songs in your smart device’s Music Library to create equivalent chord charts, which you can then play along with over the instrument’s built-in speakers:

Screenshot for smart pianist for song "Just the Way You Are".

(Note that the CSP can also convert this chord chart into a Score that activates Stream Lights above the keys of a CSP — a way cool feature that is not available on other instruments.)

As with the previous versions, Smart Pianist 2.0 also lets you save your favorite setups using a registration feature or by uploading your recorded songs to an integrated Dropbox account. You can also use the app screen to see the score of any MIDI file and program the pedals of your instrument to turn the pages of that score. You can even load and play songs via the app wirelessly if you use a UD-WL01 wireless USB adapter (available separately from Yamaha).

Since Smart Pianist adapts to the instrument it is connected to, features of version 2.0 vary somewhat from instrument to instrument. For a detailed specification and compatibility chart, click here.

In short, Smart Pianist 2.0 adds enhanced features to a large number of Yamaha hybrid and digital pianos, along with consistent operation using one convenient app. If you have one of those instruments and an iOS device, I highly recommend that you check it out!

 

Check out these related blog articles:

Learn to Play Your Favorite Songs

How to Add New Songs to Your CSP

Kooky Karaoke

Getting the Most Out of Audio to Score

Three sizes of small plastic woodwind instruments.

Venova: How Can a Plastic Tube Sound Like a Saxophone?

Written by Matt Kerns on . Posted in Woodwinds.

You may already know that the Yamaha Venova is a fun instrument that blends the simplicity of a recorder with the sound of a saxophone. But have you ever wondered what kind of engineering magic it takes to give a plastic tube the sound of a saxophone? Believe it or not, it’s not just because the Venova uses a real sax mouthpiece and reed (soprano in the case of the YVS-100 model, alto in the case of the YVS-120, and tenor in the case of the YVS-140). There’s actually a lot more going on inside that crazy looking body than you may realize!

Back in the early 1990s, Yamaha was looking for a way to reproduce the sound of a saxophone in the VL series synthesizers. Unlike the sample-based synthesizers that are common today, VL synths emulated different instruments by mathematically recreating a physical model of their sound. This was a groundbreaking technology that opened up all sorts of new possibilities for synthesizers, but it also required a lot of processing power, especially for the computer chips of the era.

Unfortunately, the mathematical formulas needed to accurately model the sound produced by the conical taper of a sax are extremely complex and overwhelmed the processors available for synthesizers back then. However, it turns out that there’s a shortcut. If you take a relatively simple model for a straight tube, then add the model for another straight tube coming out at a 90-degree angle, the waveform that’s produced is very similar to the waveform of the conical body of a saxophone. This “split pipe” model was much easier to reproduce, and ultimately formed the foundation of the mathematical formula that was used in the VL series synthesizers.

Diagram of one cone and one longer thin pipe with a smaller pipe attached at one end at a 90-degree angle to long pipe.
The waveform of a conical saxophone body can be reproduced by two straight tubes in a “split pipe” design.

It turns out that this isn’t just a mathematical formula – you can actually build a physical instrument with those same characteristics and produce the same sound!  After several years of prototyping and refining in the Yamaha R&D labs, the Venova is the finished product. Using a real mouthpiece and reed helps with the feel and response, but it’s really that split-pipe design that gives the Venova its sax-like sound. The straight cylindrical pipe has been scrunched up to make the instrument shorter and bring the holes closer together to make the fingerings easier to reach, which is why we have all these weird-looking bends along the bottom, but otherwise this is the physical representation of that split pipe synthesizer model.Gif showing the construction of the Venova compressed body.

This unique design is so innovative that in 2017 the Venova won the top Grand Award in Japan’s prestigious Good Design Award competition. This was a tremendous achievement, both because it was the first time that Yamaha won the grand prize, and because it was the very first time that a musical instrument had been honored with the top award in the competition’s 67-plus year history.

 

Click here to see and hear the Venova in action.

The Do’s and Don’ts of a Successful Concert

Written by Christopher Ferrell on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

Few opportunities in education foster accountability through true and authentic presentation of student work in real time better than a well-planned and executed concert performance.

It is an outstanding way to showcase your music program and provide a genuinely enjoyable cultural experience for your community.

Careful consideration of all concert elements like engaging the audience, inviting student input and thoughtful pacing will assure a wonderful performance. What follows are some key do’s and don’ts that — with some planning, patience and creativity — will help you captivate everyone involved.

Song Selections

There are many factors to consider when deciding what to perform with your musicians.

DON’T pick music that is too technically challenging.
DO select pieces that showcase and expand your students’ skills.
DO create a program that the students feel comfortable presenting and that they feel is worth their time and effort.
DO consider letting students have some input into the musical selections.

You develop their trust and encouraging critical thinking skills by involving them in decision-making. In the end, you would use your expertise when evaluating their input, but the exercise can be rewarding for both you and your students.

Attention, Please

Many times, we as educators fail to take into account the people in the audience. This important constituency at most school concerts consists mainly of parents. They are both our most discriminating and our most supportive group.

DON’T assume they know everything!
DO take time to discuss audience etiquette with them in a friendly and enjoyable way.
DO make them feel that proper concert behavior is important to the students and parents.

Consider having a student read a short script detailing audience etiquette including the structure of selections with multiple movements, when to applaud, appropriate sound and noise levels (especially mobile phones and any small child that would like to lend his or her voice to the performance), and entering and leaving the venue. This simple yet important introduction can make the concert more enjoyable for everyone.

A Musical Adventure

A concert isn’t a jog on the treadmill; it’s a roller coaster ride!

DON’T perform selections that are too stylistically similar or that use similar tempos.
DO consider having a theme for your program.

The theme doesn’t need to be too literal or constraining. Choose a particular historical period, movie category or genre. Include the theme when marketing your performance on posters and social media and in email or school publications. This process can be a fun and exciting way to create anticipation for your performers and your audience.

DO take your audience on a journey.

Consider beginning with something short and high energy, then following it with a selection that is slower and more lyrical in nature, each with different tonal coloring. If you include an intermission, perform something energetic beforehand to keep your audience excited for the second half. Be sure to end the show with an exciting selection to tie a bow on the concert but leave your audience wanting more. If you plan ahead with this idea in mind, you’ll keep your students and audience engaged and lost in the music.

A Critical View

Ask students to openly evaluate their performance post-concert and share their perceptions of the total experience.

DO remember that your students or performers have the highest stake in the program. This experience is truly all for them.

Students can be extremely perceptive and insightful when we give them a voice.

In the End

The more we are willing to stand back and consider all of the elements involved in concert programming, the better the view gets!

DO remember that thoughtful planning and programming is an important part of our job.
DO keep the focus on providing students with the best environment for them to be successful.
DO remember that we learn as much from the process of detailed analysis and reflection as we do from the preparation for the performance.

Now … go get ’em!

Photo Courtesy of Christopher Ferrell


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Jeff Coffin

Jeff Coffin: Professor Rock Star

Written by Liz Neidich on . Posted in Educator Profiles. 1 Comment on Jeff Coffin: Professor Rock Star

Jeff Coffin remembers listening to AM radio in the car as a child and being attracted to the emotional component of music. In fifth grade, he chose to play the saxophone in the school band program, or rather he believes that the saxophone chose him.

“I think [the saxophone] is very close to the human voice, which is one of the reasons it appealed to me,” says Coffin, a three-time GRAMMY® Award winner.

“I felt like I was able to emulate the voice.”

This initial attraction produced a passion for and a dedication to music that would lead Coffin to an incredible professional career: playing with both Béla Fleck and the Flecktones and the Dave Matthews Band (DMB), forming his own group — Jeff Coffin and the Mu’tet — and teaching music at the collegiate level and in clinics around the world.

Stick With It

In middle school, long before starting his professional career, Coffin wanted to “say goodbye” to his band program and music altogether. “All of my friends were deciding to play sports, which I also did, and I was like, ‘Man, I’m kind of done [with band],'” he says.

His director, Arthur Lagassee, asked him to stay at least through the annual Christmas concert. Out of respect for Lagassee, Coffin stayed and never looked back. “I can’t imagine what my life would have been like had I quit band,” he says.

To keep young students interested in music, Coffin encourages directors to make rehearsals creative and fun. “[Students] want to have something that interests them. Get them improvising immediately. Get them doing call and response and get them listening to different kinds of music. Open them up and talk to them.”

In seventh grade, Coffin began playing with Lagassee’s trio, a defining moment in his musical career. “I got the bug,” he says. The bug was powerful enough to keep him involved in music throughout his high school years and land him in the music education program at the University of North Texas.

On Tour

Jeff Coffin with students

After college, Coffin moved to Nashville, Tennessee, and began running jam sessions while teaching private lessons on the side. As luck would have it, a musician who knew Béla Fleck attended one of these sessions. Impressed with Coffin’s talent, he introduced him to Fleck, who then asked Coffin to go on tour with the Flecktones. Coffin spent the next 14 years as a Flecktone, during which time the group would often open for the Dave Matthews Band. In 2008, when DMB saxophonist LeRoi Moore was injured in an accident and later died, Coffin took his place with the band. “The Flecktones had been taking some time off,” Coffin says, “so, with [their] blessing, I took the Dave Matthews gig.”

During his time outside of these groups, Coffin also started his own band: Jeff Coffin and the Mu’tet — an ensemble that has been comprised of the same people for about 16 years and has recorded 10 CDs. “Being a leader is the most difficult thing I’ve ever done,” Coffin says about the Mu’tet. “I have to deal with all the merchandise, I have to deal with the assistants, I’ve got to deal with management, club owners, booking agents. There’s a plethora of things that I have to do that [the other members do not]. And I have to get up on stage and be the lead guy.”

Despite the difficulty of leading a band, Coffin consistently thinks outside the box and is a true innovator in his professional career. For years, he has used pedals on his horns, just as a guitarist would, to alter the sound of the saxophone and give himself more of a sonic pallet to choose from — because why should guitarists have all the fun?!

The sounds he was able to create with the pedals inspired him to learn a unique skill — playing two saxophones at once. “It’s fun, it’s a cool sound, it’s interesting, it’s experimental, it’s visually appealing to people, but it’s just a tiny part of what I do,” Coffin says.

On the Flip Side

To further his musical expression, Coffin composes and started his own record label, Ear Up Records. The company name derives from Coffin’s belief that listening is one of the most crucial components of musicianship. “The philosophy of the label is that it’s all handpicked by musicians, and it has to do with the artistic integrity, not the commercial potentiality of it,” he says.

In art as in life, Coffin takes advantage of many opportunities for personal growth. In his spare time, for example, he explores his creativity as an avid photographer. This pursuit of personal growth gave Coffin new insights as an educator.

Outreach in Cuba

In 2015, Coffin traveled with Caleb Chapman and his afterschool youth band to Cuba to record several big band tunes, resulting in the album “Jeff Coffin and Caleb Chapman’s Crescent Super Band: The Inside of the Outside.” Coffin plans to donate the proceeds from the CD toward musical gear for Cuba’s School of Music at the National School of the Arts.

The nearly 600 students living at the school have very little equipment, Coffin says. “It’s not like they have a bunch of reeds or a bunch of mouthpieces or horns to choose from,” he says. “They get what they get, and that’s what they deal with. They’re incredible musicians, so we want to help in any way that we can with that.”

For teachers who work in schools or with students who don’t have much in terms of musical equipment, Coffin’s advice is that it comes down to the practice and refinement of fundamentals. “Ultimately, it’s not the horn, the mouthpiece, the neck or the reed,” he says. “It’s the passion and understanding that’s behind what’s being played.”

Tailor Your Teaching

Jeff Coffin speaking and holding a saxophone

In Coffin’s latest gig as a professor of jazz studies, he teaches saxophone studio lessons and works with the top jazz ensemble at his university. The most important part of his teaching process is talking to his students about what they want to learn in order to tailor his lessons.

“Get to know them as people, not just as students,” Coffin says. “They are fertile minds and are looking for direction and guidance. Don’t make it about you. It’s all about them. There are many ways to reach students, and it’s our job as educators to expand the way we educate to fit the way the student learns.”

When he’s not busy rocking out on stage or in the classroom, Coffin leaves his stomping grounds in Tennessee and travels the world, giving clinics, master classes and lessons. “I involve the students from the very beginning of the clinic, and we talk about a wide variety of things — from why we do long tones to the aesthetic nature of music and how it relates to us as sentient beings,” explains Coffin. During these sessions, he encourages a lot of questions. “I try to get the students to be curious and to draw ideas and concepts out of what I present to them,” he says. “I basically allow them to be creative in their thought process and to provide a safe space for them to ask questions — no matter how ‘far out’ those questions might be.”

These clinics have given Coffin the opportunity to travel off the beaten path to unique places, including Havana, Cuba, and Tuva, a republic of Russia located in southern Siberia. “I’m really fortunate that music has taken me to a lot of very unique and unusual places around the globe,” he remarks. “I’m very thankful every day for that.”

Learn While Teaching

For students wishing to pursue a career in professional performance, Coffin says that fundamentals are key. His three-volume book, The Saxophone Book, discusses what Coffin calls “The Big Five” of fundamentals: listening, tone and dynamics, articulation, rhythm and time, and harmony.

Through his presentations and in his university classes, Coffin feels he learns as much as he teaches. “We are there to learn together, and I feel that I am a student most times, and they are the teachers,” he reports. Yet even as a prominent performer and educator, Coffin will always consider himself to be, above all, a student. “Stay open and realize that you have a lot to learn,” he says. “The moment you stop being a student is the moment you need to stop teaching.”

Top Photo Alysse Gafkjen for Yamaha Corporation of America

Bottom Photos © 2017 Carol Mackay Photography, All rights reserved


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Kevin Sedatole

Written by Kevin Sedatole on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

The Importance of Subdivision

In the last five years of my teaching, I have emphasized the importance of subdivision for performers.

Kevin Sedatole

I have told my students to place themselves in the subdivided beat that they need to be in before they begin playing. That usually means one rhythmic denomination smaller than the one they’re actually performing.

Subdivision prior to playing is the remedy for many challenges beyond rhythm. It produces more precise beginnings and better tone quality, intonation and evenness.

Ask any professional musician about subdivision, and that person will probably say that it is one of the most important aspects of his or her playing.

My conducting colleague and friend, Kevin Noe, is a major disciple of subdivision. He has made me see the light on this vitally important aspect of performance. I use this concept in my own score study and with all ensembles I conduct.

Remember, it’s not subdivision while you play, it’s subdividing before you play!


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Douglas Droste

Written by Douglas Droste on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Technique vs. Emotion

Early in my conducting career and marriage, my wife, Amanda, and I were talking to one of my colleagues about a major orchestral work. 

He was going on and on about the conducting technique required to lead such a work.

Amanda, who is not a conductor but a fine singer, started grilling my friend. “How does it make you feel?” “What does it make you think of when you conduct?” “Can you describe your feelings about this section?”

This conversation served as a “lightbulb” moment for me.

I, too, was very concerned with the technique of music making and often forgot the powerful emotional aspect. As educators we get wrapped up with festivals, travel, class schedules and student behavior among many things, and this emotional element can get pushed aside.

After that conversation, I knew I had to dig deeper to fully appreciate all that music had to offer. Since then, when studying a score, I constantly look inward and feel how the music is speaking to me. The conversation immediately helped my conducting, and it also confirmed that I made a good marital choice!


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Yamaha Master Educator Cheryl Floyd

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Cheryl Floyd

Written by Cheryl Floyd on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Don’t Be Afraid to Ask

I was teaching general music at a private middle school in Tampa, Florida. Shortly after I was hired, the headmaster informed me that it was traditional for the 8th grade class to do a musical in the spring.

The musical that year would be “Damn Yankees” because the youngest son of George Steinbrenner, the owner of the New York Yankees,  was in the 8th grade class.

During that fall, my husband Dick and I were attending a fundraising dinner for the University of South Florida. At one point, Dick leaned over and said, “That’s George Steinbrenner at that table!”

I jumped up and marched right over to Mr. Steinbrenner’s table. I introduced myself and told him that we needed a few things for our production of “Damn Yankees.” He grabbed a napkin and wrote down everything I requested including uniforms, hats, bats and balls.

Within a week, all the items arrived at the school in time for the production!

So dream big and never be afraid to ask!


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Kevin Ford

Written by Kevin Ford on . Posted in YMEC Content.

Begin with a Question

What has led to the greatest growth in my students and in my teaching was developing the mindset of a conceptual teacher.

As a young educator, I provided entirely too much information to my student performers.

Priding myself on showing up prepared, I made sure to research and detail every nuance, and as a result, rehearsals were driven solely by my preparation.

All my energy was directed toward what information I could provide, leading me to make every musical decision.

What was missing was a collaborative effort between my students and me. This challenge became especially evident as we began new pieces of literature. I found myself repeating information, and the inconsistencies of previous works would continue to be prevalent. Unfortunately, falling into the trap of this way of teaching is commonplace as the pace of the rehearsal moves rapidly, appearing as if you are getting things done efficiently and effectively.

More Questions than Answers

However, when I would watch master teachers rehearse various ensembles, I noticed a common characteristic. Initially, more questions were asked than answers provided. For example, rather than specifically stating the areas of concern between rehearsals marking B to C, they would insightfully prompt reactions that resulted in the performers reaching the correction on their own.

At first glance, this method seemed to extend the rehearsal. However, as the ensemble continued, it was evident that going through this process in a collaborative manner provided the opportunity for students not only to retain information but also to apply the learned concepts to any piece of literature.

Seeking Student Input

In my own rehearsals, I have found this technique to be especially beneficial in developing the students’ ability to play with artistry and expression. Now, rather than specifying exactly how I think a phrase should be shaped, I always begin with a question, objectively seeking their input regarding the architecture of a phrase and encouraging students to think like artists and to make creative choices.

Through this approach, the performers seem to possess a greater investment regarding the macro and micro development of a piece of music, ultimately leading to more memorable and fulfilling performances.


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Dr. Rodney Dorsey

Written by Rodney Dorsey on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Positive Working Relationships

One of the most important lessons I’ve learned during my career is the significance of positive working relationships.

So much of our success as teachers and conductors is directly related to our ability to establish positive working relationships with our students and colleagues. When we understand that concept and act on it, we can create experiences that support and enhance the overall education of our students. When we work with our colleagues in the best interests of our students, we can truly provide the students with meaningful musical experiences.


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Music Education in Japan

Written by Elaine Morgan Cutting on . Posted in Case Studies.

As educators, we can always glean new insights from the teaching practices in other countries.  Japanese schools, for example, strive to take excellence in music education to a new level. They emphasize an early appreciation of music, with mandatory classes in elementary school and junior high.

In Japan, kindergartners can be seen marching in perfect step during school ceremonies, and elementary school students can be heard performing difficult concert repertoire such as Alfred Reed’s “Armenian Dances” — usually a high school band piece in the United States — with enviable accuracy. By the time musicians reach the junior high and high school levels, they’re ready to participate in the All-Japan Band Competition, one of the nation’s largest symphonic band contests.

One school that consistently wins awards at this competition is Kashiwa Municipal Senior High School. Its 263 musicians average 70 performances per year, and its ensembles are known for utilizing cultural instruments such as the three-stringed shamisen, similar to a guitar. The key to the band’s success is efficiency.

“The most important factor is to systemize the practice … not to waste one second,” says Shuichi Ishida, music director of symphonic band at Kashiwa. “Even if the band director is absent, by strong systemization, it will be possible to let the band practice with the same quality as [when the] band director is present.”

What sets apart Japan’s music education programs to create high performing instrumental students, even at young ages?


Members of the Kashiwa Municial Senior High School band performing on stage.

Create a Systemic Approach

At Kashiwa Municipal Senior High School, there is no band class during the school day; instead, band members stay after school for three hours on every weekday for band practice.

Students are not expected to practice beyond those three hours a day. Because many homes in Japan are very small, students are unable to practice at home. “I am thinking first of all to motivate children, so that they can work on practicing proactively,” Ishida says. “I try to draw talent with voluntary participation in practice rather than imposed practice.”

During practices, Ishida prioritizes the basics rather than just running through the pieces they plan to perform. “We start with basic training [with the] ensemble even [if] we do not have enough time,” he says. “The sound is totally different with basic training.”

To keep practices efficient, Ishida recommends simplifying instructions to help students maintain concentration. “If directors can talk to students with easy words [and] short sentence[s], it works for students’ better understanding,” he says.

To further help students understand musical concepts, Ishida uses the Yamaha Harmony Director, a keyboard that helps students learn how to fit individual notes into chords. “Almost all Japanese school [bands have] it,” says Ishida. “Some [schools have one] for each section.”

Students at Kashiwa participate in various ensembles. “[Students] graduate experiencing both concert and marching band,” he says.

Additionally, all music students are expected to be in parade bands.

Offer Many Performance Opportunities

The more opportunities students have to perform for an audience, the more motivated they will be to improve. Ishida’s students participate in marching and concert band competitions as well as regional band festivals. Beyond these contests and typical concerts, students play at corporate events, senior citizen homes, and at elementary and junior high schools to inspire younger musicians.

Additionally, Ishida suggests that students watch live performances. He invites Kashiwa alumni who play professionally to come back and visit the school. “Live performances of these closest professional players … can engage students the most and raise their motivation,” he says. Ishida also brings in Yamaha Artists for clinics and joint performance opportunities. “These experiences make a big difference,” he explains.

Partly because of its varied performance opportunities, few students leave the band from year to year. “With the consciousness of all members [feeling included], few students quit on the way,” Ishida says.

Remove Financial Barriers

No matter their geographic locations, school bands need money to function effectively, but Ishida strives to minimize any fees that individual students need to pay.

To accomplish this goal, Ishida seeks out sponsorships. “We organize [support] by civic groups, local companies and Lions Clubs,” he says.

As a result, the band is able to set a maximum student fee for overnight trips at 1,500 yen, which is less than $15. “The shortfall has been received as a subsidy from Kashiwa City and the aforementioned support groups,” he reports.

By making music accessible to everyone, developing a strong practice ethic and keeping students motivated with ample performance opportunities, Ishida has developed an approach that can improve any school music program — no matter where it is in the world.


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Jeff Coffin’s Words of Wisdom for Educators

Written by Liz Neidich on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

In Jeff Coffin: Professor Rock Star, we learn how Coffin draws his teaching techniques from his career as a soloist, leader and performer with several groups including Béla Fleck and the Flecktones and Dave Matthews Band.

He provides the following advice to fellow music educators.

Teach Students as Individuals: “Talk to them and get to know them as people,” Coffin says. “Remember that they are people first, and that your influence is a lot of times profound.

Become a Better Listener: “I think that with listening, you can have everything, and if you’re not listening, you’ll end up with nothing,” Coffin says.

Serve the Music: “Be a wide enough musician to be able to go into a situation and be convincing and be authentic enough that it works,” Coffin says. “Being able to play well will get you called once. It’s the other things that get you called back.”

Never Stop Being a Student: “We are all students, and we are all teachers,” Coffin says. “I probably learn more from my students than they learn from me, and I think they learn a lot from me.”

Photos (c) 2017 Carol MacKay Photography, All Rights Reserved


cover of the 2017v3 issue of SupportED featuring saxophonist Jeff Coffin

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V3 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

The box fronts lined up so you can read the covers for the three Steinberg Cubase products - Cubase Pro 9.5; Cubase Artist 9.5; and, Cubase Elements 9.5.

Steinberg Videos, Part 4: How to Compose Music with Chords

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Recording.

Offering pristine sound quality, intuitive handling and a wide range of advanced tools for complete music production, Steinberg Cubase is one of the most popular digital audio workstations out there. In this series of videos, we’ll show you exactly why!

In this installment, host Andrew Shravemade demonstrates how to use the Cubase Chord track and Chord pads — powerful creative tools that allow you to quickly and easily write and produce your own music … even if you can’t play an instrument! Included are step-by-step instructions for building intricate chord progressions by playing just single notes and for editing the data to get everything in perfect time. In just minutes, you’ll be able to create your own great-sounding backing tracks. Check it out:

Click here for Part 1: “How to Do Your First Recording In Cubase”

Click here for Part 2: “How to Do Editing In Cubase”

Click here for Part 3: “How to Get Started In Cubase AI and LE”

 

Click here to access the full YouTube Cubase AI/LE Music Production Essentials playlist.

Click here to find out more about Steinberg Cubase.

Watercolor rendition of someone playing an acoustic guitar.

Turning a Gift Into a Career

Written by Rich Tozzoli on . Posted in Brand.

I consider myself blessed to have turned music into a career.

Like most grade school kids, I started out playing band instruments before transitioning to guitar in my early teens. But I never studied music in college, and after graduating with a Marketing/Management degree, I worked in commercial lending at a bank for a few years. Making a life with music seemed like something others did. So how in the world did I end up not only doing just that, but working with some of the very same artists I grew up listening to?

The only answer I have is that being able to create music is a gift I was given; in fact, I believe it’s one of the reasons I was put on the planet. While that may sound overly deep, it’s how I truly feel. Music brings me a sense of deep satisfaction that my previous life in banking did not.

This journey did not happen overnight. There is a sense of right time, right place and the ever elusive thing called luck, which always seems to occur when preparation meets opportunity. After making the decision to leave banking, I found myself drawn to recording, mixing and production, and fortune shone upon me when I crossed paths with the great jazz fusion guitarist Al Di Meola, who gave me my first job in music — at first assisting on just about anything that needed to get done on the road and in the studio, and later traveling to many parts of the world and making records with him. This gave me the opportunity to observe artists like Al and others at the top of their craft do what they do, and the observing, learning and applying of those skills still pushes me to work hard every day.

All the while, I honed my own musical abilities until I eventually received an assignment from the Nickelodeon TV network to compose some tracks for their international library. That led to other opportunities to get my work on television. One show led to another, and then another. Over the years I’ve composed rock, metal, funk, acoustic country, and just about every other genre there is, conjuring up every kind of emotion you can name. Sometimes I have to write a variety of sounds and styles in the same day, literally minutes after each other.

The fun part of creating music for television is the challenge to get the tracks to fit the emotions and pace of the show. Slow, bluesy acoustic tracks might not work for a fast-moving crime scene, but if the camera is focused on someone sitting on a country porch pondering whodunit, it might be just right. Hard rock might not be a good fit for a documentary about Alaskan ice floes but will work perfectly for one about race cars. Next time you’re watching a show, focus on how the music helps the flow, pace and energy of each scene. Then try to imagine the same show with no music, period. It might not work at all. That’s just one example of the power of music.

If you’re planning a career in music, I cannot understate how important it is to know your gear. Because of all the time and effort I’ve put into learning the ins and outs of my DAW and all the plugins and instruments I use, my brain doesn’t even have to think when I’m creating music. It just does.

I also make a point of learning something new just about every day. That can mean almost anything. For example, I might take the time to create a new Line 6 Helix® patch for guitar or study some new tunings. I might test out some drum loops I’ve never explored or learn some keyboard chords I’ve never used before. And I’m always experimenting with new mics, preamps and ways to record everything from a full drum kit to a simple shaker. The more you know, the better prepared you’ll be when your brain calls upon you to get the part done. Again, I don’t have to think about it. I’ve already done it, learned it and stored it away for quick recall.

I’ve always believed that creating music is what I call “life deep.” That means that the G chord I learned when I was 14 still applies today, many years later. And building upon that by learning, say, a whole variety of G chords (Gsus, Gm7, G6, for example), you create a palette of knowledge that keeps expanding your skills. Getting better at your craft is a lifelong pursuit, whether it’s what you do for a living or what you do for fun.

 

Check out Rich’s other postings.

Stylized soundwave on a background of concentric circles.

Using Reverb and Delay In Live Sound, Part 2

Written by Steve La Cerra on . Posted in Live Sound. 1 Comment on Using Reverb and Delay In Live Sound, Part 2

In Part 1 of this article, we talked about the basics of reverb and delay — two important effects that add spaciousness to a sound. Now let’s describe how exactly they can be added to your mix and give you some tips on how best to use them in live sound.

Return to Sender

Adding reverb or delay to a sound (or group of sounds) is almost always accomplished with something called a send, which takes some of the audio from a channel (or channels) and routes it either to a built-in effect or to an output on the mixer, where it can be patched to an external effect. These sends are usually called aux sends (short for “auxiliary”), although they are also sometimes called Effect [or FX] sends). The original unprocessed sound is called the “dry” signal, while the added reverb or delay effect is called the “wet” signal.

For example, the effect send on a Yamaha MG06X mixer consists of a simple on/off pushbutton that sends the signal to the effect. The aux sends on more advanced Yamaha models like the MG16XU use rotary knobs, as shown below; in that particular mixer, you turn up the AUX4/FX knob in order to send the signal to the effect. The use of rotary knobs allows you to apply the effect (in differing amounts) to more than one channel. (To learn more about aux sends, check out this blog posting.)

Graphic illustrating dial settings.

Once the signal is sent to the effect processor, digital technology does its thing, creating a reverb or delay effect. But now we have to bring that effect back into our mix, almost like it’s a new signal — and in fact it really is a new signal. That’s where an effect return comes in. An effect return is like a mini input dedicated to an effect.

Effects returns normally have level controls and various routing options, such as panpots. The effect return on the Yamaha MG06X has both a level control and a switch. Bring up the level control to return the effect to your mix. Use the switch to choose between the different effects.

What Program Should I Use?

Generally speaking, you should use short reverbs and delays on fast songs, and longer reverbs and delays on slower songs. That’s because, when a band is playing at a fast tempo, a long reverb or delay will make the mix “muddy” and reduce the clarity of an instrument by stepping on the original sound.

Here are some suggestions for using reverb and delay on specific instruments:

Drums: Reverb almost always works better than delay for drums. Start by adding a small hall to the snare drum and see if you like the way it puts the drum into an imaginary space — but don’t add too much or the snare will lose impact. You can do the same for toms. Avoid using reverb on cymbals or high-hat because it will make them too “splashy.” Reverb on a kick drum is generally a bad idea because it makes the bottom end of your mix muddy and you’ll lose clarity on both the kick drum and the bass guitar.

Percussion instruments like conga and bongos can benefit from a bit of short room reverb to dramatizes the “slap.” Long reverb on a tambourine works for ballads where the tambourine is playing on the two and four, but avoid it if the tambourine is playing eighth or sixteenth notes, or is being played on an up-tempo song.

Vocals: You can use reverb or delay on a lead vocal — or both! For ballads, a hall program on the lead vocalist generally works well and adds the sense of depth you get from being in a large room. If you want something more intimate, try a small room program. A plate reverb on vocal can emphasize the highs of the vocal sound but be careful about adding too much plate — especially on sibilant vocalists — because it can emphasize “s” and “t” sounds.

If can view the actual delay time, start at around 250 ms, with enough feedback to get two or three repeats. At faster song tempos, try shorter delay times; at slower tempos, try longer delay times. This prevents the delay from interfering with the original vocal and making the song’s lyrics difficult to understand. You can also briefly switch on a long, rolling delay to emphasize a word at the end of a lyric — but be sure to turn it off so that the delay doesn’t cover up the vocal.

Background vocals can be fattened up with a doubling effect (i.e., a very short delay, around 30 ms) but keep it subtle so that it doesn’t make the vocals sound sloppy. Ditto for doubling on a lead vocal.

Guitar: Delays work great for giving guitar solos a sense of continuity but ask if the guitar player is already adding their own effects because you don’t want to overdo it. On rhythm guitar, really long delays with a lot of repeats will result in a sound similar to The Edge from U2.

A bit of reverb on a rhythm guitar will help it “sit” in your mix and blend well with other instruments. Try a room type reverb with a short decay or an ambient program. This is especially useful when you are mixing outdoors because there are very few natural reflections in an open space and so guitars can sound very “dry.”

Keyboards: A small hall or medium-size room reverb works great on piano to add depth and size. A bit of short room reverb on an organ sound works nicely to add a sense of width and space. Delay works well for synth solos … especially if you’re in a prog-rock band!

Horns: A small room or an ambient program makes horn stabs more dramatic. Longer rooms or halls work well for sax and trumpet solos. Delays can be useful for horn solos but tend to work better when the tempo is slow and instrumentation is sparse. If you’re working with a ska band, you can get away with a short delay on the horns

Bass: For the most part, stay away from using reverb or delay on bass. It reduces definition and adds clutter to the low end. An exception might be if you had a fretless bass taking a solo in a ballad — in which case adding a little hall reverb can elongate the note endings in a very flattering way.

 

Check out our other Tools of the Trade postings.

Click here for more information about Yamaha mixing consoles.

Open bodied electric guitar on its side adjacent to a control panel with buttons and knobs and a display screen with word "Yamaha SLG2008" visible.

Layering Guitar with Studio Response Technology

Written by Robbie Calvo on . Posted in Electric Guitars.

There is nothing quite like walking into a well appointed state-of-the-art recording studio. Living and working in Nashville for 17 years gave me the opportunity to witness some of the world’s finest tracking rooms.

All those consoles, outboard gear and microphones costing millions of dollars! Add to that the custom designed acoustic treatments and the in-house instruments, including fine grand pianos, vintage organs, guitars, basses and drums and you can understand why recording time is such a precious commodity.

Like so many musicians these days, I track most of my projects at home on a computer-based system. I have a couple of tube preamps and nice microphones that I can use for capturing acoustic guitars and amp cabinets but quite honestly, the amp modeling and effects I can get direct from the Line 6 Helix® sound just as good. I rarely record vocals or other acoustic instruments, so some of the outboard processors and microphones in my studio are, frankly, losing their relevance.

The Question

Do actual microphones and tube preamps sound better for recording guitars than digitally modeled mics, amps, speaker cabinets and guitar pickups? The simple answer to that is … it’s subjective. If you have a quiet environment, an excellent microphone and preamp, and the engineering skills to use them well, you can get amazing results. Owning a great guitar and having the necessary chops to track all of your parts cleanly while monitoring through headphones is also a major factor.

Of course, I love the sound of a miked acoustic guitar, especially to capture the percussive aspect of the instrument — but honestly, the hassle and time spent setting up the signal chain sometimes outweighs the sonic benefit of the end result!

Enter Studio Response Technology

Yamaha have spent decades developing innovative onboard guitar pickups. The latest Studio Response Technology (SRT) powered systems combine mic modeling technology and under-saddle piezo blending systems. SRT models the sound of the acoustic guitar being recorded with carefully selected high quality microphones and preamps in a studio environment.

The SRT2 pickup systems in Yamaha A Series guitars feature the modeling of two classic microphones: a Royer R122 active ribbon model, along with a Neumann U67 large diaphragm condenser (on the A5/A3 rosewood models) or a Neumann KM56 small diaphragm condenser (on the A5/A3 mahogany models). When you consider that, together, these mics can cost well over $10,000, it makes a compelling argument to own an amazing guitar that features those modeled tones … at a fraction of the cost!

Yamaha SILENT Guitars™ also feature SRT systems that are optimized to produce the body resonance and tone of a full-size acoustic guitar. They faithfully reproduce traditional acoustic guitar sounds for direct recording (i.e., without an amplifier) as well as live performance and headphone practice.

My Process for Layering Guitar Parts

Open bodied electric guitar on its end in front of a control panel with buttons and knobs and a display screen with word "Yamaha SLG2008" visible.

Layering guitar parts is an art form and requires careful orchestration and execution. Planning each overdub ahead of time will be well worth the time you’ll save re-recording parts. Make sure your timing is impeccable: If in doubt, record the part again until it sits perfectly with the groove. Pay close attention to dynamics and feel; this is a recorded performance, not just a robotic execution of parts. Last but not least, tuning is not overrated! I tune after every take because there is nothing worse than capturing the perfect performance only to find it’s slightly out of pitch.

I thought it would be educational and fun to record and film the sound of the SRT-powered SLG200S steel string SILENT Guitar, layering a variety of modeled acoustic guitar parts combined with the Line 6 Helix. I used the SRT system to provide the blended piezo/mic models and Helix for the modeled preamp and effects.

The Video

Here’s a video of me layering a number of parts with the setup described above:

The chord progression I play in the opening section of the video is G – Bm7 – Cadd2 – D/F#. This can be analyzed as a I – III – IV – V progression in the key of G. The tonal center (resolution point) of this progression is G Ionian.

The Parts

Guitar Parts 1 and 2 – Strumming

I like to capture rhythm guitar parts in “open” position first. The bass notes and open strings give me a clear sonic picture of the lowest and most open tones. I can then create and build complementary overdubs from there on up the fretboard.

If you listen carefully to the intro you’ll hear that I’ve double-tracked the initial rhythm guitar part and panned the first pass hard left and the second (doubled) part hard right. Spreading the initial guitar parts wide in the stereo field gives me a great sonic platform for further added layers.

I used the blend control on the SRT system with a 60/40 ratio in favor of the mic modeling. This setting gave me more “air” in the tone. EQ on the guitar was set flat and a touch of reverb was added in Helix.

Guitar Part 3 – Fingerpicked, Capo 2nd Fret

Here, you’ll notice that I have a capo on the 2nd fret and I’m playing different chord shapes to facilitate still being in the key of G. The F shape is actually G; the Am shape is Bm; Bb is C; and the C shape is D. Using capo techniques like this enables you to raise the pitch of the chords and consequently separate the frequency range of multiple guitars in a mix. I created additional space in the audio spectrum by fingerpicking the third guitar part, adding some EQ (a boost of 3.0 dB at 2600 Hz with a Q width of 0.88, along with rolling off the lows at 100 Hz), a sprinkle of reverb and panning the guitar to 10 o’clock in the audio field.

Guitar Part 4 – Fingerpicked, Capo 5th Fret

The capo is now placed at the 5th fret and I’m playing a D shape to give me the G; a partial of F#m7 to give me the Bm; a G shape for the C; and an A shape for the D chord. You’ll notice how using the capo introduces complementary voicings that have a wonderful musical magic to them. If you understand the CAGED guitar system and can analyze harmonic structures, you’ll be able to apply capo parts like this in any key. Well worth the study and practice!

I panned this guitar part over to 2 o’clock in the mix so that it occupies its own space on the right hand side and I carefully adjusted volume and reverb for clarity and overall balance, as well as adding a little gentle EQ: a 4.0 dB boost at 1000 Hz with a Q width of 2.00, and a 3 dB boost at 260 Hz with a Q width of 0.10. I also increased the blend ratio to 80/20 in favor of the mic modeling for all of the fingerpicked parts to introduce more “air” and defined tonality.

The Slide Melody

On listening to the rhythm parts I could hear a simple slide melody in my head, so I took some time to locate the notes on the guitar. I find that singing new melody lines for guitar instrumentals yields the most natural and unique results for me and prevents muscle memory from dictating the creative process.

Notice how the first half of my slide melody is played near open position on the 3rd and 4th strings and the second half of the solo is played further up the fretboard on the upper strings. These are all conscious musical choices that add variety and tonal progression to the music.

The SRT settings for this guitar part were in favor of the piezo pickup, with a 60/40 blend. This gave the slide more presence and less air than the other guitar parts. I also added a touch of compression, overdrive, delay and reverb from the Helix to help the slide notes sustain and sit front and center in the mix.

The Wrap-Up

I hope this musical example has inspired you to experiment with the latest modeling technology. When you consider the cost, time savings and creative results, it’s a technique well worth considering for your recording projects.

Photographs courtesy of the author.

Check out Robbie’s other postings.

 

Click here for more information about the Yamaha SILENT Guitar.

Click here for more information about the Line 6 Helix.

View of a guy's hands using a video game console with video game on screen in background.

Three Reasons to Upgrade Your Sound System for Modern Gaming

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in Gaming. 1 Comment on Three Reasons to Upgrade Your Sound System for Modern Gaming

You’ve had a long day and it’s time to relax in front of your TV and play your favorite video game. The start screen appears and you begin. But there’s one problem: The sound is thin. You can’t hear enemies as they approach and the explosions don’t correlate to the rumble intensity on your controller. The audible excitement level just doesn’t seem to match what’s on screen.

The good news is that there is an easy solution: Instead of relying on your TV speakers alone, add a sound bar or sound bar and subwoofer combo for added punch. Or, if you already have a sound bar, upgrade to a 4K AV receiver and/or 5.1-channel surround sound system to take your gaming experience to the next level.

If you’re thinking that your TV’s speakers or a set of headphones are good enough for your gaming needs, allow me to change your mind. Here are three reasons you should upgrade your sound system:

1. Cinematic experience

Games are like movies now, so if you want to experience the game the way it was designed, you’ll need to listen to the dialog and sound effects on a powerful audio system in addition to viewing the video on a high-resolution big-screen TV.

Popular and massively attended events like the E3 Gaming Expo are evidence of the importance of video games in today’s world. Modern video games not only capture and display stunning 3D visuals in 4K and HDR but also give you the option of hearing back the audio soundtrack on a 5.1-channel surround sound system, often with Dolby Digital support. Since most modern game consoles utilize PCM (Pulse Code Modulation) lossless audio format, surround sound is often used by game designers to make the gaming experience even more immersive. For that reason, before getting a sound bar you may want to double-check its compatibility with multi-channel PCM. Most AV receivers do, however, support the format, so all you need to do is properly configure your gaming console to enable surround functionality.

2. Nuance

Depending on the game, there are different elements that game designers highlight to elevate the game-playing experience. First, there’s the underlying musical score. Much like a film, this supports the main narrative of a story game, or it can represent characters with individual leitmotifs. To get the full range of what the composer is going for, you’ll want quality speakers and a subwoofer.

A surround sound system is also important for hearing dialogue, ambient noise and sound effects, especially when they’re split between left, right and rear surround speakers. How else can you hear an enemy sneaking up behind you, or experience the sound of explosions as you speed away from disaster in your digital sports car? Fighting and survival horror games benefit from surround sound as well, letting you hear character subtleties like breathing or creepy laughter coming from all around you.

3. It makes you feel like a kid

Remember the feeling of going to your first concert or watching that first blockbuster on the big screen and the “wow” factor that came with it? You can get that same feeling from modern video games if they’re supported by a powerful audio and video playback system. Upgrading to something more fitting to the developer’s vision allows you to better experience well-crafted, immersive stories in real time.

Technological advancements have made quality sound more affordable than ever before — and, of course, your surround sound system can be used for more than just gaming, including watching movies and listening to music. So what are you waiting for?

 

For more information, check out these blog articles:

Home Theater on a Budget, Part 1: Starter System

Home Theater on a Budget, Part 2: Intermediate System.

A woman in a darkened recording studio listening through headphones.

Don’t Disturb This Groove

Written by Shelly Peiken on . Posted in Creativity.

Creative people need privacy. But privacy is not an easy space to find with this thing called life going on all around us.

Even when we find we have some (privacy), we can’t take for granted that the magical portal will open to the Zone — the place where we are unquestionably and most definitely at Peak Performance. “On Our Game,” as sports marketers would say.

There’s no GPS for getting into the Zone. The map changes daily. And there’s no guarantee that just because we’re available we get to go in. Sometimes it takes weeks before we receive the nod. So when I’m lucky enough to have been granted entry and my hubby knocks on my writing room door to see when we’re having dinner, I’m not happy. That’s the knock that could kill the Muse.

But let’s be fair. When he’s in his studio composing, I knock on his door too. Funny, he gives me the very same look. 🙁

What to do? Never intrude? Live alone? Get creative only when no one’s home? Yes, but the doorbell still rings. Sirens still scream. Lawnmowers still blow. Sometimes the gardener even waves through my office window just to say hi. Friendly gardener.

I love hotel rooms. No doorbells, no lawnmowers, no robo-calls. I make 24/7 use of those “privacy please” signs. Last time I was in New York I opted out of new linens and towels for three days. Leave things as they are lest it change my point of view. I’m not that dirty.

In his 2016 memoir Bruce Springsteen writes about a rule he had when his kids were little: If he was writing he was not to be disturbed. Hey, he could have been working on “Thunder Road” and we might never have heard it. That would be sad.

One day his wife Patti told him (and I paraphrase), you’re going to miss it. And he asked miss what? And she said the kids … waking them up, getting them off to school. It’s gonna be over in the blink of an eye. He changed the rule. Started making them breakfast. Good boy, Bruce.

Big choice. What songs did the world live without because of that choice? Then again, maybe he wrote better songs because of that choice or because he’s the kind of man who would make that choice.

Moving on. The people in my gym think I’m antisocial. And I am. Ideas come when I’m moving. When the blood is flowing. So don’t talk to me. Seriously. Pretend we don’t know each other. And don’t take it personally.

In fact, I use my wireless earbuds as a deterrent even when I’m not listening to music. If you see those Shrek-like things in my ears and still try to engage, I will give you the stink eye. If you persist I will stop the treadmill, remove one Shrek-like thing and give you my undivided attention … which will most definitely make you feel like you’re annoying me. Because you are.

My apologies. I should wear a T-shirt that actually says, “Don’t talk to me.” As a matter of fact, I’m going to Google it. I’m sure it exists.

A t-shirt with the phrase "Please Don't Talk To Me"

There you go. At least it says please.

Let’s face it. Being in the Zone is blessed. Mystical. Elusive. However, when you’re fortunate enough to have found yourself there, don’t give it the time of day. Just carry on. Keep streaming whatever stream of consciousness earned you a ticket in the first place. After all, the Zone has a mind of its own. It is temperamental. Give it too much deference and it will disappear as quickly as it came.

Woman with her back to us sitting in a chair facing a computer screen with a professional microphone and studio setup.

To prevent these precious moments from slipping away, my husband and I have developed a signal for when we absolutely need each other’s attention: We get in each other’s peripheral line of vision, silently flap our fingers to our palms twice and then leave the room, as if to say, in the subtlest of ways, I know you’re in deep … need to talk … when you take a break … bye. OK, so it does put a bit of a blip into our concentration but certainly not as jarring as a bam on the door or a shout across the house: “I’m going to the market — what do we need?”

Ah … he just went off to play tennis. I’m home alone! Woohoo! Hey, I just learned how to record my own vocals — something I’ve resisted for decades. What was I waiting for? Our home studio is empty and soundproof. I think I’ll get busy.

Hail to the Zone. May you find it often. And stay for as long as you can.

 

Check out Shelly’s other postings.

Drawing of outdoor patio with pergola and how multiple speakers mounted and focused on area under pergola would focus sound waves.

How to Enjoy Great Outdoor Sound Without Disturbing Your Neighbors

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in Audio How-to.

Have you ever wanted to relax in your backyard while enjoying music from your outdoor speakers but couldn’t due to complaining neighbors? You’re not alone. Fortunately, the solution is simple: add more speakers.

That may sound counterintuitive, but theme parks have long adopted this method for allowing their patrons to hear music clearly during a parade without having to blast it loudly. The strategy requires you to add a speaker every five to ten feet, which allows you to keep the overall volume down while your music remains clearly audible anywhere in the yard.

Equipment Needed

To create the perfect ambience for yourself or your guests during a summer party, you’ll need the right tools for the job. Start the process by creating a basic system in your yard with a two-zone AV receiver such as the Yamaha RX-V685 and a pair of outdoor speakers. If this isn’t sufficient to cover your entire yard at moderate volume levels, consider adding another amplifier to power more speakers.

AV receiver angled to show front and left side.
RX-V685 MusicCast AV receiver.

The reason you’ll need a second amp is to ensure that the extra speakers don’t overload the AV receiver — something that could potentially damage your equipment, or worse. As an example, the RX-V685 has a minimum impedance rating of 6 ohms per speaker. Adding another amp that has 4 ohm drive capability (such as the Yamaha WXA-50 MusicCast wireless streaming amplifier) will allow you to safely add up to four more 8 ohm speakers for low-volume, full coverage music in your backyard without any danger of overload. As a bonus, the WXA-50 also provides MusicCast capability for wireless control. For more zones, and ultimately more speakers, check out the Yamaha AVENTAGE line of receivers.

Two speakers, one horizontal and one vertical.
NS-AW194 high performance outdoor speakers.

You’ll also need the right outdoor, all-weather speakers to execute this plan. To start, try up to four of the reasonably-priced Yamaha NS-AW194 high performance outdoor speakers. They offer a versatile design for ease of installation and provide outstanding sound quality with each speaker rated at 8 ohm nominal impedance.

Setup, Placement and Positioning

To get the most from this multi-speaker approach, there are several things to consider. First, decide where the speakers will go. Then you’ll need to plan out where to run speaker wire and how each speaker will be mounted. Some areas you can use include the eves of the house, a fence or a pergola if you have one. To learn more about mounting outdoor speakers, check out our blog article “How to Mount Outdoor Speakers.”

If you intend to listen in only one part of the yard (in a patio sitting area, for example), it’s recommended to mount the speakers around the perimeter of the area facing inward towards the center. Just be aware that controlling sound outdoors is more difficult than indoors, especially if you’re located near a highway or busy street. But using this method will help cut through environmental noise and at the same time reduce the need to blast the music at high volumes.

Drawing of outdoor patio with pergola and how multiple speakers mounted and focused on area under pergola would focus sound waves.
For an optimal outdoor listening experience, be sure to point the speakers inward.

Wireless Control

If you’d like to control your speakers wirelessly using a mobile device, check out the MusicCast Controller App, which is compatible with any MusicCast-enabled device, including the RX-V685. (Look for the MusicCast logo to ensure compatibility.) If you have a receiver without MusicCast, the WXC-50 pairs well with any legacy AV receiver or Hi-Fi system to allow you to select and listen to your favorite streaming services through the MusicCast app. To get an idea of other practical applications for using MusicCast outdoors, check out our blog article, “Wireless Amp Turns Outdoor Speakers into MusicCast.”

Once you’ve put in the work, you’ll have a powerful outdoor speaker system that both sounds great and contains your music so that only you get to hear it … and not the neighbors next door!

Note: The setup described in this article is merely a suggestion. We recommend that anyone unfamiliar with how to set up a system like this consult an expert installer to ensure that proper precautions are followed.

Off-Season Care and Maintenance for Percussion Instruments

Written by Troy C. Wollwage on . Posted in Percussion. 1 Comment on Off-Season Care and Maintenance for Percussion Instruments

After a long season of percussion activities, it’s time for a much-needed break. Of course, this includes your percussion equipment.

Every ensemble can (and should) be proactive in protecting its equipment. Your gear has taken a lot of stress and strain, but the good news is that keeping your equipment in top competitive shape for next season is a matter of following these four steps.

Four Key Steps

1. Take Inventory: Take a complete inventory of all the equipment at the end of each semester. This will help eliminate the question of “what do we actually have” and will help cut down on “disappearing” equipment during the down times.

2. Designate a Contact: Designate a specific individual to be responsible for all of the instruments during the off-season. This person’s job will be to make sure that maintenance checks for all instruments are performed. Oftentimes, the care and maintenance of percussion equipment after a show is overlooked. The best way to ensure that instruments are ready for the next event is to make sure that the ensemble staff members are diligent about post-event care.

3. Find the Proper Environment: Keep all musical instruments in a cool, dry environment all year. Extreme temperature changes creates extra wear and tear on the equipment, so, for example, do not leave battery percussion in an equipment truck for any length of time. All instruments should be kept under some form of supervision or security at all times to ensure the integrity of the equipment. Due to extreme weather during the winter, improper storage — especially in the Midwest and eastern part of the United States — can do significant damage to percussion instruments.

4. Keep it Clean: At the end of every season, the entire battery should be thoroughly cleaned. Take the heads off each drum, clean each part, and then re-lubricate everything with lithium grease as the drum is reassembled. After doing this, place clean drum covers on the drums before storage. Drums should be stored in Field-Master™ hard cases or Battery Packs™ for optimal protection. As noted in #3, all equipment should be stored in a secure, cool and dry indoor environment.

Care Details for Specific Instruments

Snare Drums
  • Each drum should be carefully inspected and cleaned while being disassembled and then reassembled.
  • Wipe down each drum with a soft cloth, including the hardware and the shell.
  • The tension on both the top head and bottom head should be reduced by half. (During storage, the heads should be taut to keep the tension rods in place.)
  • For the snare guts, the vertical adjustment should be loosened by three or four turns.
  • If the drums have an MTS unit, it should be stored in the off or down position.
  • Ensure that any hardware attached to the drum for the carrier is tight and in working order.
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that may need replacement.
  • Place a clean drum cover on the drum and then place the drum in a hard or soft case.
  • Each drum should be stored in a secure and cool environment.
Multi-Toms
  • Each tom set should be carefully inspected and cleaned while being disassembled and then reassembled.
  • Wipe down each drum with a soft cloth, including the hardware and the shell.
  • The tension on the head should be reduced by half. (During storage, the heads should be taut to keep the tension rods in place.)
  • Make sure the spacers and tenor rails are tight and in working order.
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that may need replacement.
  • Place a clean drum cover on the drum and then place the drum in a hard or soft case.
  • Each drum should be stored in a secure and cool environment.
Bass Drums
  • Each drum should be carefully inspected and cleaned while being disassembled and then reassembled.
  • Wipe down each drum with a soft cloth, including the hardware and the shell.
  • The tension on both heads should be reduced by half. (During storage, heads should be taut to keep the tension rods in place.)
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that may need replacement.
  • Place a clean drum cover on the drum and then place the drum in a hard or soft case.
  • Each drum should be stored in a secure and cool environment.
Hardware and Carriers
  • Wipe down all parts with a soft cloth.
  • These items can be left stacked neatly in an indoor facility.
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that will need to be replaced prior to the first camp.
  • Do not store hardware or carriers in the cases with the drums because they can damage the finish and hardware over time.
Keyboards
  • Store keyboard instruments in a cool, dry indoor place to avoid extreme heat or cold. Improper winter storage may do significant damage to any instrument.
  • Do not keep keyboard instruments on an equipment truck for any length of time.
  • Ensure the integrity of the instrument by keeping it under some form of supervision or security at all times.
Marimbas, Vibes and Xylophones
  • Wipe down the bars with a soft cloth — avoid the use of any chemicals.
  • Take the bars off the instrument and store them in a cool, dry place up off the floor and wrapped in a soft blanket or, better yet, in a dedicated instrument bag designed to prevent any sliding or shifting that may occur in blankets.
  • Avoid storing any objects on the wood frames or the accessory bars.
  • Wipe down the wood and metal frame with a soft cloth.
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that may need replacement.
  • Check all cords and replace any that are worn or frayed.
  • Place a clean cover on the instrument for storage.
Timpani
  • Wipe down the bowls and heads with a soft cloth — avoid the use of any chemicals.
  • The heads should be left in tune — do NOT adjust the tension of the heads.
  • Pedals should be in the forward or “toe down” position to keep the tension on the heads.
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that may need replacement.
  • Place a clean cover on the instrument for storage.
Bells
  • Wipe down the bars with a soft cloth — avoid the use of any chemicals.
  • The bars do not have to be removed from the instrument frame.
  • Store the instrument in its original, closed case. Do NOT store the instrument lying flat on top of another mallet instrument, such as a xylophone, marimba or vibraphone.
  • The instrument should be stored flat in a cool, dry room.
Chimes
  • Wipe down the tubes and heads with a soft cloth — avoid the use of any chemicals.
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that may need replacement.
  • Check all cords and replace any that are worn or frayed.
  • The instrument should be stored upright in a cool, dry room.
  • Place a clean cover on the instrument for storage.
Concert Snares and Concert Toms
  • Wipe down each drum with a soft cloth, including the hardware and the shell — avoid the use of any chemicals.
  • The tension on the drum heads should be reduced by half. (During storage, drum head should be taut to keep the tension rods in place.)
  • For the snare guts, the vertical adjustment should be loosened by three or four turns and in the off position.
  • Store in cases — preferably hard cases, if appropriate sizes are available.
Concert Bass Drum
  • Wipe down each drum with a soft cloth, including the hardware and the shell — avoid the use of any chemical.
  • The drum head should remain in tune and does not have to be loosened.
  • Place a clean cover on the instrument for storage.
Miscellaneous Hardware
  • All hardware should be cleaned with a soft cloth.
  • Stack the hardware neatly in an indoor environment.
  • Tighten all parts before storing.
  • Take note of any missing or corroded parts that may need replacement.
  • Hardware tends to “disappear” during the off-season because the parts and pieces are small — a full inventory list of your equipment will help cut down on replacing lost items.

All this work at the end of every season will help ensure that your musical investment is protected, and that the band is ready to play when the next season rolls around!

A view of a vibraphone from the front.

Vibraphone Lessons with Rusty Burge, Part 2: Using Patterns in Improvisation

Written by Dr. Dave Gerhart on . Posted in Percussion.

Here’s the second installment in our series of video lessons on vibraphone performance technique by Yamaha Performing Artist Rusty Burge.

Percussionists are taught patterns at their first lesson. They use patterns to learn paradiddles, flams and other rudiments. Their usage can also help in developing a vocabulary for jazz improvisation, as Rusty shows in this video:

Below are the first two patterns from the video. Make sure to practice these in all keys and modes!

Pattern #1:

Four measures of musical annotation.

Pattern #2:

Four measures of musical annotation.

 

Rusty Burge is Professor of Percussion at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and is also a member of Percussion Group Cincinnati, with whom he has performed extensively throughout North America, Europe and Asia. He was formerly principal percussionist with the West Virginia Symphony and plays extra with the Cincinnati Symphony. Burge received his undergraduate degree from the Eastman School of Music and a master’s degree from CCM, where he teaches percussion and jazz vibraphone in addition to directing the CCM Steel band. He has performed with Peter Erskine, Ted Nash, Rich Perry, Dave Liebman, Rufus Reid, Steve Allee, Roland Vazquez and Michael Spiro. His new book, Method for Vibraphone, will be released this coming fall.

Click here for Part 1 in this series: Pedaling Technique and Grips.

Click here for Part 3 in this series: Basic Jazz Voicings.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha vibraphones.

Ripples in water emanating from the center.

Catch A Wave

Written by Howard Massey on . Posted in Music. 2 Comments on Catch A Wave

With summer fast approaching, this seems like an appropriate time to take a short break from exploring the many facets of music and focus instead on a more basic topic: sound itself.

So what is sound, anyway? Some people are surprised to learn that it’s actually two things — a physical phenomenon and a perceptual one, as the Oxford dictionary definition states:

Sound (noun): Vibrations that travel through the air or another medium and can be heard when they reach a person’s or animal’s ear.

The physical component is the vibration, and the perceptual component is how we hear the sound. The former is what we’ll be discussing here, and it is, of course, factually objective — when a vibration occurs, it occurs, no ifs, ands or buts. On the other hand, the latter is completely subjective. In other words, if your parents hear a sound that is loud and jarring, you may well perceive that same sound as being of only moderate volume and quite pleasing. This has been the basis of generational wars since time immemorial (I can distinctly remember my mother sniffily calling The Beatles’ music “noise” — as misguided a pronouncement as her contention that they would “never last”) and I talk more about that in this posting.

Musical Sound

The primal source of every sound occurs when a physical object is moved or otherwise disturbed from its resting state. In the case of musical sounds, that object might be a human vocal cord or a reed pulsating because a column of air is pushing by it, or it might be a skin or a string being struck or plucked.

Circular ripple in water.

In response, the gaseous or liquid molecules around the object (i.e., air or water) are shifted from their resting state, which in turn shifts the molecules around those molecules, back and forth in a fairly regular pattern. The resulting vibration causes a sound wave to be produced. This is easily observed by dropping a pebble into a pond. Ripples fan out from the central source of the disturbance, spreading far and wide until they run out of energy.

Of course, this is a highly simplified explanation of what’s actually going on. For one thing, all sounds actually consist of a series of interlocked vibrations called overtones and undertones — these are what give sounds their distinct tonal character, or timbre. In addition, musical sounds are characterized by the presence of an easily detectable predominant frequency (called the fundamental frequency), which gives it a distinctive pitch, and the overtones and undertones tend to be whole number multiples (or divisions) of that pitch. I talked about this at some length in my previous blog posting The Numbers Game.

Recorded Sound

Up until the end of the 19th century, you had to physically be within earshot of a sound in order to hear it. But by the late 1800s, thanks to the advent of recorded sound (developed by Thomas Edison, along with several other less famous innovators), millions could enjoy a concert — or at least a scratchy rendition of it — not just the few hundred people crowded into the theater or auditorium where it was performed.

As the delivery medium for recorded sound evolved from the vinyl record to magnetic tape to digital files, the processes required to get that initial vibration from its source to its final destination (our ears) have become increasingly convoluted. Devices such as the recording lathe, microphone, loudspeakers and recording/playback heads had to be invented in order to convert sound energy to electrical and magnetic energy.

Things got even more complicated with the advent of digital recording in the 1970s — the delivery medium of choice to this very day. As shown in the illustration below, the original movement of air is converted by a microphone to an equivalent (i.e., analog) electrical signal and then sent to an electronic component called an analog-to-digital converter (A/D for short), which produces a series of equivalent ones and zeroes (digits). These can then be further processed digitally before getting stored to hard drive, flash drive, or other computer medium. From there (following any additional digital signal processing [DSP] you want to apply), the stream of digits is fed to a digital-to-analog converter (D/A for short), which converts it back to — you guessed it — an analog electrical signal, which is then routed to a loudspeaker, which converts it back to physical vibrations of air that we finally perceive as a sound.

Diagram of transition from analog wave to digital and back to analog.

Whew! It’s amazing that what we end up hearing is even vaguely similar to the original sound … but it can actually be remarkably close. And, of course, one of the cool byproducts of digital recording is that it allows us to not only hear the sound with our ears but view the sound with our eyes. For example, here’s a wavefile of the Beach Boys singing “Catch a Wave” (not coincidentally, the title of one of their early hits):

Sound wave.

 

Can you make out the three syllables? (“Hard” consonants like “k” and “tch” cause increased density in the waveform, so you should find the first one easily, but “a” and “wave” kind of flow into one another, so it’s a bit trickier.) This kind of visual feedback makes it easy to edit and “comp” performances together — something that was difficult to do on magnetic tape (since physical cutting with a razor blade or scissors was required) and completely impossible when recording direct to vinyl disk.

So if a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound? Well, it definitely makes a vibration (but only because it falls in a forest; if it fell in outer space, it wouldn’t even do that), but whether or not it actually makes a sound is open to debate — and that’s something I talk more about in this posting.

 

Check out Howard’s other postings.

Shot of someone's lower legs in twills and boots using the effects pedals for guitar.

Electric Strings: The Power of Plugging In

Written by Martha Mooke on . Posted in Artists, Electric Strings, Strings Artists.

Many years ago I was presenting a workshop entitled “The Power of Strings: Plugging In!” at a statewide music educators conference. The participants were all music teachers who had never played electric string instruments but were either planning to purchase some for their schools, were simply curious … or, in one case, outright skeptical.

I started off by displaying the chart below and described the setup I’d brought with me, which consisted of my 5-string electric Yamaha violin, plugged into several effects pedals, similar to those used by electric guitarists. I demonstrated plugging in to both a single instrument amp as well as going through a complete PA system with two speakers.

Diagram on The Power of Plugging in.

Then I played some of my original music (I started out as an improviser and eventually became a composer so I would have something to play on my electric viola!) while pointing out the different effects and techniques I use to achieve the sounds that make it seem like I have a whole ensemble playing with me.

Here’s some background, before I get to the fun part of the story:

There are many kinds of pedals, some of which have a single effect. Digital delay, for example, creates a delayed playback of your original note — kind of like an echo, only you can adjust the length and number of repeats. Reverb, which changes the ambience (from playing in your living room, for example, to playing in Carnegie Hall) is another common effect, as is a pitch shifter (which adds harmonies, changes octaves, etc.). Other effects, like flange, wah or chorus add a modified signal to the original, resulting in different textures; allowing you to do things like creating a “wah-wah” effect similar to a trumpet player using a mute to cover and uncover the bell.

What kind of effects you use and how you use them are a matter of personal (and practical) preference. For my composing and performing, I usually use several effects at the same time. For that reason, I employ what are called “multi-effects” pedals that allow me to control the different settings (parameters) of multiple effects. I also use a “looper” pedal that allows me to record a phrase or idea on the spot, play it back, add layers on top of the original “loop” and then continue playing over the loop and layers.

For those just starting out, I suggest getting a couple of single effect pedals. Plug your instrument into one, then into the other, then into an amp (this is called a signal chain). Experiment with the sounds, create rhythms, make up strange or exotic melodies and harmonies. Then switch the order of the pedals and see (or, more accurately, hear) what happens!

Okay, back to my story:

During my presentation, I demonstrated my setup using several electric instruments (including 4- and 5-string electric violins — the latter being my personal favorite), and explained how I use the different pedals to change sounds (adding delays, reverb, pitch, etc.) and to create rhythms, textures, harmonies and loops.

Some of the teachers asked questions such as: “What repertoire can the students play with this kind of setup?” Well, try playing Bach or Mozart through a distortion pedal with some digital delay and see what happens! In fact, any kind of music can be played through pedals. It’s also a great opportunity for the students to make things up (i.e., improvise) and create their own original music.

Towards the end of the workshop, I set up “playstations” in each corner of the room where the teachers could plug in (there were electric violins, a viola and a cello) and try it out for themselves. Each station had one effects pedal, and headphones were plugged into an amp or mixer, which kept the overall sound level down and also gave the players the freedom to try different things out without feeling self-conscious.

All but one of the teachers eagerly headed for a “playstation.” When I asked the lone holdout why she didn’t even want to try it out, she said she wasn’t “buying it,” that she didn’t see any purpose. After assuring her that she would not go deaf (tip: always start with the volume down on headphones or speakers and gradually turn up the knob) and that no one would know whether she stepped on a pedal or just played a Bach cello suite without any effects, she went and sat down and started playing. A minute or two later I went to check on her and saw that she had a big smile on her face as she swayed and tapped her feet. I don’t know which effect(s) she tried, but I’m pretty sure after that, she “bought it”!

Photo credit: Tina Fineberg
The box fronts lined up so you can read the covers for the three Steinberg Cubase products - Cubase Pro 9.5; Cubase Artist 9.5; and, Cubase Elements 9.5.

Steinberg Videos, Part 3: How to Get Started in Cubase AI and LE

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Recording.

Offering pristine sound quality, intuitive handling and a wide range of advanced tools for complete music production, Steinberg Cubase is one of the most popular digital audio workstations out there. In this series of videos, we’ll show you exactly why!

Here, host Andrew Shravemade covers basic Cubase concepts, including making sure you know where your files are stored and where to go whenever you need a helping hand. He also shows you how to add MIDI, VST Instrument and Audio tracks as well as demonstrating how to record a track and walking you through some of the editors. You’ll also learn how to instantly import loops and samples into your project and let Cubase do all the hard work in terms of time-stretching loops so that they fit snugly into your project tempo:

Click here for Part 1: “How to Do Your First Recording in Cubase”

Click here for Part 2: “How to Do Editing in Cubase”

 

Click here to access the full YouTube Cubase AI/LE Music Production Essentials playlist.

Click here to find out more about Cubase AI.

Click here to find out more about Cubase LE.

Electronic keyboard.

Mastering AI Fingered Mode

Written by Gabriel Aldort on . Posted in Workstations.

There are a total of seven fingering modes offered by Genos, but the deepest and most flexible of these is called “AI Fingered.” This mode is awesome for not only playing live, but for songwriting as well, and once you get comfortable with it you’ll be churning out rich, thick chords using only a couple of fingers.

To understand how it works, we must first understand what Style playing is. The “Styles” in Genos are a mixture of accompaniment and rhythmic backing patterns from a variety of different musical genres (i.e. pop, jazz, country, etc.). The Genos Style Engine analyzes your fingering of chords in a designated keyboard range (usually, but not limited to the left hand) to generate backing tracks that recreate the sound of a full band or orchestra. So if you play a C Major triad, for example, the band plays in C; switch to an F Major triad and the band plays in F.

Let’s start by working with a Pop Style called Songwriter Ballad. To select this style, you can either use the touch screen or the physical STYLE Button to enter the Style section:

A finger pressing a button marked "Style".

Next, select the “Songwriter Ballad” Style, then hit the EXIT button:

Menu on a screen.
A finger presing "exit" button.

You’ll now want to change the Fingering mode to AI Fingered, which resides in the “Split and Fingering” menu. Press the Menu Button, then select Split & Fingering:

A finger pressing the menu button.
Finger pressing "Split and Fingering" on a screen.

If it isn’t already selected, change the Fingering mode to AI Fingered on page 2/2 and then press CLOSE:

Menu on screen.

Important: Note where the split point is, as this will determine where Genos will track the chords you play in the left hand. If necessary, the range can be easily changed in this screen:

Menu on screen.

When you’re satisfied with the split point, press the EXIT button twice to return to the Main Display.

The last step before we start playing is to make sure the ACMP (Auto-Accompaniment) button is lit. (It’s located just above and to the right of the joystick.) This is important because if the button is not lit, you will only hear the Drums and Percussion of a Style and no chord tracking will take place:

Finger pressing button marked "ACMP".

Now start the Style playing back by pressing the Style START/STOP button (the button on the far right of the Style Control Section):

Finger pressing button on electronic keyboard panel.

One of the coolest features of AI Fingered mode is the ability to play simple three-note triad chords using only two fingers; it also lets you play more complex jazz chords using only three fingers. For example, just playing C and E results in a C Major chord:

Two fingers playing electronic keyboard with lit up buttons on panel above.

Or you can play the full C Major triad of C, E, G:

Hand playing electronic keyboard with buttons lit up on panel above.

The right side of the Style field in the Main Display will always show you in real time what chords are being generated:

Screen displaying "Songwriter Ballad".

Next, let’s try generating a C minor chord using only two fingers, C and E♭:

Hand playing an electronic keyboard with panel buttons lit up above.

Now this is where things get interesting and a little deeper. If I want to play a C Major 7 chord, instead of using four fingers, (as I would on a piano), I can play it with only two. Play C and the B above it and you’ll hear the band is now playing C Major 7. (This can also be seen in the Style field as well.)

Hand playing electronic keyboard with buttons on panel above lit.

How about a bluesy chord like a C7? Once again, this is a four note chord when played on a piano, but on the Genos it can be played with only two fingers — C and B♭:

Hand playing electronic keyboard with buttons on panel lit above.

Let’s go even deeper and play a C7 9 Chord. The chord tracking within AI Fingered mode is so advanced, you don’t even have to play the root of this chord for it to be recognized — just as a pianist playing with a bass player would do. So if you play E, B♭ and D (essentially the 3rd, 7th and the 9th), the accompaniment is playing a C7 9 chord:

Hand playing electronic keyboard with buttons on panel above lit.

To play a Cm7 9, simply hold down B♭, D and E♭, and presto, you’ll hear this juicy and delicious jazz chord:

Hand playing electronic keyboard with some of the buttons on panel above lit.

The last chord we’ll demonstrate is what’s affectionately referred to as a “slash” (or compound) chord. This is a chord with its bass note (inversion) indicated by the addition of a slash and the letter of the bass note after the root note letter. To change any chord to a “slash”/ compound chord in AI Fingered mode, simply play the note a whole step below the root. For example, to play a C/Bb chord, simply hold down the root (C) and play the Bb a whole step below it:

Hands playing electronic keyboard with some of buttons on panel above lit.

This is shown in the Style Field as follows:

Screen showing "Songwriter Ballad".

Keep in mind that all the chords demonstrated here in the key of C can be easily recreated in any key. The notes may change, but the formula always stays the same.

As always, the key to deepening your understanding of AI Fingered mode is to simply experiment: Play different two- or three-note combinations and listen to the chords that result. Have fun!

 

Click here for more information about Genos.

Home Theater on a Budget, Part 2: Intermediate System

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in TV & Movies.

In the first article in this four-part series, we learned that creating the perfect home theater experience on a limited budget is an entirely realistic goal. In this installment, we’re going to level up.

Here are some tools to assemble a quality intermediate level home entertainment system at an affordable price.

AV RECEIVER

Front face of an AV receiver with a wireless remote on right and the antenna on left.
RX-V485 AV receiver.

Because it is the centerpiece of every home theater system, an AV receiver needs to handle the bulk of your entertainment needs. The Yamaha RX-V485 provides an exciting home theater experience with powerful 5.1-channel surround sound, complete with Zone B functionality that lets you listen to 3.1 channels in your Main Zone while sending stereo sound to two speakers in Zone B.

MAIN SPEAKERS

Two stereo speakers next to each other - one with the filter cover on; the other with the speaker and subwoofer exposed.
NS-333 bookshelf speakers.

Designed specifically for home theater applications, the Yamaha NS-333 bookshelf speakers are an ideal match with the RX-V485. They allow you to properly implement its CINEMA DSP 3D feature and capture all the subtleties of surround sound in all of your favorite content.

CENTER CHANNEL SPEAKER

Horizontal speaker.
Yamaha NS-C444

The main purpose of a center channel speaker is to boost dialogue, leaving the other speakers to capture background noise, explosions, music and other elements occurring on screen. A good choice here is the Yamaha NS-C444 which is designed to help deliver the Dialogue Level Adjustment and Dialogue Lift features in the RX-V485, allowing all dialogue to come through clearly, regardless of other sounds it may be competing with on-screen.

SUBWOOFER

Small square speaker.
Yamaha NS-SW100

A quality subwoofer is a must for any home theater setup, since it allows you to feel the low-end action such as explosions, fight scenes and car chases. The Yamaha NS-SW100 powered subwoofer delivers all that and more, with a special Twisted Flare Port that adds clear, tight bass sounds to your favorite content.

ACCESSORIES

As with any home theater system, make sure to leave room in your budget for speaker wire, HDMI cables, speaker stands and other accessories you might want to include with your system.

Now the only thing you’ll have to do as you enjoy your new home theater system is to decide where to rest your feet!

Part 3 of our “Home Theater on a Budget” series, covering advanced systems, can be found here.

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha AV products.

Four young musicians practicing their saxophones in a band room.

Five Saxophone Facts You May Not Know

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Woodwinds. 5 Comments on Five Saxophone Facts You May Not Know

Here are five cool facts that even many sax players don’t know about their instrument.

1. It Has a Unique History

The saxophone is the only instrument in wide use today that was invented by a single individual — a musical instrument designer named Adolphe Sax, hence the name saxophone.

Sax was born in Belgium in 1814. He was a versatile musician who could play many wind instruments and he set out to create one that would not only embody the soloistic and lyrical nature of a woodwind but also be better heard among brass instruments. In 1846, his invention, the saxophone, was patented in Paris.

Fun Fact: Though a creative and enthusiastic person, Sax was not the luckiest child. Numerous accidents during his youth almost ended his life! These include falling from a third story window, being burned from a gunpowder accident, swallowing a pin, nearly drowning, and being poisoned three times.

2. There Once Were Fourteen Different Saxophones

Adolphe Sax thought the saxophone would be capable of fitting in with a variety of ensembles, and so he made them in a range of sizes; from the sopranino in the high range to the contrabass in the low range. (He also invented the saxhorn, a brass instrument with valves similar to today’s flugelhorn and alto horn.)

However, of the fourteen different types Adolphe invented, there are only four types in widespread use today. In pitch order they are, from high to low, the B♭ soprano, E♭ alto, B♭ tenor and E♭ baritone. Each of these saxophones has a range that spans two and a half octaves.Graphic representation of the relative sizes of saxophones.

3. It’s the Only Brass Woodwind

From its earliest days, the saxophone was always made of brass. However, because it generates sound with a single reed, it is classified as a woodwind. The only other metallic woodwind is the flute, which was made entirely of wood at first — something that’s sometimes seen even today.

4. It’s All About Bringing Balance

Because the saxophone was designed to bridge the gap between brass and woodwinds, it plays an important role in creating tonal balance. Not only does it serve to blend the divergent tones of these two groups, but it can also help support both high and low woodwinds. Due to this degree of versatility, it plays an important role as a middle voice in a large ensemble.

5. It Has a Dynamic Personality

The dynamic range of the saxophone is the widest of all the woodwinds. Because it has a conical bore and not a cylindrical one (in other words, its tube becomes progressively narrower toward one end, as opposed to a clarinet, where the diameter of the tube remains relatively constant), the saxophone can produce a sound that is surprisingly similar to the human voice. This gives it a wide range of emotional expression and makes it ideal as a solo instrument, so it should come as no surprise that the saxophone features prominently in the history of jazz music. Less well known is the fact that the sax often plays an important role in classical music too (particularly in the works of French composers), and is used in a wide range of instrumental groupings, including chamber groups, orchestra, and wind ensembles.

Bonus Question: What’s the Difference Between Jazz and Classical Saxophones?

Though the principles of the instrument are the same, the qualities of a saxophone can be different in jazz as compared to classical music. With jazz, the ideal saxophone allows players tremendous freedom of expression, and so they tend to prefer an instrument with a larger bore (that is, one with a more dramatic taper). The raspy tone and cutting power of a jazz saxophone contributes to the texture of the music and helps the instrument stand out during soloing.

In contrast, classical saxophonists must perform with many other instruments in the orchestra, and so they tend to prefer an instrument with a clean, refined tone and crisp articulation. Generally, classical players prefer a more gradual taper as it gives more precise control over pitch and dynamics.

However, the differences between a “Jazz” and a “Classical” saxophone are subject to opinion. There are numerous examples of jazz saxophonists using a “Classical” instrument and vice versa. The only way to know which works best for you is to try both.

Two saxophones side by side.

The mouthpieces are even more different. A jazz saxophone mouthpiece is relatively wide, with thin walls and a large chamber that gives the player tonal flexibility. In contrast, a classical saxophone mouthpiece is designed with a more narrow space to provide greater control. However, one mouthpiece can be suitable for multiple genres. For example, some jazz soprano saxophonists prefer a classical mouthpiece for its clean tone. Changing the mouthpiece will have a drastic effect on how the instrument plays. Everything from the tone, sound quality, pitch, and articulation will be different. The cork on the end of a saxophone neck allows a variety of mouthpieces to be attached so that players can change them depending on the sound they wish to achieve.

 

This posting is adapted from the Yamaha Musical Instrument Guide.

For more information about Yamaha saxophones, click here.

Pedalboard for guitar or bass with multiple rows of controls.

Line 6® Videos, Part 2: Helix® LT

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Electric Guitars.

In this video, Paul Hindmarsh takes you on a tour of the Line 6® Helix LT® guitar processor. Featuring the same powerful dual DSP processing and award-winning HX Modeling technology found in the flagship Helix Floor and Helix Rack guitar processors, its streamlined design and hardware configuration make it a less expensive alternative for budget-conscious guitarists who still want to access the power of Helix.

Ready to check out some of the great Helix sounds? Click these links:

Helix Sound Samples: Electric and Bass Guitar – Part 1
Helix Sound Samples: Electric and Bass Guitar – Part 2
Helix Sound Samples: Electric and Bass Guitar – Part 3
Helix Sound Samples: Electric Guitar – Part 4
Helix Sound Samples: Electric Guitar – Part 5
Helix Sound Samples: Bass Guitar – Part 6

Click here for Part 1: “HX Effects”

Click here to find out more about Helix LT.

Metronome in motion.

Four Metronome Exercises for Developing Timing Skills

Written by Dr. Dave Gerhart on . Posted in Piano How-to.

Musicians are supposed to have good timing. But do you just practice with your metronome or do you interact with it during your practice sessions?

Correctly used, a metronome should act as an accompaniment partner. In this article, I’ll offer four exercises to help improve your timing while using a metronome.

There are many different kinds of metronomes and they come in all shapes and sizes, including classic pendulum and digital models; many musicians use an app on their phone for that purpose. It really doesn’t matter what kind of metronome you own. You just need to make sure you have one and that you use it regularly.

A Metronome Is Not Just Something To Listen To

Most people use the metronome only as a passive device — in other words, something to listen to — and it’s true that most musicians need to be able to play along with one, especially in studio settings when you are playing along to a click track. But if you have difficulties playing in time when there isn’t a metronome or click track accompanying you, the reason may be that you have only developed your listening skills, not your timing skills.

Strategies for Developing Timing

In order to effectively develop timing skills, you need to add space between metronome clicks. Here are four strategies for doing so in conjunction with this downloadable exercise sheet.  As you continue to work on your timing, be sure you practice this worksheet at different tempos:

1)      Add space between beats

 – Instead of having 4 clicks in a 4/4 measure, put your metronome on half notes and have two clicks per measure.

 – Set the click to just the downbeat of the measure.

 – Set the click to the downbeat of every other measure or every 4 measures.

2)      Moveable pulse

 – If you are using half notes as your pulse, practice with the half notes on 1 and 3 as well as 2 and 4.

 –  If you have one click per measure, move the click to start on beat 2 of the measure instead of the downbeat.

 – Put the metronome on quarter notes, but when you start your phrase, think of the click as being on the “ands” of the beat instead of the downbeats.

3)      Create subtractive loops or patterns

 – Program a loop into a sequencer program (such as GarageBand or Cubase, etc.) and create a 4-bar loop. On the fourth bar, instead of having a measure of groove, leave it blank.

 – Next, practice with two bars of groove and then two bars of space.

4)      Put space between your metronome and your instrument

– Put the metronome on the other side of the room with a recording device. The metronome should be loud enough so that you can hear it when you are not playing. Once you start playing, you should only be able to hear yourself and not the metronome. Play back the performance on your recording device and listen to how well you performed with the metronome. I have found this approach especially beneficial when practicing excerpts.

Once you start thinking about your metronome as an accompaniment partner instead of always being a dictator (“you will always play on every beat with me”), your timing skills will begin to blossom!

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha classic pendulum metronomes.

Click here for more information about the Yamaha ME-55BK clip-on digital metronome.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Dr. Travis J. Cross

Written by Travis J. Cross on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

From Another Angle

The first time I ever participated in a conducting workshop, the clinician tried to get me to conduct the shape of a multi-bar phrase, rather than every single beat and note along the way.

The teacher was outstanding, but I just couldn’t get it — either I wasn’t yet ready as a musician and conductor, or the concept wasn’t explained in a way that resonated.

The next summer, I observed a colleague conduct the same piece at a different workshop. A different clinician demonstrated the same concept, and I instantly realized what the other person had been teaching me the previous year.

Through those two experiences, I first understood the dual value of different approaches to addressing the same issue and the passage of time — because we all learn in our own way, and we are never the same student (or teacher) when we step on the podium again.


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Richard Floyd

Written by Richard Floyd on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

It’s All About the Music

I will never forget, as a young director, walking into an all-state band rehearsal.

My intent was to pick up a few rehearsal pointers. To my surprise, what I observed transcended all that I thought rehearsals were about.

Simply correcting notes, rhythms, balance, tuning and so on were not the priority. Certainly the conductor was addressing those elements of craft as necessary but always in the context of serving and enriching the music.

In simplest terms the rehearsal was about the art of making music as opposed to the craft of perfecting the “notes on the page.”

That experience totally recalibrated my vision for what my role must be as an educator and conductor. It was a life lesson I have never forgotten and, to this day, is core to what I hope to achieve each time I step on the podium.


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Tips from Trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

Written by Savy Leiser on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

In the blog post, The Many Faces of Trumpeter Allen Vizzutti, involving family, band directors and other musicians has been key to Vizzutti’s career and success.

His experience has shown that making connections are crucial for musical success. Here are some of Vizzutti’s top tips for educators:

1. Build A Strong Network. As Vizzutti was getting his foot in the door as a musician, the majority of his early jobs came through word-of-mouth recommendations from his teachers, professors and classmates. Band directors can help students build their own networks by connecting them with music opportunities outside of the school, whether at camps, community ensembles or on tours.

2. Find A Balance. From his experiences teaching clinics and master classes, Vizzutti has found that the best way to engage students is by introducing them to classical and jazz, in addition to popular music. Vizzutti also recommends that ensembles practice sight-reading skills.

3. Seize Opportunities. When Vizzutti was in high school, his band director encouraged him to connect with Doc Severinsen, who was an invaluable mentor throughout his entire career. Seek out opportunities to have professional musicians perform or conduct a master class for your students.

4. Encourage Music In The Family. Vizzutti’s father was his biggest influence growing up. Similarly, Vizzutti’s encouragement helped his daughter pursue music professionally. As an educator, you can advise parents to be involved in their children’s musical development.

Photos by Rob Shanahan for Yamaha Corporation of America


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Allen Vizzutti

The Many Faces of Trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

Written by Savy Leiser on . Posted in Educator Profiles.

As a teenager in Missoula, Montana, Allen Vizzutti received the rare opportunity to befriend one of his idols.

Doc Severinsen, trumpet player and bandleader for NBC’s “The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson,” gave a guest performance at Vizzutti’s high school. With the encouragement of his band director, Vizzutti played a solo for Severinsen, who eventually became one of his most important mentors.

Since then, Vizzutti’s career has grown in depth and breadth. He has appeared throughout the world as a soloist and guest performer with symphonies, military groups and renowned artists ranging from Chick Corea to Chuck Mangione to Woody Herman. Vizzutti has played for Hollywood movie soundtracks and conducted clinics throughout the United States, Europe and Asia. He has recorded both classical and jazz standards as well as his own tunes. He also composes pieces for other musicians to perform.

Vizzutti sees music as a language that transcends age. “Musicians young and old have the power to make somebody feel good by playing something beautiful,” he says. “That’s a powerful tool.”

Music in the Family

Like many musicians, when Vizzutti picked up the trumpet at age 7, he started taking private lessons. He had the added benefit of living with his teacher — his father, who also owned the local music store.

His father’s guidance included regular tips to improve technique, which evolved into lifelong performance habits. “Dad instructed me to practice without using the right-hand finger hook,” Vizzutti says. “To this day, my awareness of mouthpiece-on-embouchure pressure is acute and has helped me immensely.”

Through weekly lessons and quick tips from his father, Vizzutti also experienced an overall joy that comes from music. “We had a lot of fun playing duets,” he says.

During his clinics, master classes and residencies, Vizzutti now stresses an early appreciation for all types of music, especially classical and jazz. He recommends that parents and educators encourage students to seek out different genres of music. “They will not be taking anything away from their favorite pop and rock music by listening to classical and jazz, and they will become more sophisticated musicians as a result,” Vizzutti says.

Vizzutti and his wife, Laura, a professional pianist, applied these same concepts when instructing their own three children. With consistent musical guidance at home, all of them continued with music into adulthood. Their daughter, Gabriella, teaches percussion at the St. George’s British International School in Rome and plays violin in community orchestras.

Though the Vizzuttis occasionally perform together, they have also maintained separate solo careers.

Crucial Connections

Allen Vizzutti holding trumpet

Vizzutti discovered the importance of surrounding himself with topnotch musicians during high school when his parents sent him to the summer program at Michigan’s Interlochen Center for the Arts. Around this time was also when Vizzutti met Severinsen. “His power and endurance were a revelation to me,” Vizzutti says. “He did suggest I play more aggressively, bang the valves down hard and practice Herbert L. Clarke’s ‘Technical Studies’ every day, which I have done.”

Meeting Severinsen showed Vizzutti the importance of guest musicians in schools. “Anecdotes about the pro music business are of interest to most students,” Vizzutti says. “Guest artists are a powerful source for excitement and inspiration.”

Additionally, while Vizzutti was still in high school, his band director helped him find performance opportunities beyond school and community ensembles. Before leaving for college, Vizzutti joined his director on a performance trip to the United Kingdom.

While at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, Vizzutti earned a gig performing with the Greater Bridgeport (Connecticut) Symphony after a professor’s recommendation.

Vizzutti values all of this early exposure and recommends that educators help their students find similar types of experiences.

Vizzutti advises directors to “schedule as many concerts as [they] can manage” within their own schools. “Students enjoy playing concerts,” Vizzutti says, so these performances can keep them continually engaged.

In the Studio

Because Vizzutti built a strong network as a student, he immediately found work upon moving to Los Angeles after college. Vizzutti worked on television and movie scores, including recordings for “Starsky & Hutch,” “Star Trek: The Motion Picture” and “Back to the Future.” These jobs came mostly from word-of-mouth recommendations. “Your network has to work well enough that, out of the blue, you’ll get the first call,” he says.

To secure high-profile jobs like these, musicians must first earn a reputation for being reliable and easy to work with, then always be at the top of their game when performing. Band directors can help their students develop a strong work ethic and good attitude. “The important aspect is how well do you get along with everybody?” Vizzutti says. “Is it fun to have you?”

When performing for a movie soundtrack, a musician should expect the unexpected and always be ready to sight-read. According to Vizzutti, educators should emphasize sight-reading as often as possible with their students. “I’m a fan of programs that move through more music in terms of sight-reading,” he says.

Now living near Seattle, where a lot of video games are produced, Vizzutti often records for the video game industry.

New Methods

Along the way in his performance and clinic work, Vizzutti noticed that a lot of trumpet method books were lacking more difficult keys and more contemporary music, so he decided to develop two new methods of his own.

“The Allen Vizzutti Trumpet Method” (books 1, 2 and 3) has many duets and etudes while his “New Concepts for Trumpet” focuses on breaking down specific techniques like double tonguing. Vizzutti describes “New Concepts” as a book that would help young players since its difficulty ramps up gradually and “Trumpet Method” as great books for players who want a challenge.

Overall, Vizzutti recommends that band directors work with brass students on focusing their airflow. “Most kids don’t use steady, smooth airflow, and that is what needs to happen,” he says. “Blow with lips close together, not pursed or tight; don’t buzz. High notes are a result of fast air moving through a small aperture, not blowing hard. Have students practice some things very softly to learn aperture control by feel.”

Fun and Fundamentals

Allen Vizzutti playing trumpet

Vizzutti’s philosophy to always perform at your best has helped him not just as a performer but also as a clinician. Regardless of location, age group or even audience size, Vizzutti makes sure to always give a top performance. “I play the same way for five people or 5,000 people,” he says. “Sometimes I walk into a gymnasium, and the whole school’s there, or it might be five trumpet players in a room.”

He advises educators to add some pizzazz to their lessons to keep students engaged. “I empathize with the fun factor,” he says. “When I was younger, a more military style was normal. Now, programs are very loose and fun but productive.”

To achieve a fun-yet-productive environment, Vizzutti suggests that educators balance classical and popular music as well as vary the amount of time spent on each piece. “I mix moving through literature quickly and working on important pieces over longer periods,” Vizzutti says.

To keep music education going strong, Vizzutti suggests that school programs get exposure in as many ways as possible both inside and outside of their own buildings. “I want to encourage music educators to keep up the fight in terms of how difficult it might be to find funding,” he says. “Play in the cafeteria for 10 minutes at lunch, do public mall playing, go to the park. Get in front of the public and make sure they know what’s going on in your program. That support can remind administrators these programs are vital.”

Whether he’s conducting a master class or swapping tips with a music teacher, Vizzutti focuses on ensuring that students understand music’s lifelong benefits. “My philosophy is to remind them to keep music in their lives as long as possible,” he says.

Photos by Rob Shanahan for Yamaha Corporation of America


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Explore Nontraditional Music Programs

Written by Marcia Neel on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

Like most secondary music educators, your teaching credential probably allows you to teach K-12 music — anything from elementary classroom music to high school band.

We each have our specialties, but many secondary instrumental educators have found success and great personal satisfaction by learning about and providing more comprehensive and inclusive music-making opportunities.

Three Ways to Engage Students

Larry Livingston, chair of the conducting department at the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music, speaks fervently about his trio of recommendations that allow for the awakening, engaging and challenging of even more students in our incredible, life-changing art form.

1. Broaden the base

2. Teach so that students will be able to continue to enjoy music-making without us

3. Acknowledge and honor ALL music

Be More Comprehensive

In serving our school populations most efficiently, Livingston recommends considering the following when developing a more comprehensive music program.

1. Do our programs reflect our demographic?

2. Are we maximizing the kids and music relationship?

3. Is it OK to demythologize classical music?

The traditional approach to school-based, music-making requires students who want to be musicians to play a traditional instrument in a traditional ensemble. But this may not be as powerful as a new school of thought—give students the opportunity to explore the power of music in their lives.

The music education experience should instill students with passion and provide them with the power for music-making that will encourage them to continue their experiences well after they leave our ensembles–no matter what the genre.

Mariachi Success

One example that addresses all of the above is evidenced by the growing popularity of mariachi programs. Schools with a large Latino demographic have found great success in engaging students, parents and local communities by implementing standards-based, traditional mariachi programs. Students are not only participating in school-based mariachi programs, but they have also begun to form their own ensembles outside of the school day within the community. Monaco Middle School in Las Vegas, has a successful program that serves almost 600 students.

More Success Stories


closeup of someone playing he ukulele

Other examples of successful programs that are gaining traction by introducing more students to the joy of music-making are listed below.

• World Drumming at North Attleborough (Massachusetts) High School

• Taiko Drumming at Crespi Carmelite (California) High School

• Music Technology at Huntington Beach (California) High School

• Hip Hop at Clark Street (Wisconsin) Community School

• Ukulele with the Langley Ukulele Association in British Columbia

Enrollment is overflowing in classes like those listed above. Through these types of experiences, even more students are discovering the life-fulfilling joy that music-making provides — no matter the genre.


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Phase Out Phasing Problems

Written by Elaine Morgan Cutting on . Posted in Teaching Tips.

Any elementary-level science class teaches students that sound and light travel at different speeds; in the context of marching band, this abstract concept becomes a real challenge.

Directors may be faced with a frustrating mystery when the ensemble seems to be doing everything perfectly in the band room, yet it sounds so off on the field. The problem simply boils down to that science lesson.

So how do students and conductors overcome the basic physics of time and space in order to produce a flawless, perfectly synchronized show across the whole field? Try these tips from leading marching instructors.

Listen or Watch?

The most important factor is to give students clear and precise instruction on when to listen and when to watch.

“That really is the major key — whether you watch or listen,” says Greg Bimm, who has been director of bands at Marian Catholic High School in Chicago Heights, Illinois, for 40 years. “In every circumstance, the acoustics are a little bit different. It depends on how the music is scored, where the pulse comes from; it depends on what people are playing immediately before.”

Setting a few broad guidelines based on the musicians’ positions on the field can be a good start.

“Generally, for us, a rule is if you are in front of the drum line, then it’s a listening zone,” says Daniel Berard, Yamaha Master Educator and director of bands at Fossil Ridge High School in Fort Collins, Colorado. “The farther forward you are on the field — for us it’s between the 40-yard lines and the front hash — that’s a listening zone. The farther back, we’ve designated as watching zones.”

Fossil Ridge has about 200 members and has been a consistent Colorado state marching band finalist and won the class 5A championship in 2012 and 2013.

Find the Pulse

Ask students to discover what the time feels like within the context of the music rather than relying on a downbeat.

“Developing as an ensemble all comes down to how well the ensemble develops its sense of pulse,” Berard says. “If the students aren’t always tied to a Dr. Beat [metronome] in rehearsals that does allow a little bit of independence for the students.”

For a smaller group, like the 50-student Archbishop Alter High School band in Kettering, Ohio, consider relying completely on the feel and sound. The Alter band, which has won the Mid-States Band Association A class championship every year since 2012, has done away with the visual role of a drum major entirely, instead allowing students to feel the beat of the music from set percussion points. “We use grounded percussion that we put on the field,” says Todd Tucker, director of bands. “That pulse from our percussion stays in one place. We always know this is where the pulse is and where the beat is coming from.”


Fossil Ridge High School band performing on football field

Fossil Ridge High School Band

Interpret Visual Downbeats

In those bands that do have conductors and drum majors, try different watching techniques for students in different sections. “We might tell somebody to play the downbeat when you see the ictus [or beat] is even with the conductor’s shoulder instead of their sternum,” Berard says. “It allows people who are farther back or farther out to account for that sound delay and play slightly ahead of what their peers who are close to the front or the center are playing.”

Another way is to tell students to watch the hands. “Anticipate exactly where the drum major’s hand is going to be, and you play at that instant,” Bimm says. “If we use the term ‘play on the front side of the hands’ to the end zone people and ‘play dead on the hands’ from the back 50, we never missed [the beat].”

Plan Ahead


Archbishop Alter High School band in uniform performing on football field

Archbishop Alter High School Band

Issues can also be handled before players even get on the field by keeping the spacing problem in mind while creating the drill. Look out for certain musical passages such as complex melodic tradeoffs between sections where phasing issues will stand out more. “Most of the time, it starts with really studying the musical score in conjunction with writing the drill,” Tucker says. “So we take it section by section with the score, and there’s a lot of preparation.”

However, don’t adjust the music or drill just to make things easier. Finding the right balance takes a deep knowledge of your band. “It really is an analysis,” Bimm says. “Knowing where the strong voices are going to come from and making sure I get them in the right place, so I can create as few of those problems as possible. But I try not to overcorrect. I try not to compromise the visual integrity, just so they can play together.”

Through Bimm’s leadership, the Marian Catholic band — currently with about 250 members — has been a finalist in Bands of America Grand Nationals competition every year since 1984.

Change Things Up

If something isn’t working, don’t be afraid to change the setup. “You have to be aware if something doesn’t get staged quite appropriately,” Berard says. “Have the freedom to re-orchestrate things, so that maybe the people who are more focused and featured in the drill can be more featured and focused in the music … even if it’s not quite what the original voicing might have intended.”

These changes might even mean adding aids such as microphones and speakers directly into the drill setup. “We write our music with speaker placement in mind,” Tucker says. “We do things like panning the melodies in the speakers from side to side … to ensure that the kids can hear each other and reinforce what they need to hear in certain areas of the field.”

Don’t Lose Hope

If you’re still having trouble with phasing issues, know that you’re not alone. Don’t be afraid to look for outside help. “There are some great YouTube resources from people who have really taken this to the extreme and demonstrated how this time delay really manifests itself,” Berard says.

A quick search of “marching band sound delay” will give you a plethora of great ideas.

No matter how long it takes, solving these problems is not impossible. “Be patient,” Bimm says. “Keep working at it because you will find a solution. Sometimes it’s just a keyword you say, and it strikes a chord with the kids.”

Photos © 2017 Marian Catholic High School Band, Courtesy of Matt Black and Ken Muszinski; Fossil Ridge High School Band, Submitted by Band Parents; Archbishop Alter High School Band by Tim McHenry

 

cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Develop Student Leaders

Written by Kevin Ford on . Posted in Student Leadership.

When I began teaching in 1994 at Tarpon Springs (Florida) High School, seven students attended rehearsal.

The school had one performance ensemble, and the band room only opened for one period during the curriculum day. Since then, we have grown to nearly 300 students and have 10 separate performance ensembles.

Tarpon Springs won the Bands of America Grand Nationals marching band competition in 2014, the WGI Sport of the Arts color guard championships in 2016, the National Band Association Program of Excellence Blue Ribbon Award in 2016 and top honors for its Wind Ensemble in several national festivals.

Emphasize Leadership

The collaboration among our students, parents, administrators and teachers to collectively place an emphasis on leadership and a growth-based mindset directly shaped the progress of our program. An active and empowered student leadership council made the difference in the expansion of our organization and more importantly impacted the personal development of each of our students.

In 2009 the Tarpon Springs Leadership Conservatory for the Arts (TSLCA) became an official magnet program for students throughout Pinellas County. Presently, every student at the TSLCA takes a yearlong leadership course, music theory and music composition/technology in addition to performance ensemble courses. Just recently, we added the leadership curriculum to Tarpon Springs Middle School, creating a continuous program from grades 6 to 12.

Our student leaders hold one another accountable for the way we prepare, practice and perform. Students lead, inspire, motivate and communicate with their peers. The curriculum objectives on teaching life skills enable students to attain excellence in all aspects of their lives and positively impact the lives of the people around them.

7 Habits

We target freshmen with our yearlong leadership curriculum because it pushes them to think past just today and focus on what they would like to achieve over the next four years and beyond.

We teach the following student leadership habits, adapted from Sean Covey’s “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Teens.”

• Habit 1: Be Proactive – “Take responsibility for your life.”

• Habit 2: Begin with the End in Mind – “Define your mission and your goals in life.”

• Habit 3: Put First Things First – “Prioritize, and do the most important things first.”

• Habit 4: Think Win-Win – “Have an everyone-can-win attitude.”

• Habit 5: Seek First to Understand, then to be Understood – “Listen to people sincerely.”

• Habit 6: Synergize – “Work together to achieve more.”

• Habit 7: Sharpen the Saw – “Renew yourself regularly.”

Through this course and intense self-reflection, each student experiences a paradigm shift. For instance, rather than practicing their instruments because we ask them to do so, students practice because they become self-driven toward achievement. Each student enters every rehearsal with his or her own set of goals and leaves every rehearsal with a new set of goals.

Leadership Workshops

small band from Tarpon Springs High School performing on stage Leadership lessons don’t stop after one year. At Tarpon Springs, we require student leaders and potential candidates for our leadership council to attend six spring workshop sessions taught by band staff. We meet with them after school before they can run for a leadership position including band president, overall vice president, grade-level vice presidents, drum majors, section leaders, historian, secretary, publicity and other roles.

At these workshops, we explicitly cover our standards for all leadership expectations and operational procedures. These meetings also provide a terrific opportunity for students to provide their input about the music program. This type of feedback gives them ownership to solve the challenges of the organization.

In addition, we set up one-on-one interviews with each leadership candidate. The student explains his or her expectations of the desired position. We address our wishes for that position and make recommendations to help each person become a successful leader.

Effective Communication

An effective student leadership team serves as the liaison between the directors and the other students in the organization. Our student leadership meets as a council with the directors at the beginning of each week to discuss goals, concerns and objectives. The directors receive feedback as well as delegate responsibilities.

Student leaders then initiate the necessary steps to ensure that the students in their sections are properly prepared for upcoming performances. Well before each actual event, the leaders relay to students and parents all pertinent details as well as the expectations of each individual member.

In addition, we guide our student leaders to keep the directors aware of concerns within the organization and to offer their suggestions on how to improve them. The individuals on the leadership team will not always agree, but you can assist them in learning the art of compromise and instill in them the importance of supporting one another regardless of their personal feelings.

Teamwork and Excellence

Communicate to your students that the organization can only succeed when all students are succeeding. Enable students who are excelling to help inexperienced students with their individual struggles. I assure you that this model of peer excellence will be contagious. The need to promote and foster this concept should be an educational priority for you.

Student leaders must be devoted to excellence at all times and conduct themselves with integrity in all aspects of their lives: within an academic classroom, socially at a party, on social media and in the music building.

Ultimately, providing leadership opportunities for students empowers them to take responsibility for their own excellence and inspires them to be creators, risk takers, innovators, artists and leaders who will not only make a positive difference in their own lives but also in the world.

Bottom Photo Courtesy of the Tarpon Springs Leadership Conservatory
 


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

 

Advice from Yamaha Master Educators Kevin Sedatole and Gary Lewis

Written by Kevin Sedatole and Gary Lewis on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Kevin Sedatole: Only You Can Do the Music

Early on in my college teaching career, I was trying to prioritize what aspect of teaching to focus on.

Kevin Sedatole

I remember [Professor] John Whitwell preaching to our music education students, “Only do the things that only you can do.”

What he meant was, only you can do the music — selecting, studying and teaching. You must be able to find students, parents and patrons who will be invested in your program and rely on them to do things that are not musical. This takes a lot of educating, tutoring and monitoring, but ultimately it will pay off. It allows you to spend more time with the music, ultimately making you a better teacher.

This lesson impacted on me, and it has stayed with me. I’ve watched many of my mentors do this as they deal with students, staff and colleagues. Invest in the people you work with and let them do their work, so you can do yours.

Gary Lewis: Focus on Artistic Matters

Gary Lewis

I remember hearing [famed saxophonist/composer] Bob Reynolds talking about trying to “do only the things that only you can do.” The context was focusing on the musical aspects of being a conductor/educator and finding ways to delegate as much of the administrative work of the job as possible. There are others with the skills to do much of the “administrivia” surrounding our positions, but we as music educators are the ones who are trained to deal with the musical and artistic issues. We should try to delegate as many of the non-musical tasks as possible in order to focus our energies on artistic matters.

While this advice is helpful in dealing with the “busy work” consuming us, I also aspire to a different, more musical application of the same idea. As conductor/musicians we should focus on the things that “only we can do” while on the podium too, such as interpretive matters, musical gesture, line and architecture, etc. The musicians themselves, once we provide them with the skills, are perfectly capable of taking responsibility for the ongoing pulse.

I once heard Simon Rattle tell an orchestra, “Look, I don’t have time to do my job AND yours!” As Gustav Meier often said, “Death to the beat!” Let’s empower the musicians with whom we work to take responsibility for what they can do and free ourselves to conduct the music, not the beats.



This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Marguerite Wilder

Written by Marguerite Wilder on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Remembering the Enthusiasm and Passion of a Beginner

After three weeks of beginning band, an aspiring fifth grade trombone student in my class attended an after-school band time.

Ben’s song choices utilized the playing of mostly 1st, 3rd and 4th position notes; I helped with the slide position when he performed long 6th position notes.

After playing several songs for me with great success, Ben attempted another song on the page — this one with, unfortunately, very different results. My comment was, “Oh, my goodness that was a train wreck with boats and planes involved.” He laughed and said that he knew that and would practice more. Then I pointed to yet another song in the book and asked him if he could play that one. He placed his hand over his heart and excitedly told me it was his favorite trombone song in the whole world.

Group of elementary school age children in band practice with a spotlight highlighting the female trombone player.

The song was “Hot Cross Buns.” Why was it his favorite? There were three important reasons, he explained earnestly:

1. Mom came running into his room and praised Ben when she “finally” recognized a real song;

2. Ben and Mom visited a neighbor’s home where Ben again performed his beloved “Hot Cross Buns” to great acclaim; and

3. Ben and Mom called Grandma in Minneapolis and he played her “Hot Cross Buns” over the phone. (Thank goodness Grandma was not wearing her hearing aid at the time!)

What a wonderful experience! I’m happy to report that Ben went on to perform many other “new favorite trombone songs in the whole world” during his distinguished career as my first chair trombonist for the next eight years!


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Craig Kirchhoff

Written by Craig Kirchhoff on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Technique is Secondary to the Music

In the spring of 1973, I took my high school band  to the University of Wisconsin-Madison for a clinic session with H. Robert Reynolds, then Director of Bands at the University of Wisconsin.

Forty-four years later I can still recall the repertoire that that my band — the John Marshall Junior-Senior High School Symphonic Band — performed that morning: Second Suite in F by Gustav Holst, Trauersinfonie by Richard Wagner, and American Salute.

Following our short performance and Bob’s hour-long clinic, he escorted me to lunch. I was surprised and touched to find him extremely complimentary about the band and our performance. I specifically remember him commenting upon the band’s excellent intonation, ensemble, control of articulation, dynamics, balance and technical facility.

I was feeling quite elated about Bob’s positive evaluation until he looked at me, paused for what seemed to be an eternity, and said the following: “Now that you have accomplished all of this, when are you going to start worrying about the music?”

At that moment, the earth seemed to stand still.

I can attest to the fact that it was a very long and conflicted 90-mile bus ride back to Milwaukee. That day changed my entire philosophy about teaching and band conducting. Today, that startling moment of revelation continually reminds me of the daily challenge in rehearsal to remember that technique must always be the “servant,” and music the “master.”


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Larry Gookin

Written by Larry Gookin on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Say Something

When I was 15, my high school band director, Don Lawrence, told me to “say something” when I was playing a trombone solo with the jazz band.

That simple comment has remained at the foundation of my career in music as a conductor, performer and educator.

To “say something” implies there is more to music than playing what’s on the page. A performer must discover the emotional content of the composition and interject his or her own personal feelings into the performance in order to “say something.”

There are numerous published books dealing with emotion and meaning in music and the art of expressive performance. Recently, I’ve enjoyed reading two books by David Whitwell — “The Art of Musical Conducting” and “American Music Education: The Enigma and the Solution.” Both support the belief that music is the language of emotions.

If as music educators we believe this to be true, then our selection of literature, rehearsal priorities and educational purpose will take on a unique direction, one that will make a profound difference in the lives of our students, just as it did mine when I was 15.


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Anthony Maiello

Written by Anthony Maiello on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Watch How Successful Musicians Conduct Themselves

In my 52 years as a music educator, I have had many wonderful opportunities to grow and learn about music and life.

Anthony Maiello

One of the key factors I can attribute my profession and personal growth is by being around good people who are also good musicians.

By doing this, I was able to learn much about teaching and performing music, but also about how it relates to life in both general and specific ways.

Observing prestigious successful musicians and how they conduct themselves in both musical and nonmusical settings has taught me many great “tricks of the trade.” Their influence has helped me engage others and share my passion for music with people of all ages.


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Advice from Yamaha Master Educator Daniel Berard

Written by Daniel Berard on . Posted in Master Educator Collective.

Be You

Always strive to be the best version of you, but be you.

I’ve been very fortunate to have had wonderful influences, both personally and professionally, and there was a point in my career when I thought that if I just copied those people, their words, their gestures, their mannerisms, etc., I would be successful.

However, in trying to be someone or something I thought I should be, I was missing what I brought that was unique and authentic.

The most authentic version of you can be the most influential version of you. It allows you to bring your best to your students, while showing them that you are learning and growing all the time as well. And that, to me, is where the most dynamic learning occurs.


cover of the 2017v2 issue of SupportED featuring trumpeter Allen Vizzutti

This article originally appeared in the 2017 V2 issue of Yamaha SupportED. To see more back issues, find out about Yamaha resources for music educators, or sign up to be notified when the next issue is available, click here.

Stop watch on a graphical background.

The Practicing / Jamming / Creating Trichotomy

Written by Alan Chapman on . Posted in Educator.

One of the most difficult conundrums musicians are faced with is how to use our time effectively. We all want to practice to get better. We all want to create something that inspires us and share it with others. And we all want to enjoy playing music just for the love of it.

In a world full of responsibilities and distractions, it can be difficult to find enough time to satisfy all three. I work as a full-time software developer, and I have several hobbies, including playing keyboard instruments, so I definitely struggle with this.

When I want to create new music, I often feel guilty about not practicing enough. As a result, I put off creating music for another time, but then when I sit down to practice, my focus doesn’t always last as long as I would like. That’s because I can’t keep myself from jamming and just enjoying playing the instrument. Sometimes I can’t even stop myself from constantly switching the piano sample I’m using while practicing, or changing the amounts or types of reverb, or tweaking the EQ or envelope parameters. It’s frustrating knowing that, while all this playing around can be helpful in a creative way, it’s really getting in the way of what I should be doing.

The bottom line is that it’s difficult to maintain discipline and focus on the right things …but that’s exactly what it takes. It’s no surprise then that whenever you read an interview with a great musician you’ll find they almost always speak of three things: their work ethic, their practice habits, and the amount of time they commit to their instruments.

Practice

Let’s start by talking about practice. There is no substitute for it and no getting around it. But what many people do not realize is that you can accomplish many things in 15 minutes of good practice, and almost nothing in three hours of bad practice. Bad practice occurs when no goals are set, nothing specific is identified to work on, and (importantly) when you don’t practice to a metronome or record yourself. In my experience, when you are engaged in bad practice, you tend to slip away and begin to just jam to whatever music you already know and enjoy, to play the same passages you are familiar with, and lose focus on improvement. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing … as long as you aren’t substituting it for practice.

So you should always approach practice with a plan. Here are a few tips for effective practicing:

1. Set a time limit and stick to it. It doesn’t matter if it’s 15 minutes or three hours. Your practice time is your practice time. Try setting an alarm, even if you have to set one for each separate practice activity within the overall time allotted.

2. Have goals or activities planned. For example, jazz players are often advised to learn the 2-5-1 chord progression in every key — a very worthwhile goal. In that case, you should have a practice activity dedicated to an exercise around playing that progression.

3. Practice what you don’t know. Don’t practice the parts you know because you know them, practice what you don’t know. Use a recording/playback app or device to loop and even slow down difficult passages so they become second nature.

4. Log your practice. The simple act of writing down what I did (or didn’t do) has had more impact on my commitment than any other single factor.

5. Make it a game. Practicing shouldn’t just be a challenge, it should be fun too. For example, once you can perfectly play a passage at a certain tempo ten times in a row, take the tempo up a notch, then keep doing so until you completely run out of steam.

Finally, and this is specific to keyboard players in particular, but 6. Practice playing the instrument, not the keyboard. Most keyboards and plugins have several modes, functions and settings … and they also often offer thousands of sounds to choose from. Unless you are specifically working on creating new programs or setting up your rig for live situations, you shouldn’t be distracting yourself with the many sounds and features of the keyboard or plugin. Just choose one sound that’s appropriate for the type of music you’re playing for the duration of your practice time and imagine that it is physically the only instrument in the room.

Create

Creating music is the most time-consuming activity. As a keyboard player, I usually construct recordings of multiple instruments layered into an arrangement. I use Steinberg Cubase as my primary tool, and my workflow usually begins with a very short and simple idea that I build on and keep adding to until I’m satisfied I have something to mold and polish into a finished recording. For creating sounds, my favorite go-to instrument is the Yamaha MONTAGE. I’m mostly a “preset” guy, in that I usually use the factory performances with just a few tweaks to my preferences. I do occasionally like to dive in and create new sounds as well, especially when I’m working an analog synth, or on an instrument with a very intuitive interface such as the Yamaha reface DX. But, as I said, this can sometimes be very time-consuming: I can spend hours just tweaking a few settings on one sound to get it where I want it before ever even making a melody with it. Even after making the recording, I find myself editing the MIDI data to get velocities to sound more natural, correct my terrible timing, create loops for sections, or program the things that I simply cannot play well by hand. And this is just the tip of the iceberg!

Jam

All of which leads to the central question: How does one find time for all of this? Jamming seems like the obvious first casualty. It’s fun, and it can spur your creativity, but as far as accomplishing a goal it’s usually not much more than a time bandit. My advice is: Jam when you feel like it, but schedule time to practice and to create, and honor that commitment. It’s much easier to find time for something when you don’t leave it to chance or when you get the inspiration you need to begin.

How you manage the split is up to you. If you perform live, practice will and should get the majority of your attention. If you’re regularly publishing songs to the cloud or elsewhere, then more of your time should be spent on creating. But most importantly: Keep playing music!

Row of electric guitars in their stand on a darkened stage.

Altered Tunings, Part 2

Written by Mac Randall on . Posted in Guitars How-to.

In Part 1 of this article, we looked at some popular alternatives to standard guitar tuning, including such favorites as drop D, double drop D, D-A-D-G-A-D, and a couple of open tunings (which produce the sound of a full chord without your having to put a finger on the fretboard). For each of those tunings, you have to alter the standard pitch of either one, two or three strings on your guitar.

In this article, we move on to tunings that require you to retune four, five and, finally, all six strings. We’ll start with some additional open chords, and then wander further afield into tunings that some might find a bit more odd. Again, all tunings are presented in typical pitch order, from lowest string to highest.

Retune Four Strings

E-A-C#-E-A-C# (Open A)

You’ve got to admit this tuning has a cool symmetry: the top three strings mirror the bottom three strings, only an octave higher. Although the bottom two strings stay the same as standard, the detuning of the other four strings makes the whole thing sound surprisingly low, which is probably why most players who use this tuning have a capo handy.

Bob Dylan put a capo on the 3rd fret when he used open A for his song “One Too Many Mornings,” which is referenced in the example below. If you choose to do as he did, note that what you hear will actually be in the key of C rather than A:

Five measures of musical annotation.
C-G-C-G-C-E (Open C)

What’s the difference between tuning your guitar this way and playing in open A capoed up to the 3rd fret (as in the previous example)? You don’t have the same cross-string symmetry as before, but you do get a high E, which adds brightness to the guitar’s tone, and a low C, which balances out that brightness with extra heft. This is a particularly nice tuning for slide playing, and it also responds well when you throw in a little dissonance, as Jimmy Page learned when he used it on Led Zeppelin’s “Friends,” the inspiration for this example:

Four measures of musical annotation.

Retune Five Strings

C-G-C-F-C-E (Csus4)

Just one note has changed here from the previous tuning, but that whole-step descent for the 3rd string is a real mood shift. The presence of an interval of a fourth (represented by the F) gives this tuning a modal flavor similar to D-A-D-G-A-D, but you don’t have the same kind of major-second interval between two adjacent strings. And that ringing major third (C to E) on top makes the sense of key less ambiguous than it is when you tune to D-A-D-G-A-D. It’s not sad-sounding exactly, but it is reflective. This is one of many unusual tunings that were employed by the late great British troubadour Nick Drake; this example was inspired by his “Place to Be”:

Two rows with a total of 5 measures of musical annotation.
B-F#-B-E-A-E (B modal)

Anyone who uses altered guitar tunings has to reckon eventually with the master: Joni Mitchell, who employed about 60 different ones over her career, many of them unique to her. In Part 1, we checked out her use of open E, but that’s pretty normal stuff compared to this low, ominous tuning, which distinguishes her song “The Magdalene Laundries.” There’s no clear third to be found in this example, making everything sound hauntingly unresolved:

Five measures of musical annotation.
B-D-D octave-D unison-D octave-D unison (“Iris”)

The most bizarre tuning of our dozen was discovered by the Goo Goo Dolls’ Johnny Rzeznik, another guitarist who’s fond of messing around with his tuning pegs. He’s playing it on the band’s massive late-’90s hit “Iris,” and that sound of a single note ringing in three octaves with two unisons is pretty distinctive.

To make it completely clear what you do here: The 6th string goes down a minor third from standard, the 5th string goes down a full fifth, the 4th string stays the same as standard, the 3rd string goes down a fourth, the 2nd string goes up a minor third, and the 1st string goes down a whole step. Tuning that 2nd string all the way up to D can be a little hair-raising; if you want to use this tuning regularly, you might want to consider setting up a guitar especially to handle it:

Four measures of musical annotation.

Retune All Six Strings

C#-F#-C#-E-G#-D# (C#m9/11)

This is one of my own discoveries; other players may have used it at some point, but I am unaware of who they might be. It’s the only tuning out of our 12 examples that you can immediately tell is in a minor key, but it’s not quite an open chord — at least not one you’d play all that often. You need to put a finger or two down on a fret before it really starts yielding melodic returns, but when you do, it’s memorable, as demonstrated here:

Four measures of musical annotation.

Of course, these short examples give you nothing more than a brief introduction to what altered tunings can do. To really understand what these examples can do, you’ll have to dig deeper. Ask yourself the following questions: How do the chord shapes you’re used to playing in standard tuning adapt (or not) to different tunings? What other shapes can you try?

Altered tunings can be inspirational and a wonderful boost to creativity. They give you a chance to break out of old routines, throw away the rule book, and just have fun. So next time you put new strings on your guitar, don’t tune them up to standard immediately — stop at a random point on the way and give a couple of strums. Maybe you’ll hear something that’s interesting but not quite right to your ear. Turn the pegs until it does sound right, and then see what that sound brings out in you. With a little time and imagination you’re bound to come up with a number of exciting ideas of your own.

The audio examples in this article were performed on a Yamaha FG-TA guitar. For more information on how they were recorded, check out our blog posting “How to Record TransAcoustic Guitar Effects.”

 

Click here for more information about Yamaha guitars.

Five Great Father’s Day Gift Ideas

Written by Ted Goslin on . Posted in TV & Movies.

We all know the struggle: You need to buy a gift for someone special but the only things you can think of are the usual — stuff that they either already have or don’t really need. And when you consider the gift recipient’s individual tastes, hobbies and technological needs, this can be even more challenging.

So this Father’s Day, why not get a head start and get dad something he’ll both love and need? Here are five gift ideas that any music / home theater lover will appreciate all year round:

Image of the preamplifier.
Yamaha WXC-50 streaming preamplifier.

1. Hi-Fi Upgrade

If your dad is a lover of vinyl and already has a classic home Hi-Fi system complete with a turntable and stereo receiver, you might want to consider helping him update his system with the latest technology that allows for streaming music. Check out our blog article: How to Add Streaming to Your Legacy Audio System.

 

View of a small table small plant, vase of flowers and a small cylindrical speaker next to them. The lower shelf has books adjacent to a subwoofer just slightly smaller next to a chair with a small piece of rug in front and a landscape painting above.
Yamaha MusicCast SUB 100 subwoofer.

2. Home Theater Enhancements

Enhance your father’s home theater experience with a surround sound system, either by updating or adding to it. If price is an issue, refer to the first in our Home Theater on a Budget series of blog articles, which talks about how to assemble a low-cost starter system. We also have an article here that describes how to add wireless surround speakers to simplify an existing system.

 

3. Streaming Services

For dads who love to watch movies or TV shows, you might consider buying them a subscription to one of the many streaming services out there.

4. Musical Instrument

Why not help your dad reignite his love for music? Whether he’s a first-timer looking to learn guitar or an experienced pianist looking to purchase his first digital keyboard, we offer plenty of options to explore.

Guitar on flat surface. Keyboard on a stand.

Air popper popping popcorn and it falling into a serving container.

5. Popcorn Popper

If he’s already set up with a home theater system, maybe what your dad needs is a better way to enjoy the experience. Why not get him a popcorn popper? They’re reasonably priced and can be enjoyed by the whole family on movie night.

 

Now all you need to do is drop the hint and hope your dad gives you the info you need to buy him the perfect Father’s Day gift!

 

View of top of electronic keyboard.

Creating EDM in Genos

Written by Yamaha Corporation of America on . Posted in Workstations.

Genos is our newest and most powerful Digital Workstation keyboard ever. Whether you use it for songwriting, live performance or recording, Genos will help inspire your musical creations.

Is EDM music your thing? Here’s a video that shows how Style sections can be used to build energy in the arrangement:

Going for more of an ElectroHouse style? No problem — Genos has got you covered:

 

Click here to find out more about Genos.

 

Five Tips and Tricks for Motivating Your Child to Practice All Summer Long

Written by Heather Mansell on . Posted in Acoustic Strings.

Summer break is a charmed time for students. It’s a carefree period when they can get some rest, spend more hours at play – and in the process often forget about practicing their instrument! As a parent, it’s great to watch your kids enjoy themselves and spend more time outdoors and with their friends. But how can you encourage them to also keep up their musical skills so that they don’t lose their pace of progress during their time off?

Here are a few tips and tricks to motivate your child to keep playing during their summer break, and have them primed and ready for the next school year.

1. Set Goals

Talk to your budding young musician about their playing and ask them if there is something they’d like to be able to accomplish on their instrument. Maybe it’s mastering a scale or improving their vibrato, or memorizing a piece that they worked on previously. Find what appeals to them and discuss it as a potential goal. If a young player can articulate achieving something that is on their mind, they are more likely to go for it.

2. Encourage Them To Build A Repertoire

One of the most exciting things to do as a player is to go to a sheet music store (or online), peruse the titles and pick out new repertoire to work on. New music can really get their imagination going, so talk to your child about which pieces they’d like to try and learn – even if it’s a pop tune that you personally don’t care for. You can ask their teacher for a recommendation, but generally speaking, a motivated  player will have a good idea of what they are able to tackle. Aim high!

3. Establish A Visual Cue

This may sound like an obvious suggestion, but having your child’s instrument visible in their room, or in the place they would normally practice is helpful. You can even try putting it out on an instrument stand so that it is easy to pick up and start playing at any time. (Just be careful of heat, dust and/or passers-by to prevent damage.) Sometimes a simple visual cue is the difference between walking past a case sitting on the floor and feeling the urge to put in a solid playing session.

4. Have Them Play With Others

Are there other kids in the area who are musicians? Ask your child if they know of any other kids they’d like to play with and arrange a jam session or a reading session. Help them organize repertoire, instruments, gear (like stands, chairs, etc.) and a place to play – maybe with the goal of getting a concert out of it by the end of the summer!

5. Do It In Short Spurts

It is summer, after all, and practicing is about quality, not quantity. Encourage short-spurt practicing – maybe just 15 minutes at a time to work on something in a focused manner. It could be just working on a scale or étude for 15 minutes, then coming back later in the day to work on something else.

Last but not least, always encourage playing in any way possible. Refer to it as simply “playing” and not “practicing,” which can sound like a chore. Associating playing as a year-round activity sets your child up for the best chance of success as a musician – and as someone who has the ability to enjoy making music for years to come.

 

Check out these related articles:

The Benefits of Bringing Electric Violin to Summer Camp  

What’s the Difference Between an Electric Violin and a Silent Violin?

Stylized soundwave on a background of concentric circles.

Using Reverb and Delay In Live Sound, Part 1

Written by Steve La Cerra on . Posted in Live Sound.

Two of the more fun audio tools are reverb and delay — effects that are used to add a sense of space to your mix. Let’s look at each, and then see how you can best use them in live sound.

The Basics

Reverb can be described as the sound left over in a room after the source stops. What do we mean by that? Let’s say you walk into a quiet, empty church and clap your hands. The handclap itself only lasts a fraction of a second, but then there’s an explosion of sound created by it being reflected off the walls, ceiling and floor. Those reflections create a reverberant sound, which we call reverb for short.

The amount of reverb produced depends on how big the room is and how reflective the surfaces are. What’s inside the room changes the character of the reverb, so an empty room will have a longer reverb time than a room that’s filled with people — because people and their clothing absorb sound. Reverb is very “dense,” meaning that there are so many reflections happening closely together that you don’t hear them separately. They’re kind of mushed together.

This is different from delay, which is sometimes called echo. Delay is also sound being reflected from a surface, but with delay you are able to hear a distinct repeat of the sound. For example, maybe you are watching a baseball game. You hear the crack of the bat, and then a moment later you hear it a second time. That’s because the sound hit the other side of the stadium and bounced back to you, creating a sort of duplicate. The repeat — the delay — is usually lower in volume than the original, and probably not as bright sounding.

Delay and reverb are really useful in both live mixing and in recording. They add a sense of space or distance to a sound, or can be used creatively to emphasize a lyric or the end of a solo by repeating it or making it last longer.

In the old days, reverb was created using live chambers, vibrating metal plates or springs, each of which  produce distinctly different sounds. Delay was primarily created using analog tape machines, which sound great but are expensive and difficult to maintain. Nowadays we use digital processing to create reverb and delay effects such as those built into the Yamaha MG X/XU Series mixers.

Reverb Types

As an example, the entry-level Yamaha MG06X mixer provides several different reverb “programs” (types) such as Hall, Room, and Plate.

– Hall: simulates the environment of a concert hall. Hall reverbs tend to sound big, and last longer.

– Room: simulates the sound of a large room like an auditorium. Room reverbs are shorter than halls and sound smaller.

– Plate: simulates the sound of a vibrating metal plate. Plate reverb was very popular in the 1970s. It tends to sound thin and emphasizes the high frequencies of a sound.

The intermediate-level Yamaha MG20XU adds a few more reverb programs such as:

– Ambient: creates the sense of a small space around a sound. Ambient programs are much shorter and “tighter” than a hall, room or plate reverb.

– Early Reflection: This effect is not quite reverb since it includes only the shortest reflection paths. Imagine you are in a tiled bathroom and clap your hands. You wouldn’t hear a long washy reverb; instead, you’d hear a very short, tight series of reflections from the tile. This a good example of the early reflection effect.

– Gated reverb: This is an effect that was really popular in the 1980s, especially for snare drum. Gated reverb is non-linear, meaning it does not behave the way you’d expect. Normally, bigger rooms produce longer reverbs. With a gated reverb, the room sounds big but the end or “tail” of the reverb is cut off by a noise gate instead of fading smoothly (see the Tools of the Trade blog posting How To Use a Noise Gate.)

Delays

Delay effects are usually defined by two things: delay time and number of repeats.

Delay time is the amount of time before you hear the first repeat or echo. The number of repeats is exactly that. Longer delay times give the illusion of distance. If you shouted “hey!” at the wall of a handball court, the sound would reflect back at you a fraction of a second later. If you walked farther away from that wall and tried it again, it would take longer for your voice to reach the wall and bounce back to you. Delay time is usually expressed in milliseconds, abbreviated “ms.” One millisecond is 1/1000th of a second.

The delay time can usually be dialed in as a specific number, and it interacts with another important control called feedback. More feedback produces more repeats, but beware that adding excessive feedback to a delay can produce some unpredictable results like out-of-control looping echoes that get uncontrollably louder and louder.

Many different effects can be created simply by tweaking these two controls. For example, short delays (around 20 to 50 ms) produce a doubling effect. “Slap” delay like you hear on recordings from the 1950s is created using a slightly longer delay time of around 50 to 125 ms. Long, rolling delays have a delay time of 300 ms and up, often with a good deal of feedback.

As an example, the Yamaha MG06X provides three delay programs:

– Short: this produces a doubling effect

– Long: longer delay times than the Short delay.

– VO Echo: intended for use on vocals.

Reverb and Delay Parameters

Reverb and delay programs usually provide a number of adjustable parameters. This is a simply a fancy word for some aspect of the effect that you can tweak. For example, when you choose REV HALL 1 on the Yamaha MG10XU, the Parameter knob allows you to change the reverb time to suit the music you are mixing. If you choose the DELAY program, then the Parameter knob will allow you to adjust the delay time.

More advanced mixers like the digital Yamaha TF1 show the delay time in ms and give you separate control over delay time for the left and right channels. This allows you to do things like create “ping-pong” delays (delays that bounce between the left and right channels). The TF1 also allows you to create a rhythmic delay by entering song tempo in Beats Per Minute (BPM), or through “Tap Tempo,” a feature that lets you tap a button in time to the music, with the onboard computer automatically calculating the delay time based on your tapping! If your mixer doesn’t have those features, don’t be discouraged — you can always set delay or reverb time by ear.

In Part 2, we’ll talk about the way reverb and delay is added to a mix, and describe some creative applications, including instrument-specific tips.

 

Check out our other Tools of the Trade postings.

Click here for more information about Yamaha mixing consoles.