Colby Norton Tuba Ky All-State 2020-2021 Tyrell 19
A quick read of the 2020-2021 Kentucky All-StateTuba Excerpt Tyrell #19 from 40 Advanced Studies for Bb Bass. I like to play the pieces that my students are working on allowing my natural tendencies (tone, tempo, rhythm, intonation problems, style, and so on) to exist. This gives me an idea of possible problems that may occur during a lesson so that I can have a game plan on how to fix said problem.
This tuba etude is a classic with its scalar patterns and sequences. Though it is fast, slow scale practice will be key (no pun intended). I practice my scales in modes, for example Eb-Eb one octave, then F-F one octave but in the key of Eb (F dorian). A lot of the Tyrell etudes use this kind of compositional pattern, so the quicker you can recognize this, the faster you will be able to play it.
Apply this pattern to all major scales
Not only is this a great way to learn your scales (p.s. scales are still apart of the audition) it will put some quality time towards finger dexterity and precision.
The second part of the equation is the tongue. You can practice tongue and finger coordination with the scale patter above, but you may also want to isolate the tongue with its own exercise. I like Hetzler’s exercise for clarity below.
Like the instructions say, play this three times soft at tempo 74, first time all air attack, second time with your preferred double tongue syllable, third time with your normal articulation. Once you are comfortable with the exercise, increase the tempo, but keep the dynamic at mezzo piano.
Once you get the fundamentals in check, start applying them to the etude.
Dynamically I just followed the phrasing.
I never get too loud because I personally don’t have good tone control in the louder dynamics on tuba. As for the roof top accents, I just put a little extra weight while keeping everything separated. You can play around with shape, but the phrasing is pretty repetitive so there isn’t a reason to overthink it.
The most important thing to remember here is your practice of the scales and recognizing the patterns. Start slow and make sure each note is full of tone and clarity. A few spots in my run through of this had a few fluffed notes. I would go back and use the Hetzler exercise on this a phrase at a time. 1-3 bars air attacked, then again with the “too-too” exercise and then finally with your normal exercise. Again, this is just a brief run down of how I would approach this etude, if you would like to play for me for some feedback, book a lesson here!