84BDsop Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 also, Weird Al Yankovich has some awesome and hilarious barbershop songs! "Since You've Been Gone" is more 50s doo-wop than barbershop. I don't think he's ever done a pure barbershop parody. if he did, tho, he;d nail it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruckner8 Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 Superb! balance, blend, intonation, coordinated breathing it's ALL there! If every corps was like this, then we would have very happy judges :) You're assuming the judges would be able to discern the idea, and then actually give credit for it once achieved. I can guarantee you, from personal experience, judges listen to intonation like judging pornography: "I know it when I hear it." INTONATION is on the Ensemble Music sheet. To the judges, it's a Yes/No proposition. All I'm trying to say: intonation is as expressive as dynamics, color, range, etc. It's part of the "effect." In the barbershop idiom, this fact is recognized. In drum corps, it is not. (Granted, it's more difficult to get everyone on the same page in a group like the Ambassadors of Harmony [other thread]. The Qtet in this current thread is actually being much more expressive with it than the larger group. But the larger groups still STRIVE to be expressive with it.) I have lots of experience playing in/writing for/teaching trombone choir and brass choir. Students CAN be taught to open their ears to these other tunings. Western Musical Education has completely forgotten about alternative tunings. (we've "dumbed down" to equal temperament) IMO, no student should be allowed to graduate without taking Voice for two semesters, singing in a Choir for two years, taking an acoustics course, and taking Aural Skills for two years (with no such thing as "testing out" of AS! If a kid has the ears of Mozart, then make a custom course, more difficult, until you find their limits!). I think learning to sing is way more important than learning piano. (Every music program has a "Piano class requirement!") Instead, our universities pump out technically proficient, musically cliche robots who can't hear a #### thing. Wow, sorry bout that. This went from "intonation is expressive" to a rant on current music education. Oops. Oh well, I prefer to bury my important rants in threads like this, where no one will read them anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Toby Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 Wow, sorry bout that. This went from "intonation is expressive" to a rant on current music education. Oops. Oh well, I prefer to bury my important rants in threads like this, where no one will read them anyway. I read it. But, as a current music education major, I have to agree.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
drumcorpsfan4567 Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 What does an acoustics course entail? I'm curious, I'm not sure if my university offers such a course (maybe they do, I just don't know about it). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
glory Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 Spread them out over 50 yards, get them twisting, turning and hustling into and out of formation, and I'll be impressed. Impressed in a drum corps sense, not a barbershop sense. HH Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kickhaltsforlife Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 You're assuming the judges would be able to discern the idea, and then actually give credit for it once achieved. I can guarantee you, from personal experience, judges listen to intonation like judging pornography: "I know it when I hear it."INTONATION is on the Ensemble Music sheet. To the judges, it's a Yes/No proposition. All I'm trying to say: intonation is as expressive as dynamics, color, range, etc. It's part of the "effect." In the barbershop idiom, this fact is recognized. In drum corps, it is not. (Granted, it's more difficult to get everyone on the same page in a group like the Ambassadors of Harmony [other thread]. The Qtet in this current thread is actually being much more expressive with it than the larger group. But the larger groups still STRIVE to be expressive with it.) I have lots of experience playing in/writing for/teaching trombone choir and brass choir. Students CAN be taught to open their ears to these other tunings. Western Musical Education has completely forgotten about alternative tunings. (we've "dumbed down" to equal temperament) IMO, no student should be allowed to graduate without taking Voice for two semesters, singing in a Choir for two years, taking an acoustics course, and taking Aural Skills for two years (with no such thing as "testing out" of AS! If a kid has the ears of Mozart, then make a custom course, more difficult, until you find their limits!). I think learning to sing is way more important than learning piano. (Every music program has a "Piano class requirement!") Instead, our universities pump out technically proficient, musically cliche robots who can't hear a #### thing. Wow, sorry bout that. This went from "intonation is expressive" to a rant on current music education. Oops. Oh well, I prefer to bury my important rants in threads like this, where no one will read them anyway. I read it. But, as a current music education major, I have to agree.... Yep. I'm lucky to be in a program where 4 semesters of aural skills, 3 semesters of choir, and 3 semesters of voice are required. Testing out of aurals is possible... but there is only one kid in the school right now who has tested out. The kid has a ridiculous ear, but no one challenges him, and it is disappointing. And like I said before, everyone is to tuner dependent. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DAvery Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 What does an acoustics course entail? I'm curious, I'm not sure if my university offers such a course (maybe they do, I just don't know about it). When I switched from Electrical Engineering to Music Ed I took an independent study class from an engineering professor. We called it the "Science of Sound". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruckner8 Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 What does an acoustics course entail? I'm curious, I'm not sure if my university offers such a course (maybe they do, I just don't know about it). Every university has one, I'm sure. The question is: Does your university offer one to music students, that doesn't have all of the super-duper Calculus/Fourier Analysis/Mathematics behind it? My undergrad place (Oberlin Conservatory, '89) had a course specifically titled Musical Acoustics, dumbed down enough as an elective for eager music students. Some math is always involved, but nothing "worse" than ratios, exponents and logarithms...Algebra I stuff. In that course, I learned: -) Physics of open/closed pipes (ever wonder why a clarinet and flute are the same length, but clarinet is almost an octave lower?) -) Inverse Square Law -) Interference -) Physics of Brass Instruments (tubes with bells and cupped mouthpieces; conical vs cylindrical;valves/slides) -) Physics of Strings -) Physics of each Woodwind instrument (tubes with keys/reeds; conical vs cylindrical) -) Physics/tuning of a piano (extreme tension strings..why does a piano tuner use stretched octaves?) -) Technical Definition of an Interval (a frequency ratio) -) Technical Def of Equal Temperament -) Technical Def of Cents -) Technical Def of Harmonic Series -) Technical Def of Just Intonation -) Technical Def of Meantone temperaments (there are many) -) Technical Def of/explanation for the difference between sound pressure (device measurable) and perceived loudness (human hearing...Gawd, every drum corps person needs to understand this!!!) -) Basics of Fourier Analysis, Spectrum Analysis I'm sure there's more, but that's the stuff I still think about--and incorporate into my teaching--today. In recent incarnations of the course, they take a "field trip" over to the big organ on campus, and do an "organ crawl" so everyone can see it work up close, and hear demonstrations of the various mixtures, etc, to bring all of the technical stuff into a real musical context. Google (or wiki) each of those topics...information is lot easier to come by these days! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bruckner8 Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 Yep.I'm lucky to be in a program where 4 semesters of aural skills, 3 semesters of choir, and 3 semesters of voice are required. Testing out of aurals is possible... but there is only one kid in the school right now who has tested out. The kid has a ridiculous ear, but no one challenges him, and it is disappointing. And like I said before, everyone is to tuner dependent. Wow, can you PM me the name of your university? Or did I miss it? I'd like to start recommending it to everyone, lol. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jamesjones0611 Posted December 2, 2009 Share Posted December 2, 2009 (edited) Every university has one, I'm sure. The question is: Does your university offer one to music students, that doesn't have all of the super-duper Calculus/Fourier Analysis/Mathematics behind it? My undergrad place (Oberlin Conservatory, '89) had a course specifically titled Musical Acoustics, dumbed down enough as an elective for eager music students. Some math is always involved, but nothing "worse" than ratios, exponents and logarithms...Algebra I stuff.In that course, I learned: -) Physics of open/closed pipes (ever wonder why a clarinet and flute are the same length, but clarinet is almost an octave lower?) -) Inverse Square Law -) Interference -) Physics of Brass Instruments (tubes with bells and cupped mouthpieces; conical vs cylindrical;valves/slides) -) Physics of Strings -) Physics of each Woodwind instrument (tubes with keys/reeds; conical vs cylindrical) -) Physics/tuning of a piano (extreme tension strings..why does a piano tuner use stretched octaves?) -) Technical Definition of an Interval (a frequency ratio) -) Technical Def of Equal Temperament -) Technical Def of Cents -) Technical Def of Harmonic Series -) Technical Def of Just Intonation -) Technical Def of Meantone temperaments (there are many) -) Technical Def of/explanation for the difference between sound pressure (device measurable) and perceived loudness (human hearing...Gawd, every drum corps person needs to understand this!!!) -) Basics of Fourier Analysis, Spectrum Analysis I'm sure there's more, but that's the stuff I still think about--and incorporate into my teaching--today. In recent incarnations of the course, they take a "field trip" over to the big organ on campus, and do an "organ crawl" so everyone can see it work up close, and hear demonstrations of the various mixtures, etc, to bring all of the technical stuff into a real musical context. Google (or wiki) each of those topics...information is lot easier to come by these days! You went to Oberlin? Awesome. And here I was thinking that no real musicians were involved in drum corps, you sir have proven me wrong! lol. I'm being sarcastic because all of my teachers want me practicing over the summer and doing stuff like Tanglewood over the summer instead of doing "that crap no one cares about" called drum corps. *Edit - Oh, and if I have to hear one more time how Bruckner 8 really is the Dark Knight theme, I think I may kill a small puppy. Edited December 2, 2009 by jamesjones0611 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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