After a few weeks of having the contraforte I am having a recital! I am very excited about the program, and if you are in the bay area you should definately come. March 8 at 8pm at the San Francisco Conservatory of music. This is an all contraforte recital featuring
Mozart’s Contraforte Concerto (possibly known as an oboe concerto)
Mignone Waltz
Dorf Contrabassoon duet
If we all live through it, there will be cake!
I just bought a Snark tuner to try out. Many of my colleagues have it and they have nothing but positive things to say about it. I have had clip on tuners before, or at least an extension to plug in to my regular tuner.
The Snark is very quick and responsive, there is no lag time waiting for the tuner to focus on the pitch. There are settings to either pick up vibrations directly from the instrument or to pick up sound through the microphone. The pitch level can be calibrated from 415-466.
This tuner is great for bassoonists because it can easily clip onto the bocal, or onto a oboe/clarinet bell. I actually purchased this tuner for my contraforte and like most tuners it cannot register the lowest octave. That would be my only drawback.
I have some basic care tools that I use to maintain my instruments. Key oil, cork grease, bore oil etc. But there are some things that I have found to be very useful especially in buying a used contraforte. The contra was in the use of Lewis Lipnick, a very accomplished and busy player. It had some tarnish on the keys, and I don’t trust myself to take it all apart to clean it. Contrabassoons and contrafortes also suffer from water problems. Contra is the only woodwind instrument that never EVER gets swabbed!
I found these silver polish strips to be amazing! You get a wet paper towel, wipe down the tarnished area and then just wipe it with the polish wipe and its done. I also have “acidic hand oil” like we all do, but mine can damage the plating of instruments over time. So this is a very easy way to keep my keys from damage. These I found at Bed Bath and Beyond
The other great find is Silica gel packets; this is a form of desiccant, or a chemical that removes moisture from the air. I bought a couple packs of these and I keep two in the contra case at a time. When the contra is put away in the case, the instrument is still filled with moisture and warm moist air. These packets help dry out the air inside of the case. I bought mine off of Amazon
The contrabassophone was invented in 1847 by Haseneier. It was intended to improve the contrabassoon at the time by using a very large bore and tone holes. There is a great resemblance to the contraforte! The contrabassophone has a less severe bore flair than the contrabassoon, and is closer to a cylindrical bore. The fingering system is also much closer to the Boehm system flute.
This fall I am returning to the San Francisco Conservatory of Music for a PSD (professional studies degree) in bassoon & contrabassoon. I am really excited to be studying with both Steve Paulson and Steve Braunstein and I think that my contrabassoon skill will increase significantly!
I am planning out a few recitals, and since this degree doesn’t require any academic requirements, I can program some difficult works. I haven’t decided on the order of the recitals yet but I have planned four recitals, two for fall and two for spring. So these are the possible programs in no particular order:
Paris Conservatory Commissions
Jolivet Concerto
Saint Saens sonata
Dutilleux Sarabande et Cortège
Villa Lobos (or just loosely South American themed)
Concerto
Duo (oboe, bassoon)
Bachianas Brasileiras bassoon No. 6 (flute, bassoon)
maybe a few Mignone Waltzes
Solo Baroque
Bach Cello Suite V
Bach Cello Suite II (possibly on contra)
Telemann Fantasias (some on contra)
IDRS repertoire
Vivaldi Concerto C Major RV477
Hummel Concerto
Dutilleux Sarabande et Cortège
Carter Retracing
I have been putting out reed orders for the past few months with great success and have had a great time connecting with customers. However it has been a hassle to manage reed orders along side regular gig emails etc. so I decided to create a reed website! It is a site that will be constantly updated with new products and cane sources. So feel free to check it out!
There is an icon (will make more sense in a few updates) at the bottom of the webpage linking to my eBay store. That is where I sell sale reeds or inventory that I need to move, usually at a reduced price.
This year was my first IDRS conference yet and it was amazing! I met so many legendary players and nice people. There was an entire room of vendors and instruments to try as well as a room full of music provided by trevco. The bassoon selection was impressive and included:
Püchner
Fox
Moosmann
Walter
Wolf
Schreiber
and oboes were brought by
Marigaux
Buffet
Fox
Püchner
It was odd that even though there were Loree oboes and Heckel bassoon at the conference. Loree and Heckel were not there only their used instruments were sold through other sellers.
Legère reeds were there and many more bassoons were hooked onto some synthetic reeds. Other innovations were brought by Guntram Wolf. They brought a Lupophon and the Contraforte.
Now this is particularly interesting to me because I have been seriously getting into contrabassoon and I feel a strong pull towards the contraforte. I am now raising funds to buy a contraforte to take auditions with. I have a list of repertoire to perform and record on it and was a great treat to get to play another one this week. If you ever get a chence to get your hands on a contraforte, test it! the dynamics, range, note connection is all much easier.
This is a project I premiered with oboist, Sydne Sullivan. Written by Joseph M. Colombo.
This year will be my first year attending an International Double Reed Society conference. I have always wanted to go to one but they have a been so far away. This year however, it is being hosted at the University of Redlands in Los Angeles from June 25-29. The schedule is packed with masterclasses, concerts, workshops and lectures from many of the biggest double reed artists currently active. I have already squirreled away a budget for the event and Im sure there will be many new products to try out.
I am particularly looking forward to Frank Morelli’s master class playing Sluka’s sonata, John Millers excerpt class, and the exhibit hall. There are events happening each day and a concert every evening. The two performances that I am looking forward to are Martin Kuuskmann performing Steve Paulson’s concerto for bassoon and Frank Morelli performing the Mozart.
This link contains all of the IDRS convention information for this year
idrs2013.org
Kristopher King 