If you own use BOTH a bass tuba and a contrabass tuba, does this trick work for you?

[bloke]

If you find yourself working too hard to play something (which requires some degree is finesse/nimbleness/agility) on the contrabass tuba, you go back and play it on the bass tuba (where it's much easier). You then return to the contrabass tuba (whereby - with the bass tuba - you've gotten away from overworking to play the passage/exercise/piece) and it's much easier/smoother/nicer - then - playing it with the contrabass tuba.

[marccromme]

Yes. It does. I am mostly switching between a MW Eb 5v tuba and a Holton/Bach bass trombone this way. Very beneficial to switch to another instrument and play the same music with different technical challenges. Its like my brain ceases getting blocked in technique, and starts thinking music again. Very usefully.

[WC8KCY]

Yes. I sometimes use a euphonium and even the clarinet to work on tuba stuff.

Is it really that different than working out a difficult tuba passage using a piano, then going back to the tuba? Nope.

[WC8KCY]

bloke, if your brain is wired like mine, you can work out the rhythms, phrasing, articulation, pitch, and dynamics of a passage on just about any alternate instrument, and once you've nailed those things down and etched them into your musical memory, you're playing it much more "on autopilot" once you go back to the "tough" instrument.

[cmccain]

I can also recommend this technique, since I pretty frequently switch between bass trombone and CC tuba. I would hazard a guess doing this plays on the same psychological trick as taking an essay/email/story you've been writing and changing the font for the whole thing, then re-reading it to catch all the typos or weird phrasing you missed the first time. I think hearing the same tune in a different tone or register gets your brain to separate the music from whatever habits you've developed while working on it and makes different details pop out.

[bloke]

Flowing past the places that are sort of the equivalents of crossing the break on the clarinet (as we have quite a few of those on our giant foghorns) using an alternate instrument which is smaller, built in a different key, and doesn't provide those challenges, gets us out of a quickly formed habit on any particular piece of tensing up when we encounter those spots, and then we can play right through them - as long as we concentrate on the music and throw anxiety to the wind, if a pun is acceptable here.

[Pauvog1]

If you find yourself working too hard to play something (which requires some degree is finesse/nimbleness/agility) on the contrabass tuba, you go back and play it on the bass tuba (where it's much easier). You then return to the contrabass tuba (whereby - with the bass tuba - you've gotten away from overworking to play the passage/exercise/piece) and it's much easier/smoother/nicer - then - playing it with the contrabass tuba.

Yes

[Kevbach33]

It does for me, and especially when I play the parts as written on euphonium. Maybe hearing the different tonality and where that sound is coming from in relation to my ears is the trigger for me.

But there are some parts that my brain just can't compute with the bass tuba (mostly Sousa marches for whatever reason...).

[arpthark]

I've tried this trick with my bass saxophone and my contrabass saxophone, and it doesn't seem to work.

[Mary Ann]

I admit to the opposite just in terms of making the instrument "go." If I'm having trouble physically and I practice on an instrument that is harder to make it go, and then come back to the one I was having trouble with, suddenly it is less difficult. A slightly different application, I think.

[bloke]

I've tried this trick with my bass saxophone and my contrabass saxophone, and it doesn't seem to work.

[acemorgan]

I do it often with my bass tuba and tenor tuba. I play euphonium in treble and my Eb in bass. If I have trouble on the euphonium, I will play the same thing on tuba, but also playing the treble score. I know, different keys, yada yada. But the relationship between the fundamentals and partials is constant. My range is much better on tuba, and I can make my brain stop "messing with my chops" (Adolph Herseth).

When I come back to euphonium, it's like the brakes are off.

[humBell]

Clarification?

Are you playing the identical notes on the other tuba? Or identical fingerings?

I would say both have their value in the figurin' of things out...

[humBell]

I've tried this trick with my bass saxophone and my contrabass saxophone, and it doesn't seem to work.

"Look at the size if that thing!"

[acemorgan]

Clarification?

Are you playing the identical notes on the other tuba? Or identical fingerings?

I would say both have their value in the figurin' of things out...

For me, I use the same fingering. That way, the relationship of the harmonic series to the specific instrument's fundamental is the same.

[Mary Ann]

Clarification?

Are you playing the identical notes on the other tuba? Or identical fingerings?

I would say both have their value in the figurin' of things out...

To use identical fingerings I'd have to be reading a different clef, it would sound in a different key and would be like learning an entirely different piece of music. OK for simple things that I could do by ear anyway, but for learning something difficult, of no use to me.

[Paula]

I switch between CC EEb, Bass Trombone & Euphonium (even on occasion electric bass) - I suspect this more about finding the instrument ob which you are most proficient to solve the musical problems, and then the technical problems become easier.

I do use my trombone study books to practise tuba and vice a versa to help with range

[humBell]

Clarification?

Are you playing the identical notes on the other tuba? Or identical fingerings?

I would say both have their value in the figurin' of things out...

To use identical fingerings I'd have to be reading a different clef, it would sound in a different key and would be like learning an entirely different piece of music. OK for simple things that I could do by ear anyway, but for learning something difficult, of no use to me.

You have hit upon the crux of my clarification. It was hard to tell whether the thread was pointed at playing the music with other people, where your point is valid (though me and my RRHP: really really high pitch a=660 group (too lazy to come up with the actual hz... and who am i kidding, my rrhp group is just me busking by myself) just play all the contrabass parts on modern eb tubas without clef changes or transpostions) or at @acemorgan's comment above, the usefulness of doing the same fingerings, but in a range that has easier demands to meet one way or anotherfor sounding notes or agility of playing. And yeah, as someone mentioned a baritone earlier, that really in both instances, octaves being what they are. The one caveat is us three valvers who like to do false tones, well, baritones typically make them a lot harder to use for whatever reason. And false tone work is where this sort of thing is very useful indeed! Both matching notes or fingerings.

[humBell]

I've tried this trick with my bass saxophone and my contrabass saxophone, and it doesn't seem to work.

"Look at the size if that thing!"

I can't remember who it was from, but i heard tell of someone once in Europe travels came across a contrabass sax being used as an umbrella stand, and (over the course of multiple trips, i think?) purchased it and got it back stateside to restore. Made for a good story at least. Do wish i recalled actual useful details...

[Mary Ann]

You sound like me giving esoteric alternative medical information to people -- I remember what I read but not where I read it. Some trust enough to run with that, and others don't.