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I like playing the Shostakovich 5th symphony contrabassoon soli on euphonium, it's a fun grunty little bit on that (last note played second valve as a false tone).

https://www.orchestralbassoon.com/shost ... t-2-contra

The same website has several other CBN excerpts.
https://www.orchestralbassoon.com/contr ... n-excerpts

Here's a Mahler bass excerpt I came across yesterday, this will be fun to play, might work it up on cimbasso.


I subbed on bass trombone in a community orchestra years ago, there was a Liszt piece, iirc, that had a big contrabassoon part. No CBN in the orchestra so the director asked me to play it, I can still remember the part still but not the name. Playing a solo pedal D at pianissimo with no one else playing is certainly a moment.

Anyone play any other interesting bass instrument excerpts? Certainly there's value in learning great music written for any instrument, I just enjoy stuff in our register.

Nope but today I frightened a couple of woodwind players with the NStar on a bassoon part.

well...
To the topic, there's that ridiculous tuba part that someone created for Dvorak 9 several years ago...

There's a few really great alternative tuba parts to Dvorak 9 floating around that complement the trombones nicely, a few of which have been performed by phenomenal musicians in some of the largest and most successful orchestras.

I recently judged brass auditions for a summer band and woodshed each of the prepared excerpts to familiarize myself with them. Identifying information had been removed from the excerpts, so I couldn't tell you where they were from, but it was a nice change of pace.

A couple of years ago I played the opening basoon part to Hall of the Mountain King on my Eb tuba. It's easy to get carried away. The biggest problem was noisy valves. The faster the tempo, the noisier the valves. It took a good bit of practice to push the pistons down gently.

Here's what it sounds like done well:

The last time I played it, I had a choice to make between playing those two short brass choral phrases (a 55 minute drive west of blokeplace) or playing Tchaik 4 (70 minutes east of blokeplace) with another orchestra.

It wasn't a difficult decision; the Dvorak concert paid more.

Michael Stern was the music director, and specifically said to me - in front of the orchestra (fairly close to quoting him), "Feel free to play anything that you deem appropriate." I played the two brass choral phrases only, which I deemed to be appropriate. (Some of you might know at least two of the other trombonists, Jaime Morales on principal and Chris Davis on bass.) Phil Ostrander usually covered the other part, but I'm thinking it was someone else, that time. My best guess would be Michael Hosford. Michael (Stern) was apparently fine with what I chose to play, ie. the ink), as he never stopped to ask me why I wasn't playing anything in the other movements (and nor did he approach me regarding this during the breaks). My personal opinion is that the tuba (unless light and absolutely flawlessly in tune - characteristics not always associated with tuba playing ) can easily muck up those chorale passages, particularly considering how gentle, sentimental, and pastoral is that movement. Also - as good-natured as bass trombonists are, I just don't want to sit there and annoy them by playing along with their passages in unison, and certainly not in octaves. Additionally - though I'm a functional jazz musician (no... not any sort of "artiste") and not too bad at improvising, I am one who (again: attempting to avoid being a jackass) respects the ink, when playing the classics. If I wished to play more stuff in that Symphony, I could join a community band. (Had Michael marked specific passages for me to play, OF COURSE I would have played them.)

I have never heard a viable explanation for including a tuba in that Symphony (perhaps a specific instrumentation request by the NYPO, which commissioned it...??) but the guess that I just offered is the only one that makes much sense to me. Regardless, the finale has served as some great public domain background music for quite a few cowboy B movies.
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I once got to play, on an Alexander F tuba, the bassoon soli part in March to the Scaffold from Symphonie Fantastique.

I like playing the euphonium solos on the British band classics on an F tuba, no problem with the melody coming through then.

I know a tuba player who would play through the bass parts to the entire Beethoven symphonies (once a year I think) while playing along to various recordings. I haven't gotten around to trying this myself, but I have to imagine it would be a heck of a workout.

For those who do not hold the proper level of respect for contrabassoonists (who - after all - are all accomplished bassoonists).

I was asked to cover this part, once.

https://ks15.imslp.org/files/imglnks/us ... assoon.pdf

As written...?? (possibly...)

In the correct octave - up to tempo...?? (hmm...)

I started practicing my @$$ off.
A week later, the M.D. called and told me that they located a competent contrabassoonist.
(thoink the laaard !!!!)

As a woodwind principal player was once heard remarking - under their breath - behind an audition screen at a tuba audition:

Is this all they're ever expected to play, and are these applicants as good as it gets !??!??

bloke wrote: Thu May 28, 2026 7:20 pm For those who do not hold the proper level of respect for contrabassoonists (who - after all - are all accomplished bassoonists).

I was asked to cover this part, once.

https://ks15.imslp.org/files/imglnks/us ... assoon.pdf

As written...?? (possibly...)

In the correct octave - up to tempo...?? (hmm...)

I started practicing my @$$ off.
A week later, the M.D. called and told me that they located a competent contrabassoonist.

I hate it when that happens. I was given a 1st clarinet part to play on trumpet (they're both in Bb. What more do you need). Looking at the part more closely I see it's marked clarinet in A. After working out the solution with slides rather than transposing, and woodsheding it for two weeks, the conductor says "Here's the second clarinet part. I talked Henry into playing 1st clarinet. Hand me that part" That is abusive. So now we have two trumpets playing second clarinet and one trumpet playing 1st trumpet. No one on second trumpet and no bass. I brought my tuba to the next rehearsal and played the string bass part. I didn't ask just showed up with the tuba. Not a word was said.

Colby Fahrenbacher wrote: Thu May 28, 2026 7:08 pm I know a tuba player who would play through the bass parts to the entire Beethoven symphonies (once a year I think) while playing along to various recordings. I haven't gotten around to trying this myself, but I have to imagine it would be a heck of a workout.

Dragonetti was quite the bassist! Duport on cello was a beast too!