My axe, as they say in the "biz", a tuba. Some call it the bass, others call it a concert tuba, as opposed to those practice tubas, and driving tubas out there. I usually refer to it as my horn. Most people have a misconception about the tuba, mainly that it just goes oom-pah, over and over in marching bands and polka bands. What they fail to realize is that tuba players also have to sustain notes for thrity-two measures at a time. Also tuba players are excellent at sitting quietly and counting rests...for those of you who are not musical, rests are the time period in which a member of the orchestra or band does not play while the rest of the orchestra does. More often than not, a tuba player will have five hundred measures of rests and then have 200 measures of a sustained B-flat. Usually in rehearsals the conductor will play four hundred ninety nine measures of the song and then stop and go back to the beginning. This is why tuba players are such good counters...only surpassed by triangle players. One important thing that tuba players are taught to remember while they are counting rests is to avoiding picking their noses, as this could become distracting during a concert.
People refer to those who play the tuba as many things: Tubists, Tuba players, Tubadours, Tubamanders, Tubaians, Tubanese, Tuba toothpaste. I find that most of these people have no idea what they are talking about and should be avoided.
2 comments:
Thanks for remembering my awesome triangle skills. I take credit for this entire post. No applause.
Mama plays triangle too, ya know. Sometimes its a "come to dinner" triangle, but more likely the one "ding" after 152 measures and on an offbeat, which, it may be noted, often depends on those tubas oompahing at the right time.
--The Mama
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