Where Are All The Oboists These Days? Options

[MrsB]

Yay, another oboe player (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) I hope you enjoy learning as much as I do.

What oboe did you buy?

[dumdidum]

Thanks for all your well wishes - I am overjoyed to be starting the oboe and have been inspired by reading about all your journeys (particularly the adults starters!).
I bought a wooden Selmer sterling or something like that - it is a thumbplate (wasn't sure before I got it!) and is open-holed. It cost less than ?200 so I was thoroughly prepared to have to pay for an expensive overhaul to make it playable but my teacher thinks is is playable as is .... I wonder how long it will be before I want an upgrade!
I bought a reed from an online shop - but am so naive i thought i had paid for a pack of 5 but when it arrived i realised it was only 1 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif) yowser they aint cheap are they! it was too hard so I got some medium soft reeds from David cowdy online for a reasonable price which seem good....

Time for some long note practice now (oh and need to upgrade my signature!)

[MrsB]

No, the oboe certainly isn't cheap!

Well done on your bargain buy. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[flobiano]

Good luck with your oboe journey dumdidum. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/clarinet.gif)


I went to the BDRS convention on Sunday. It was an enjoyable day.

The Dutch oboist Pauline Oostenrijk gave a recital (and also did the masterclass). She played 3 pieces I didn't know all by Dutch composers. She was astonishing. I've never heard such expressive playing. Completely spell binding performance. Her masterclass was pretty good too. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[violoboist]

I got to almost grade eight on a Stirling.... Loved it!

[dumdidum]

I got to almost grade eight on a Stirling.... Loved it!

The way I am sounding at the moment I will be glad to be able to play 'Go and Tell Aunt Nancy'!

Still, diaphragm exercises here we come!

[katica]

I missed another lesson on Tuesday. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/sad.gif)

Band practice was great, though, and our conductor (my teacher) actually congratulated us on "the most intelligent rehearsal" in the past year. Rare praise indeed. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif) We've got a private concert in two week's time. Along with a couple of other groups we'll be playing at a dinner for a national association of business people. The hope is that they will sponsor us in the future and that we might even be able to acquire more instruments. The cultural centre doesn't have, for instance, a bassoon or a French horn.

Though our program is fun and has it's technical challenges, I must say that I wish I had more opportunity for more serious and interesting classical music. Unfortunately we just don't have the critical mass of instruments for it yet.

My teacher was also pretty impressed with my reedmaking attempts, though he only took a quick look and didn't actually try any, so I don't hold out much hope that the congratulations will last long...

And a specific query to anyone who has played the Telemann Fantasia No.2. There is no articulation (e.g. slurs) marked in the second movement (Vivace). What, if any, do you play? And how fast do you play it?

[Roseau]

We've got a private concert in two week's time. Along with a couple of other groups we'll be playing at a dinner for a national association of business people.

Do they feed you as well (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

Though our program is fun and has it's technical challenges, I must say that I wish I had more opportunity for more serious and interesting classical music.

I feel much the same way and the brief glimpse that I had of "proper" orchestral music in the winter term has made me realise even more keenly what I want to play. I am hoping that the symphony orchestra will be set up again in September and that this time it will run for the whole academic year.

My teacher was also pretty impressed with my reedmaking attempts, though he only took a quick look and didn't actually try any, so I don't hold out much hope that the congratulations will last long...

You never know. And just to make you feel less hopeless, in the reeds my teacher gave me to finish off, I discovered that the blades of one move when you play it. I asked my oboist-friend what I could do about it, thinking that since my teacher had tied it on and scraped it that there must be something obvious to do that I didn't know about it. She looked at it and said there was nothing you could do about it, it was just poorly tied on. She thought I had tied it on and said reassuringly that with practice, I would stop making that sort of mistake when tying them on. When I said it was my teacher she said I should go and say "What sort of rubbish tying on is this" (IMG:style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif)

And a specific query to anyone who has played the Telemann Fantasia No.2. There is no articulation (e.g. slurs) marked in the second movement (Vivace). What, if any, do you play? And how fast do you play it?

My teacher marked in a lot for me. Do you want me to scan it and send it to you? (Although I won't have time to do it before tomorrow afternoon). It is quite varied and he has also given alternatives in a couple of places. This is one of those pieces that I found incredibly hard the first time he gave it to me and considerably easier when I revisited it a couple of years later.

I am going to play the first two movements of the Poulenc Sonata in a pupils' concert next Friday. I had a rehearsal with the accompanist on Wednesday without my teacher and then my lesson today. Before rehearsing with the accompanist I wasn't at all sure that I wanted to play the second movement in public (although my teacher was adament that it would be "good for me") but he convinced me that you couldn't tell I don't like it when I'm playing and that it sounded convincing. In my lesson my teacher was complaining that it was too obvious which bits I really don't like (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ph34r.gif) I tried saying that it was easier with the piano but he thought that was a feeble excuse and said that the pianist is supposed to be accompanying me, not the other way around (IMG:style_emoticons/default/ph34r.gif)