Scales Discrepancy Between Instruments Options

[lizbun]

There seems to be loads of scales for any instrument at grade 8, especially piano

[kenm]

There is a logic to brass instrument fingering, and there is a logic to the structure of the scales, but neither is straightforward, and combining the two at speed puts most people into computing overload. The really stupid characteristic of the main series of ABRSM Grade exams is the need to memorise the scales. This is essential for a jazz player, but is a waste of time for someone who plays only from notation. Playing scales from the sheet music, on the other hand, is an enormous help to sight reading. The point is that runs in real music are not necessarily wholly composed of a single common scale: they are often composed of small variations of a scale (e.g with chromatic notes interpolated), or short extracts from two or more scales, and to make use of the familar sequences (assuming you have practised them sufficiently that they are familiar) you need to recognise the differences or the extracts on the page.

The jazz player, OTOH, ought by Grade 8 to have memorised the scales that go with the 60 common jazz chords: major and minor, with the chords of the same name; two varieties of whole-tone, with the augmented chord; three varieties of octatonic scale, the right two of which go with a diminished chord; and the chromatic scale, which can be useful anywhere. I can't remember what goes with the half-diminished chord: perhaps a jazz expert can tell us. Part of the reason I can't play improvised jazz is that my music theory is inadequate for it.

Brass instruments with four or five valves, such as the double horn or the more elaborate tenor and bass tubas, have alternative fingerings for all but the lowest notes. On the horn, alternatives can be useful, to simplify the fingering of quick runs, to improve tuning or to change tone quality. To give a famous example: there is a six-note solo for Horn 4 in Strauss's "Don Juan" that can be fingered in 432 different ways, IIRC (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif) Rather few of them are sensible, of course.

[briantrumpet]

There is a logic to brass instrument fingering, and there is a logic to the structure of the scales, but neither is straightforward

Hmm, I guess that this is a gentle riposte to my saying that 'there's no logic in trumpet scales' ...

It's rare for me to disagree with you, kenm ... obviously I know the underlying reason for why we've got the sequences of fingerings we have, but I suspect that explaining the logic starting from the comparison of the sequences of fingerings for different scales would be extremely challenging (but probably not beyond you.)

For instance, on trumpet, comparing middle C and the D above it, you might deduce "ah, if you want to go up a tone from an open note, you put down 1+3". But then that doesn't work on G, or top space E. I'll admit that there are some small patterns of discernable logic (for instance, if the middle finger happens to be down, lifting it will always raise the pitch by a semitone; but to go up a semitone for a top space E (no fingers) you put down the first valve, and to go up a semitone from G on top of the stave (no fingers) you put down 2+3.

I guess that I'm being a little provocative, and perhaps I should write that there's "practically no practically applicable logic in trumpet scale fingering sequences"; but, that being a bit of a mouthful, I'll stick with "there's no logic in trumpet scale fingering", as that seems to sum up the position in practice, even though it is not 100% true in theory.

[kenm]

My mental image of any brass instrument except a double horn comprises:

1) The notation of its harmonic series with no valves depressed (i.e. all its open notes);

2) The approximate amount by which each valve lengthens or shortens* the instrument and the lowering or raising of the pitch that results.

These together allow one to work out all the fingerings of any note. On anything but the horn, I would expect the shortest to be chosen, but players of four-valve tubas and plug trombones may have reasons that I don't know about for doing something else.

The double horn is slightly more complicated in that I have mental image 1) for both positions of the thumb valve.

* "Lifting" third valves, taking the instrument up a tone, are popular among horn players in France.

[briantrumpet]

My mental image of any brass instrument except a double horn comprises:

1) The notation of its harmonic series with no valves depressed (i.e. all its open notes);

2) The approximate amount by which each valve lengthens or shortens* the instrument and the lowering or raising of the pitch that results.

These together allow one to work out all the fingerings of any note.

Indeed, kenm - this is indeed the logic which we both apply. But I don't think that leads to what could be labelled logical sequences of fingerings. It is, perhaps, a fine distinction, but a significant one.

I think that there are many interesting musico-psychological studies yet to be done in this area. One interesting question for me is whether brass players who have no keyboard skills have much greater difficulty in grasping scale patterns than those with keyboard skills. And if the answer is a clear 'yes' (which I think is the case), why this should be. I think that it all comes down to perceivable logical patterns.

[kenm]

Indeed, kenm - this is indeed the logic which we both apply. But I don't think that leads to what could be labelled logical sequences of fingerings. It is, perhaps, a fine distinction, but a significant one.

It's a sufficiently complicated chain of logic that one can't expect to follow it at the speed one needs to be able to play - that's why we practise scales, arpeggios and studies - but it's more logical fingering system than woodwind in their higher registers.

I think that there are many interesting musico-psychological studies yet to be done in this area. One interesting question for me is whether brass players who have no keyboard skills have much greater difficulty in grasping scale patterns than those with keyboard skills. And if the answer is a clear 'yes' (which I think is the case), why this should be. I think that it all comes down to perceivable logical patterns.

Well, I can add one example in favour of your hypothesis: I learnt piano for seven years before taking up cornet. However, while this makes scales familiar and perceivable, it doesn't make them logical (to me). To get a general theory of scales that encompasses European scales and, e.g., the two gamelan ones, you need a lot of perceptual acoustics, most of which has been established only in the last 50 years, so is far from being common knowledge among musicians.

[briantrumpet]

Why the discrepancy?

Have we at least partially answered your question, Violinia?

[sarah-flute]

I think woodwind scales are fiendishly difficult. I've just had a Grade 2 recorder player who simply forgot the lot in his exam. He does have learning difficulties but even so I think recorder scales are much more difficult than piano where at least the fingering is logical and you can see what you are playing as well as hear it.

However, I suspect that by the time each instrument has got to Grade 8 the unevenness of the pacing through the grades is ironed out.

^ I think Aquarelle gets it in a nutshell.

As a lousy pianist, a reasonable violinist and a fairly competent flautist, I find piano scales by far the easiest, violin scales not difficult to work out (though difficult to play in tune!) and flute scales a heck of a lot of work which I have become reasonably good at by dint of much practice.

And if you look at the G8 requirements, the differences are much smaller.

Some of it also has to do with range... for instance, I believe the clarinet (and certainly the violin) has several 3 octave scales that appear lower down the grade scale, whereas flute only expects 3 octaves scales off C and those only in G8. Looks unfair? Simple reason is that the expected range of a G8 flautist is only that 3 octaves, and even really good flautists don't range much beyond that (I think you can get about a 4th higher? but it's pretty tough for most), whereas for clarinet and violin with wider working ranges, it's not unreasonable to expect 3 octave scales considerably sooner.

Taking into account that different people find different things easier or more difficult, in my experience the actual difficulty of learning the requirements (as opposed to the number of keys or patterns learned) is pretty even, or even in some cases the requirements with fewer actual scales to learn are still more difficult.

FWIW, the most trouble I've ever had with scale requirements was for treble recorder G1! Only three keys, yes, but with the forked fingerings, the lack of keys to help out, and the fact that some of the fingerings don't feel that logical, I still struggled, especially with the slurred scales and arpeggios. Give me a couple of dozen piano scales to learn any day!