raystrobel47 | That was cool (Reply)

At Chatham, I teach what's called "Talent X", which introduces the different instrument families to the young kids who attend. I, of course, teach the brass instruments. Amy G., who teaches woodwinds, (and happens to be the daughter of my CMU composition professor) is an oboist, which means she also plays English Horn. Well, I got to play it today, and dooood was it cool. I remember taking oboe for my woodwind methods class, and I surprisingly did quite well on oboe, helped probably by the fact that as a trumpet player I'm used to lots of resistance in producing the sound. The English Horn had a beautiful mellow tone, and once I got a couple of notes I started to get a feel for the lower range and even some above the break.

The best part is that she began to teach me to play the "Going Home" theme from Dvorak's "New World Symphony". I had surprised

fiannaharpar last week by calling her and having Amy play that into the cell phone. :-) In fact, I hadn't even realized that she was teaching me that theme until I got the first two or three notes. (C and E-flat, on the E-flat english horn. you figure out concert pitch.) Unfortunately, my last private student of the day showed up right as I was getting into it. Amy even commented that I had a pretty good sound on it too. Squee!! Ok, I totally wouldn't mind having one of those around, except that I am not in the position to make my own bloody reeds.