Do you 'take breaths' when playing wind instruments?

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Do you 'take breaths' when playing wind instruments?

Postby Hugh-AR » 25 Jun 2022 08:35

Now ...

Do you make your keyboard 'take breaths' when playing wind instruments?

This is something I feel strongly about so hope to get some comments .. and also maybe end up agreeing to disagree.

Everywhere I look, people say "When playing eg. a Clarinet, make sure you make appropriate 'pauses' so the clarinet player can take a breath". We have discussed this elsewhere in the forum, which I will repeat here:



You have brought up the very interesting concept of how an instrument should be played.

Some instruments, like trumpets, horns and trombones are played 'smoothly', and once they 'sound', if you continue 'blowing' they will continue 'sounding' until you stop blowing or run out of breath. Which is an important point to consider when you are playing one of these instruments on your keyboard. If you have a long series of notes for the instrument to play, then a real eg. trumpet player would stop momentarily in order to take a breath .. and then continue with the melody. So to replicate this, one ought to take one's finger off the keyboard momentarily from time to time. It is so easy to just continue with the instrument playing the melody non stop from beginning to end.

With a stringed instrument, like a violin or a cello, the sound is created by running the 'bow' over the strings. And the bow has a 'finite' length. So the 'string' player has to momentarily stop and move the bow in the opposite direction.

This all comes down to whether you want your piece to sound as if the 'real' instruments are playing it, or if you are playing your keyboard as a keyboard with an overall 'voice' that sounds like a trumpet/clarinet/stringed instrument.

Here is what PeterA had to say about this in one of his posts elsewhere in this Forum:
Mentioning Breath, don’t forget a Clarinetist has to breathe regularly. So when you use that voice on your Keyboard you should also ‘take breaths’. One way of perfecting this is to take a breath as you begin to play a phrase, and as you let it out see how long you can maintain it before you have to take another. This should help you to lift your fingers from the keys at appropriate points, especially at the end of phrases in order to allow the Clarinetist to 'take a breath’.

And this comment from AndyG:
As for breathing, that's something that keyboard players often don't let their wind and brass players do and the results can be artificial - and you have a dead virtual player who hasn't breathed during the whole song! :) So think phrasing here. If you have lyrics in the music, follow them and they'll tell you where the natural breathing points are. If there are phrase marks, these will do the same. One possible exception is when you have a wind player who is adept at circular breathing - think Kenny G on sax, for example. You can then have really long solo sax lines, but don't tire the player out completely!

Then we have instruments that are best described a 'percussive' instruments. You hit the note, and even when you hold it down the sound will 'fade away'. Like the piano or vibes. No breaths needed for these people, so just carry in merrily for the whole piece without even having to think about taking 'pauses'. But, as they are 'percussive' instruments you do have to play them with a certain amount of 'attack' when playing the notes. So you can't play a piano part 'smoothly' as you would a horn.

On my AR, once you have played a piece you can theoretically 'change the instrument' you are playing with after you have recorded it .. and it will play from the floppy disk with the new instrument you have chosen. But because there will be a difference in the way you have played it (ie. smoothly or percussively), changing an instrument sound is often not an acceptable option. Of course you can do this with a keyboard too if you record in MIDI.

Hugh



The point I want to make is ... I am not playing a Clarinet! I am playing a KEYBOARD with 'the sound of a Clarinet'. So my Clarinet doesn't have to take a breath. I play things playing my keyboard 'as a keyboard' and not trying to pretend I am playing the real instrument. Here is my version of Stranger On The Shore. No pauses for 'breaths'!

Click the below to listen.
Then afterwards, click the back-arrow at the top to get back to this page.
'Stranger On The Shore' played on the Tyros 4 with a 'Clarinet sound'.

Another piece I have played with a 'Clarinet' (?). Petite Fleur. No pauses for 'breaths'!

Click the below to listen.
Then afterwards, click the back-arrow at the top to get back to this page.
'Petite Fleur' played on my AR80 with a 'Clarinet sound'.

I don't think a real Clarinet could be played the way I have played either of these pieces. But then why would a real Clarinet try to emulate the Clarinet on my keyboard?

Anybody got any comments on the above?
Have
you played a piece where you have deliberately put in 'pauses' for breaths?
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Re: Do you 'take breaths' when playing wind instruments?

Postby Hugh-AR » 26 Jun 2022 21:40

Here is one Brian007 has played, with this comment underneath!
Unfortunately the sax player died shortly after the recording owing to severe shortage of breath, and the drummer is in hospital with a Repetitive Strain Injury :D :D :D

I think of you - Merseybeat's 1964

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https://app.box.com/s/2rjrfvbvqpudoliq8tjcoeglwdd0tuua

Hugh
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Re: Do you 'take breaths' when playing wind instruments?

Postby Hugh-AR » 10 Sep 2022 22:42

And here is one by Ron Fraser where he has deliberately taken 'breaths' to make his instruments sound more realistic - Les Parapluies de Cherbourg. Not the Piano, obviously! That doesn't need to take breaths! Strings don't need to take breaths either .. but you do have to change the direction of the bow every so often.

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https://app.box.com/s/fbatt7ys9niod6rrids2vqcbla4rfw9y

I still reckon it is difficult for a keyboard player to get those pauses for 'breaths' in the right place unless it is an instrument they can actually play.

Hugh
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Re: Do you 'take breaths' when playing wind instruments?

Postby Ron » 11 Sep 2022 15:59

We have discussed this. Hugh and I would make the point that Yamaha have tried very hard in sampling the various instruments to make them sound realistic. That is why I try and make my playing of some instruments sound as realistic as I can. On woodwind or brass instruments this is easily done by taking brief breathing breaks. I also tend to take breaks when using a guitar especially acoustic guitar. I realise that we are all playing a keyboard and some tend to hold on to the notes far too long. However, lots of people do not come from a long musical background and do not always realise that their recordings could be improved by phrasing the tune more as eg with breathing breaks. I do not always follow this concept as sometimes I am desperate just to make a recording without errors which is not always easy in my case and so forget about realistic phrasing etc.

Well worth giving it a try in my opinion and see if you notice any difference when listening to the final product. :D

Regards

Ron
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