One of my most valued possessions was a photograph taken in 1954 of me and Dr. Ralph Vaughan Williams at a reception at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) after a lecture he had just given.
Moving to a new location is difficult whether it’s a mile away or 10,000 miles away and packing up all one’s belongings and determining where they should go is dramatic; which pile to throwaway, store, giveaway or take? Mistakes are always made. I left 13 boxes of stuff I couldn’t throw away in my sister’s garage in Los Angeles in 1989 when I left for Europe; after thirteen years she asked if I would please come and get them. I had a student that lived in LA pack them up in a crate, call the movers and send them to me in Lausanne, Switzerland where they sat, still unpacked for another five years. When my good friends Todd and Rose came to help me pack for the move to Japan, I was embarrassed when after opening the boxes that had been closed for 17 years, I felt I couldn’t part with their contents!
Not only were we packing for my move to Japan, we were looking through all my possessions in the world for my cherished photograph of Vaughan Williams and me.
I was fifteen and a half, I had read about the tuba concerto in Time magazine and had tried everything to get a copy of it. I even wrote a letter to the Library of Congress and received a letter that read something like this:
Dear Roger Bobo,
We have no record of a Concerto for Tuba by Ralph Vaughan Williams and you can be sure that if a composer of the stature of Ralph Vaughan Williams had written a tuba concerto we would know about it.
Good luck in your musical studies.
Library of Congress, Music Department
I heard about his lecture at UCLA, went to it and crashed the reception afterward to meet him. He was a very nice and kind man, he was also completely deaf; Beethoven could not have been deafer! During the lecture he would play musical examples and he had to have somebody tell him when the music had stopped; well almost completely deaf, as his wife, Ursula served as his ears. She was a wonderful woman with a piercing sonic laser beam voice that was able to penetrate his poor hearing.
I waited my turn in the reception line and when I introduced myself and spoke about the tuba concerto Ursula Vaughan Williams translated. “RALPH, THIS YOUNG MAN IS A TUBIST AND HE WOULD LIKE TO KNOW HOW TO GET A COPY OF THE CONCERTO”. Of course everyone in the room was looking by then. I was no longer the low profile boy who crashed the reception. Dr. Vaughan Williams put his arm around my shoulder and told me that the music was being edited at the time and as soon as it was finished he would have the Oxford University Press send me the first copy. While he was talking to me Mrs. Vaughan Williams took a picture of us. I gave them my address and went home and waited.
About a month later I received a copy of the photograph Ursula Vaughan Williams had taken and a note from her saying that they hadn’t forgotten about me and that they expected the edited version to be ready soon. I framed the photo, hung it in my room and waited for the music; it took more than half a year before it came. It arrived rolled up in a tube and when I opened it, “Sent At The Request of Dr. Vaughan Williams”, was printed on the cover. Within minutes after receiving the music it was on my stand and I was trying to play it. It was high! The fact is that I essentially learned how to play the tuba by that piece and little did I know that I would perform that concerto more that 70 times during my career. One of those performances was with the London Philharmonia in 1964 with Joseph Horowitz conducting, it was a good performance, the reviews were very good and best of all Ursula Vaughan Williams was at the performance; seeing her there was a wonderful moment.
Todd, Rose and I spent the better part of a week looking for that picture; while packing for the move to Japan we went through every page of every book, every piece of music and everything looking for it. I know I put it someplace special so that I would never lose it, but I don’t remember where. Or I gave it to someone to keep it for me but I don’t remember who. Very sadly, I think it’s gone forever, however, if ever it miraculously appears you can be sure it will become very visible very quickly.
Lausanne, December 4, 2005
Monday, September 14, 2009
Roger Bannister and the Four Minute Mile
Although this article was first published in June 1004 I feel it’s message is just as applicable to today. Enjoy
Roger
The following letter was received by email on June 27, 2004 in Tokyo, Japan.
Dear Mr. Bobo,
If you get this, this is the tuba player from North Carolina named Kory Faison. I'm just writing to tell you that my journey is about to begin. I told my brother that I was going to be the best tuba player in the world, hands down, but he doesn't believe me. I'll be auditioning for 5 music schools my senior year in high school, but I'm going to take the time now until then to find and perfect my solos. Have you ever heard of ''Dream of a Witches' Sabbath''? Well, if you choose to read this, I've finally proven that I'm one of the best here in North Carolina, but now it's time to prove it to the world. If you're still around in about 10 years, I will be the best tuba in the world, hopefully and I hope that you'll be proud to see that a small town boy has achieved the highest level of success. So, I hope we will meet, eventually.
Thoughtfully,
Kory Faison
Thank you for your letter Kory.
It's strange to have received your letter in my email inbox the very day I planned on starting this essay.
I sincerely hope that you will realize your tuba playing goals, that we will meet someday and that I will still be around. I remember very clearly a letter I wrote to William Bell a very long time ago, when I was in my early teens, which was much the same as your letter to me is today. But I wonder if you know who William Bell was? William Bell was the daddy, well, let's change that to granddaddy, or is it greatgranddaddy of all American tubists. You see, the generations of tubists are not the same as regular generations, by my observations through the 54 years of my tuba awareness; a tuba generation is about every ten years, and as each of these ten-year tuba generations passes into the next I am absolutely amazed at how the level of playing and musicianship improves.
About the same time that I wrote that letter to William Bell, it might have been 1950, I was quite interested in sports, particularly swimming as a competitor and track and field as a spectator; it was a great thrill for me to see world records fall and to see the track and swimming times getting faster and faster. One of my heroes in that period was the Australian mile runner Roger Bannister; he was the man whom the world thought would break the seemingly unachievable goal of the 'four-minute mile'. The world watched as Roger Bannister trained and prepared his strategy for his record breaking run; finely the news came that he had done it. It was a milestone (pun unintended) in track history. Today a four-minute mile is still a very good time but there are hundreds of college and even high school runners that can do it.
When I was a young man, the composer William Kraft, wrote a very fine and special piece for me called Encounters #2; it was considered extremely difficult at that time, and I had heard it said that I was the only person who could play it. If that was true it was only true for a short time; today you can frequently hear it played by high school and college players. I enjoy very much watching this happen.
But, Kory, I'm troubled by one thing; how far can it go? How fast will it be possible for a man to run a mile, will we ever see a limit? And in our tuba community will we continue to excel at the same unbelievable rate that we've seen so far? Of course, I want to believe we can but when we look at the evolution of more traditional instruments like the violin, for example, we don't see the continuing remarkable growth that is presently visible in the tuba. We see generation after generation of remarkable violinists, but we do not see the expansion of the technical capacities any more. Rather we see their ability to express their musicality, their musical soul, and their musical personality. Today, when we listen to the international competitions for tuba we begin to hear the same thing, the same growing ability to project a musical atmosphere. Everybody in these competitions has an extraordinary technique; it's the music they make that makes them winners!
Your goal to become the world's greatest tubist is a noble one, but there are a few things you should know as you begin this quest. First, please keep in mind that there are other young men and women your age that have the same goal. It's very much like the Olympics, not every athlete can win a gold medal. However, the performance of these athletes is enhanced by the energy they receive from their competitors; don't forget that.
There are three pieces of advice I would like to offer as you set off on this tuba quest:
Become part of the extraordinary tuba community; read the magazines and books, join the associations, attend every masterclass and symposium that you can so that you will know what's happening in the tuba world, and listen; listen to every CD, recital and concert possible. Be aware of every aspect of this tuba world that you are entering.
Remember that this tuba community is only a small part of the much bigger and richer musical community; look beyond the tuba, look far beyond the tuba world.
And, be your own teacher. I'm sure you have a great teacher but he or she is your second most important teacher; you are number one! It is fun to think about the things you want in a teacher; let me start your list for you: Good musician, intelligence, kind, wise, patience, perseverance, and please don't forget a good sense of humor. Use the learning tools you have: metronome, tuner, and I hope you have and use a minidisk so you can play something and instantly hear it back. We hear things differently when we hear ourselves without the horn in our hands!
Just one more thing; the experience you'll have in pursuing your quest for the next ten years will probably be more important in your life than achieving your goal of becoming the greatest tubist. Enjoy this time.
So Kory, I wish you luck in this journey, and I look forward to that meeting in ten years.
I'll be around...
Tokyo, June 30, 2004
Sunday, September 06, 2009
E Lesson Logistics
The organization of e lessons has turned out to be more difficult than I originally imagined; I have encountered misunderstandings regarding time zone differences, sound quality problems and a high percentages of cancelations, all seemingly for legitimate reasons. However, even with all these problems I believe the time for successful e lessons, music lessons, has come and that it will become a normal and workable medium. I would like to try once more to organize a schedule of these lessons.
For those interested I propose three steps:
1. An interview between the prospective student and me via Skype, to get to know each other and evaluate our compatibility.
2. A trial lesson to hear the potential student, and to find the optimum sound quality.
3. And to create a meeting time for the first lesson.
My lesson fee here in Japan is $150 per lesson, I plan on initially charging $100 per e lesson, which would be paid through PayPal.
Anyone interested in setting up an interview please contact me a bomaestro@gmail.com
Please note the time differences and calculate a mutually convenient meeting time:
North America;
Eastern daylight time is 13 hours behind Japan time.
Central daylight 14 hours
Mountain daylight time 15 hours
Pacific daylight time 16 hours
Europe:
British daylight time 7 hours
Central European daylight time 6 hours
Ease European daylight time 5 hours
For other countries please calculate the time difference.
I look forward to hearing from you and setting up a time to talk.
Roger Bobo, Tokyo
Saturday, August 29, 2009
Balancing Dynamic and Intensity
The Great Italian Maestro Carlo Maria Giulini used to tell the members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in his thick Italian accent: “My friends, please don’t confuse dynamic with intensity”; I’ve been thinking about those wise words for the last 30 years.
The dictionary defines intensity as a measurement of energy, but regarding music it needs to be a little more defined. Of course, just a measurement of energy would include the difference between loud and soft; certainly, dynamic is a measurement of energy, but for the purpose of this article I will refer to dynamic as the amplitude, the loud and soft of music, and intensity as the ratio of harmonics; that is tone quality.
The nature of sound as we play, speak, or sing, normally increases with intensity when the dynamic increases, and in piano it decreases. For example, compare the soft timbre of a sweet lullaby compared to the hard aggressive quality of a rock and roll singer. However, it doesn’t necessacerely have to be that way, there is much more to sound than just dynamic variety.
Luciano Pavarotti, for example, was able to sing very softly with great intensity, and a great actor can speak a text in a very soft voice, even a whisper but with frightening intensity; some of the most terrible villains in film and theater speak in a menacingly intense soft voice. Intensity can be the regulator of our musical quality; a pianissimo with no intensity is a weak, often unstable sound, which is nearly impossible to play with regarding intonation. And a fortissimo with too much intensity can simply be ugly.
In playing music we have both dynamics and intensity as our tools of expression, balancing the two leads toward a much richer sonic vocabulary; it’s important to use them both and not to confuse them.
Part of our job as brass players, as well as maintaining our techniques of fingers, breathing, articulation, and embouchure control, is to be aware of that chronic balance calibration between dynamic and energy and to make our personal decision for the correct mix for the correct occasion. But particularly, as lower brass players we need to formulate our opinion as to whether the bass notes, the tuba notes, those that are required in most of our playing, should simply be a big sound with wide amplitude to put a basic bottom on a brass section or to calculate an energy to that sound that is more homogeneous with the higher brasses. I won’t offer an opinion regarding this but I will only say that I have been fascinated by this question for my full playing career. We, with the help of the people we work with, have a choice. Certainly, the correct solution will very from person to person as well as through diverse styles and repertoire. Personally, I recommend keeping an open mind and continuing the search for that correct calibration, the correct mix; it’s more interesting than staying with the comfortable and predictable. Sound is part of our musicality and musicality is a growing aspect that needn’t ever stop evolving. Enjoy this search.
August 29, 2009, Tokyo
The dictionary defines intensity as a measurement of energy, but regarding music it needs to be a little more defined. Of course, just a measurement of energy would include the difference between loud and soft; certainly, dynamic is a measurement of energy, but for the purpose of this article I will refer to dynamic as the amplitude, the loud and soft of music, and intensity as the ratio of harmonics; that is tone quality.
The nature of sound as we play, speak, or sing, normally increases with intensity when the dynamic increases, and in piano it decreases. For example, compare the soft timbre of a sweet lullaby compared to the hard aggressive quality of a rock and roll singer. However, it doesn’t necessacerely have to be that way, there is much more to sound than just dynamic variety.
Luciano Pavarotti, for example, was able to sing very softly with great intensity, and a great actor can speak a text in a very soft voice, even a whisper but with frightening intensity; some of the most terrible villains in film and theater speak in a menacingly intense soft voice. Intensity can be the regulator of our musical quality; a pianissimo with no intensity is a weak, often unstable sound, which is nearly impossible to play with regarding intonation. And a fortissimo with too much intensity can simply be ugly.
In playing music we have both dynamics and intensity as our tools of expression, balancing the two leads toward a much richer sonic vocabulary; it’s important to use them both and not to confuse them.
Part of our job as brass players, as well as maintaining our techniques of fingers, breathing, articulation, and embouchure control, is to be aware of that chronic balance calibration between dynamic and energy and to make our personal decision for the correct mix for the correct occasion. But particularly, as lower brass players we need to formulate our opinion as to whether the bass notes, the tuba notes, those that are required in most of our playing, should simply be a big sound with wide amplitude to put a basic bottom on a brass section or to calculate an energy to that sound that is more homogeneous with the higher brasses. I won’t offer an opinion regarding this but I will only say that I have been fascinated by this question for my full playing career. We, with the help of the people we work with, have a choice. Certainly, the correct solution will very from person to person as well as through diverse styles and repertoire. Personally, I recommend keeping an open mind and continuing the search for that correct calibration, the correct mix; it’s more interesting than staying with the comfortable and predictable. Sound is part of our musicality and musicality is a growing aspect that needn’t ever stop evolving. Enjoy this search.
August 29, 2009, Tokyo
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
Lessons on Line
Its time has come, its emergence into the music education world is inevitable, we have both the audio and video technology to assure that it works. I have enjoyed exploring in this new teaching mode possibility and have been struck by how efficient it is and the possibilities it opens.
Setting up the camera and microphone is not difficult and in most cases the microphone in the computer seems functional enough. In fact, the only problem regarding both audio and video is having the highest quality Internet connection possible, which unfortunately, is not consistent from location to location or even day to day. Skype, which usually works very well in Japan, needs to also work well also at the location of the student. The only problem I’ve experienced is that sometimes there is a small amount of static, which is a Skype problem.
There is absolutely no question that this new mode of music education will become increasingly more available. Of course, it’s been available in general education for the last decade but the study of mathematics, medicine and economics rarely requires the high quality digital sound necessary in music.
There are other small problems to study. Of course, both the teacher and student need to have a copy of the printed music printed music; are there copyright laws to be concerned about in making the music available on line?
And how shall the method of payment work not to mention what the payment should be; should an e-lesson cost the same as a private lesson when the student comes to the teacher? --- Not serious problems but still decisions that need to be made.
I’m especially enjoying dreaming of the aspect of teaching on line frequently enough to make a livable income. It’s a nice dream because that would enable the teacher the possibility of living almost anywhere in the world of his choosing. Happily, if that possibility should present itself I think I would stay in Japan right where I am now.
If you would like to take a trial e-lesson please contact me. I expect to have everything worked out by September. In the meantime I plan to take a non-musical vacation exploring the beauties of this amazing country.
Tokyo, July 9, 2009
Setting up the camera and microphone is not difficult and in most cases the microphone in the computer seems functional enough. In fact, the only problem regarding both audio and video is having the highest quality Internet connection possible, which unfortunately, is not consistent from location to location or even day to day. Skype, which usually works very well in Japan, needs to also work well also at the location of the student. The only problem I’ve experienced is that sometimes there is a small amount of static, which is a Skype problem.
There is absolutely no question that this new mode of music education will become increasingly more available. Of course, it’s been available in general education for the last decade but the study of mathematics, medicine and economics rarely requires the high quality digital sound necessary in music.
There are other small problems to study. Of course, both the teacher and student need to have a copy of the printed music printed music; are there copyright laws to be concerned about in making the music available on line?
And how shall the method of payment work not to mention what the payment should be; should an e-lesson cost the same as a private lesson when the student comes to the teacher? --- Not serious problems but still decisions that need to be made.
I’m especially enjoying dreaming of the aspect of teaching on line frequently enough to make a livable income. It’s a nice dream because that would enable the teacher the possibility of living almost anywhere in the world of his choosing. Happily, if that possibility should present itself I think I would stay in Japan right where I am now.
If you would like to take a trial e-lesson please contact me. I expect to have everything worked out by September. In the meantime I plan to take a non-musical vacation exploring the beauties of this amazing country.
Tokyo, July 9, 2009
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