Last IVSO Concert of the season

So yesterday was the last concert for the 14-15 season with the Illinois Valley Symphony Orchestra.  We played some great rep.  Listen below for the pieces we played (not our recording, but so you can get a taste of the music)

Enjoy!

Newest Project

So I am reading Ray Still's online book and I've decided to seriously start to collect a solid teaching repertoire.  I use a lot of method books to give beginners a chance to learn how to move their fingers, air, embouchure, etc. But I always get bored of the student just going through the motions since the books get really repetitive.  Still suggests using actual music or making actual music to hone the basic skills.  This is a great idea!  That being said I need to start collecting pieces (experts to full tunes) that are good for all levels.  I find that I will get ahead of myself (actually my student) and assign an actual composed piece and then it is too much for them to handle.  I am still learning how to teach better everyday so any suggestions are welcome. 

So far I have Sinfonia from Cantata 156 (JS Bach)
Also the solo melody from Swan lake I've started to use and that seems to be going well for intervals and jumps for a beginner.
More to come! Feel free to share your knowledge.

More Genius Thoughts from Ray Still

"The body is smarter than the mind; if you think in terms of the goal, the body can do the rest, unhindered by too much thinking."

-Ray Still
http://www.raystill.com/book/part1-chap1.html

Reading

So I just started reading the Ray Still book Playing the Oboe. 

I am on the introduction :) Literally I just started reading it. That being said, I already want to share some of it with you.  Hopefully to inspire you to read it as well.

It's All About the Music

My own experience has taught me that it is only this passion for music that can motivate us to persist in the hard and often discouraging work of mastering an instrument. Though years of teaching students at every level, I've observed that the most important principle for any musician is to keep your eyes on the goal—the ability to play music as close to your ideal performance as possible.

Love, of course, can't be taught. But a method that works and is not destructive or too discouraging (or too boring) should be one that engages our love of music and focuses on the works created by the greatest minds in music history, the music of Bach, Mozart, Schubert, Brahms, Beethoven, Schumann, Haydn, and Handel for starters. I believe that it should be a method that insists on the vital connection between the sometimes tedious work of learning to control this seemingly obstinate instrument and the glorious experience of expressing music.

Still, Ray. Playing the Oboe. http://raystill.com/book/intro.html, accessed March 12, 2015.

I really enjoy how his approach is to inspire musicians through the love of music, not beat them over the head with tedious traditions, but try to incorporate the need of those traditions with what we love about music and making music.  Nothing worth having comes easy, it will always be hard work.  But as a teacher try to show the love part early on.  Show the students the part of making music that gets your blood to stir and inspires you to continue to improve.

Again I just started to read this. so we will see where it takes us!

Sharing!

So not sure to put this on my oboe or personal site so here goes on both.  Love this guy.  I am not a jazz expert but he has great insight into the craft.  Check it out!

Tour De Fourths by Mike Lebrun

Cool Article-Music is the BEST! ...take oboe lessons! ;)

New study takes note of music’s benefits

Taking lessons at an early age helps brain’s health later

BY AMY ELLIS NUTT THE WASHINGTON POST

Learning to play an instrument in youth helps older people retain listening skills, according to a new study published in the Journal of Neuroscience.

In an experiment at the Rotman Research Institute at Baycrest Health Sciences in Toronto, scientists studied 20 adults, ages 55 to 75, half of whom had music training in their youth and half who did not.

All the subjects wore headphones and were tested using electroencephalography for how fast they could identify random speed sounds, the scientists said.

The ability to recognize and comprehend speech diminishes with age even without measurable hearing loss, but in the experiment those who had experience playing an instrument were 20 percent faster in identifying random speech sounds than the nonmusicians, suggesting that music training protects against certain age-related cognitive declines.

“Musical activities are an engaging form of cognitive brain training,” said lead author Gavin Bidelman, now at the University of Memphis, in a news release.

“In our study we were able to predict how well older people classify or identify speech,” he said. “We saw a brain-behavior response that was two to three times better in the older musicians compared to non-musician peers.

“In other words, old musicians’ brains provide a much more detailed, clean and accurate depiction of the speech signal, which is likely why they are much more sensitive and better at understanding speech.”

Bidelman and his team concluded that engaging in formal music training before the age of 14 and continuing for at least a decade produced the most positive changes in the brain.

While the study did not look at learning a musical instrument later in life, the results add to a growing body of evidence that suggests learning to play an instrument at any age is beneficial to brain health.

Earlier this year researchers at the University of Vermont found that the more a child trains on an instrument the better he or she is in attention, management of anxiety and emotional balance.

And in 2013 scientists in Montreal provided evidence suggesting that ages 6 to 8 were a kind of “sweet spot” for music training in terms of producing long-lasting positive effects in motor skill and sensory perception.

“In our study we were able to predict how well older people classify or identify speech.”

— Gavin Bidelman, lead author of the study

Sectional Coaching for LPHS tomorrow

So I am learning some scores for a sectional rehearsal tomorrow for LPHS that I am helping with the Oboe section.  AND this lovely tune came up in my youtube feed while I am trying to find recordings.

I a not a band lit expert (I am an orchestra lit expert). So this might be a super common tune, but I really enjoyed it. SO I am sharing it.

Nice recording too by the North Texas Wind Symphony.  Oh Texas and their great land of bands!

Anyways.  I really enjoy this piece. Nice arches, nice flow, nice movement and use of instrumentation.  I hope you do to.

Oh and some great oboe solos ;)

Blast from the Past!

This is a bit frustrating since the NIU site does not let you embed this youtube page, BUT click the link below for a little of me and my quintet in Grad School a couple years ago.

NIU Honors Convocation - Milhaud - La Cheminée du Roi René - III - Jongleurs

Flute: Zach Weiss

Oboe: Stepher Eng

Clarinet: Amanda Kayser

Bassoon: Martha Jacobson

French Horn: Kate Swope

New Gouger

 Here is a short one!  I recently purchased my very first Oboe Gouger! It is an RDG 11 mm Gouger!  I found it on ebay for a steal! Yay!

Oboeing hard core right now.

www.stephereng.com

Recent Audition

Hello world,

So I recently audition for the the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Assistant Oboe position.  I generally get all mysterious and don't like to talk about my audition process or preparation or results with people because I am insecure and doubt myself.  That being said I am trying to move past those negative feelings to be able to share them with the world.  Maybe they will help someone, maybe being more open and less insecure will help me too! 

So the MSO is a great musical organization.  In the US their are only a select number of full time (salaried) orchestras that pay a livable wage.  The MSO is one of them.  (Pressure Pressure Pressure.)  That being said, when people win these auditions they hold onto their posts for as long as they can (or until they win another audition with another ensemble).  That being said (again!) the amount of full time orchestra openings are slim pickings. THAT is for the entire United States of America! And if you have a life, or other commitments that keep you in a certain area of the country your options are even more limited. All of this puts a lot of pressure for the vast amount of talented players that are pumped out from our college and conservatory systems in the US.  The audition committees have a vast selection of really great players that line up for these auditions.  (More pressure!)  SOOOO all of this culminates to me being VERY NERVOUS and  second guessing my abilities to interpret and retell my version of the music.  Not only the technical aspects of getting all the notes, rhythm, intonation, dynamics, phrasing....all of it, but being musical and actually enjoying what I am playing.  

Now we are at the MSO audition that just happened.  I was prepared.  The list of excerpts was reasonable with measure numbers (phew! I hate when they don't list the exact requirements and scare you into thinking you have to play the whole symphony!)  I felt great about some and ok about others.  I had a reed that I loved, but nervous since my backups were iffy.  Then it comes time to actually audition and classic Stepher I miss my high D :( on the Barber excerpt.  This mistake kills  me because it is mostly in my head.  I have taught myself over time to be terrified of slurring up to a high D because I always grunt it out and miss the entrance.  This being said.  I actually don't miss the high D anymore, I USED to miss the high D, but that fear has been so entrenched in my playing that my fears like to come true.  

So my convoluted diary entry about auditions is really about this: Don't worry about missing notes ahead of time.  What does that do!!!?? Nothing!  Just expect to play the notes they way you are planning to play them.  Expect to play the music the way you prepared it.  Then most likely you WILL play the music the way you expect.  I miss that note because I EXPECTED TO MISS IT!! STOP IT!  ok enough yelling at myself.  

Moral of my story: expect greatness from yourself and you will get greatness.  Expect to mess up stupid little mistakes and you will find yourself messing up stupid little mistake cause you are thinking about them instead of the great things. 

Thank you for reading another set of ramblings from www.StepherEng.com  Enjoy your day