[Trombone-l] alto trombone question

[Steve Gamble]

Hi Jason,

I hope this isn't too general to be helpful.  It's a lot easier to play
alto, or any other double for that matter, if you spend way less time
trying to figure it out and way more time just playing music on it.
Preoccupation with the quirks and tendencies of an instrument just make
it harder to play.  Start off by playing music that you are very
familiar with and just listen for it to sound the way you expect.  When
it doesn't, your corrections will be very direct, authoritative and
accurate, right away (just like they are on tenor, right?).  Why?
Because that's how the song goes.  It's not long before you're plenty
comfy on your new instrument.  The great thing is that you discover that
you can bring this simplified approach to your primary instrument as
well and, whutdaya know, it gets easier to play, too.

I know I'm not addressing your question about transposing parts, but it
sounds like your question comes out of frustration.  And the "that's
just how it is" answer probably doesn't do much for you at this point.
But you'll see that the various historical conventions are not much of a
big deal once you're up and running on the alto.  Just have fun.

Steve Gamble, Librarian
Tucson Symphony Orchestra
2175 N. 6th Ave.
Tucson, AZ  85705
520-792-9155 x118 office
520-792-9314 fax
520-991-7056 cell
sgamble at tucsonsymphony.org
www.tucsonsymphony.org


-----Original Message-----
From: trombone-l-bounces at maillists.samford.edu
[mailto:trombone-l-bounces at maillists.samford.edu] On Behalf Of Jason
Smith
Sent: Wednesday, December 06, 2006 2:17 PM
To: bone list
Subject: [Trombone-l] alto trombone question

I have recently purchased and am struggling to learn
the alto trombone.  I bought a copy of L Mozart's
concerto and am trying to learn.  My question is this 
Why is alto trombone music not written transposed like
so that the positions correspond to the notes on tenor
rather than learn a whole new set of notes and
positions.  To me it would seem to facilitate
switching back and forth, tuning tendencies would
correspond to the same position on the harmonic series
etc.  I entered the music into finale but in bass
clef,  did a quick transposition and now I can
actually come close to playing rather than trying to
learn a who new set of positions?


 
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