How much tension/intensity needed when playing?

[Hiro Ringo]

I have kept learning so many issues out of my Sindt/Reyburn whistle for a while and my latest interest is about the 'tension' we need to play a certain tune which I was a bit careless of when I determined to choose 'off-set' tube by Reyburn.

For example,when playing Bach with modern flute,it's cartainly easier to play his music.With traverso,it's certainly harder.Easier and exciting,easier and boring,harder and exciting,harder and boring.There must be various cases.

Basically I play the same tune with this A whistle in two ways:

a.playing the tune with fourth step down
b.playing the tune with D whistle fingering.

a. method sometimes gets some boring tunes back to life and the opposite case can be also possible and true.

Sometimes I want to play a certain tune with much less tension and the other time I feel the opposite.

I didnt ignore the issue when I determined to choose Reyburn tube but now I feel keenly that this issue is much more important than I ever expected.

A certain amount of tension needed to play a tune well and if you have various choices,that's better. Because you can choose your own proper tension.

This type of insight was what I was lacking when started the new off-set whistle.

By the way, do I use the word 'tension' correctly? Probably I need much more tension to learn English much more seriously. :roll:

[fearfaoin]

By the way, do I use the word 'tension' correctly?

Probably not, because I'm not sure what you're trying to say.
In music, I usually think of "tension" as "a feeling that the
chord progression is about to resolve to the base chord."
Maybe other people will have another definition of tension
that better fits yours...

[Hiro Ringo]

By the way, do I use the word 'tension' correctly?

Probably not, because I'm not sure what you're trying to say.
In music, I usually think of "tension" as "a feeling that the
chord progression is about to resolve to the base chord."
Maybe other people will have another definition of tension
that better fits yours...

Thanks.I understand your 'tension' and I also use the word that way.

What I meant to say by the word 'tension' is the state when one have to spiritually concentrate on something forcibly.

[fearfaoin]

What I meant to say by the word 'tension' is the state when one have to spiritually concentrate on something forcibly.

I see. That's a neat image. I'm having trouble thinking of a good English word for that... "concentration" doesn't seem to cover it.

But I understand what you're getting at. And, certain keys will bring up certain feelings, so the same song in a different key could evoke a different response entirely.

I have been playing around with my A whistle also, trying to play D tunes in D (which is like playing them in G on a D whistle). It does get confusing... But it's an interesting challenge.

[Denny]

the mental aspect of focus?

[Les Cruttenden]

Blimey, i thought i was quite bright....the only tension i could find was in my own mind after reading the thing through twice...couldn't understand a word of it..............I'm sure this has nothing to do with what is being said....but my greatest ability at both art(water colour painter) and music, several instruments...was when the tension got too much for me and about 6 years ago I had a breakdown....don't be cynical...its true...colours and music became more deep and meaningful to me at this time........I could play music that really moved folk...no i dont mean they got up and left!...and my paintings sold...really...I suppose its to do with the fact that ones emotions flow more easily when all the restrictions have fallen away. Now look what you have started!!!!!!!!!!!Best...Les.

[Whitmores75087]

Sorry to hear about that breakdown, Les.

Anyway, being a tense kind of guy by nature, I have to focus on relaxing a bit when playing, especially in public.

But you can relax too much.

I try to envision a piece of rubber hose. It's flexible, but not floppy. When I feel I'm too tense I imagine my arms and fingers as rubber.

Here's a trick my son taught me. If you think you are too tense, turn your attention to your shoulders. If they are drawn up, you're tense. Conciously relax the shoulders and let them drop.

Rubber finders, dropped shoulders. I gotta remember that.

[Chiffed]

Intensity, please. The word 'tension' makes my shoulders ache and my hands cramp.

This is a great topic: how to get, modulate, and play with intensity without producing musculosceletal tension and extreme mental constipation. Two of my favourite musical complements are "they make it look so easy" and "they really ripped the roof off with that tune". How does one do both?
Intensity without tension.

One of my biggest challenges with whistle is the fact that it takes so little physical effort, while my baritone saxophone is more physical, almost athletic, and its physicality makes it easy to play with intensity.

Vibrato is something else to consider (I know that's a whole 'nuther thread). Pitch vibrato seems to relax, loudness vibrato tends to intensify, slow vibrato ending long tones relaxes them and helps to finish phrases. Flattement just sounds like the exhaust on my boat motor when I do it.

Key, mode, tempo, instrumentation, articulation, phrasing, and the phase of the moon all seem to play a part, too.

Let's keep the ideas flowing.

[Hiro Ringo]

Ah sounds like 'intensity' is more proper word for this topic. Thanks.

I didn't mean to eliminate the state called 'relax' by the word 'tension'. Physically relaxed as well as mentally full of inspiration/poesy/concentration,mentally not bored.Something like that,then yeah, intensity.That should be the word for this.

Now for example if one compose one's music,how one demand the proper insensity of each player on the music?The easiest and the most typical way to do that is to set difficult parts to force players into a kind of concentration on the music.

And yes there should be so many other ways to get your proper 'intensity'.

A player utteres a really good perfect tone out of his instrument but he seems not to be satisfied with that and I would ask why then he might say like 'because the sound just flew out without my best proper intensity'.

The problem is whether the listeners can hear/feel the element of so called the word 'intensity'.I personally feel most of them feel that,in most cases unconsciously.
Someone says 'oh it's a good sound and in perfect condition!' but he sells his instrument after all....another keeps grumbling about his instrument but weird,he still remains with his instrument.He seems not to sell it.There are many interesting examples.

Well...under the thinking process like this,I chose my own whistle.

[brewerpaul]

In thinking of players who impress me with their intensity, the one thing that seems common to them is a very strong sense of rhythm. The best players to my ears are those whose rhythmic playing really keeps the tune moving. I'm not talking about blazing speed. I'm talking about a palpable pulse which drives the tune right along even at more modest playing speed. Listen for it.

[Zoe]

I've been thinking a lot about this issue lately, after I saw the Kane Sisters here is Pittsburgh last week. Two amazing fiddle players, but I would definitely want to listen to Liz as a soloist, but not really Yvonne. The difference in their playing was that Liz had a much more palpable love of the music and yet she played it with much more ease and less seriousness than Yvonne. Yvonne played with such intensity and concentration that it stunted her passion and expression. So I'm not sure that intensity is what's called for, if, as it does to me, intensity cannotes a narrowing concentration and fixation. I think ITM is at its best when the pulse, rhythm, lilt, and passion come through without straining and too much serious effort. Better to play tunes you love at a speed that allows your expression to come through.

[Chiffed]

Absolutely. A discerning listener can always tell if you're playing one of your favourites. Flow, groove, emotion, always show to a good listener.

Poor listeners can often be baffled with bull#$%^, and good players can fool most of the people most of the time.

Rhythmic intensity, I agree, is the best hook. Lenny Bernstein talked about this through the paradigm of phrases: little phrases of a beat, a measure, a musical sentence, a question and answer, a formal section, and the structure of the entire piece. Everything with a beginning, middle, and end (turn, turn, turn...).

Lenny went as far as to call an entire evening's concert a phrase. Symmetry, structure, and inevitable flow towards a satisfying conclusion, but not without humour and surprise. Then again, Lenny tried to sell advanced aesthetics and communication theory to kids in his television series. They're available on tape, and well worth it if you ever bashed your noggin against Marshall McCuhan (sp?) in University. Do remember, though: TV's a medium, 'cause anything well done is rare.

[Hiro Ringo]

I'd define the word 'intensity' in this way,I mean,you can apparently see the intensity sometimes,but sometimes you cant see it.Not a matter of quantity.Not a matter of physical speed.Not even a matter of agility sometimes.Not even a matter of good intonation of an well maintained instrument(then why I stick to just intonation and good instument? hehe that's very difficult and more complicated question to answer).So that's something you can grow as long as you live:the age doesnt matter.

Mike Rafferty and Tommy Reck for instance have the intensity but they conceals it,consciously or unconsciously.That's their talent and nature I guess.

....Silly me,then it comes down to the question of why I dared ask 'how much'

.....Well....logical stuff doesnt seem to fit this sort of theme at any rate.