Music Clips
Here are some clips of the Twin City Tuba Band performing various pieces. If you have never heard the group these will give you an idea of what our tuba ensemble sounds like. These recordings were made in the rehearsal hall during practice a few years back. I think most members would say the group sounds better now than it did when the records were made. We hope to update these files soon with more recent performance. To avoid copyright infringement, none of the sound files contains an entire work. Also to keep the bandwidth of our site to a minimum the sample rates of the clips are 48 kbps. You will need some sort of MP3 player to listen to the songs. We hope you enjoy them.
Ave Verum Corpus - Mozart, arranged by Sabourin
New York, New York - Fred Ebb and John Kander, arranged by Skip Gray
English Garden - traditional, arranged by David Werden
Prelude from "Te Deum" - Charpentier, arranged by Skip Gray
Ave Maria - Jacques Arcadelt, arranged by Jim Self
Improvisation Fun
Here is a song to use to practice your improvisational skills. I (Russ Kaiser) am thinking about sharing more of these if this one is well received. The tune is based on the old hymn, "Holy Holy Holy" and has a soft bossa nova feel. The key is concert C, easy for the piano, a little harder for tubas and euphs. The concept here is that the song is well known and simple enough that you should be able to pick out the melody and progression without the help of music or a lead sheet. There are 4 stanzas. The first stanza introduces the melody, slightly altered to fit the bossa nova rhythm. Practice so you can play the melody exactly with the piano. The second stanza is a piano solo. This solo sets the tone for the piece and should be a guide for your improvisational style. During the piano solo practice playing a non-obtrusive part, whole tones, or just tacit. The last two stanzas are for you to solo against. Try whatever you like here but keep within the set style.
To use the piece, right click and then save the file to your own hard drive and play it from there. By just downloading it once you will minimize the bandwidth used on our site.
Thanks for test driving the song. Drop me a line with your thoughts and suggestions.
webmaster@twincitytubaband.org
updated 8/21/2005