first jam/session, help with breathing!

Whistle
1

In around 4 days i have my first jam/session,with a guitarist and myself on whistle performing 3 tunes. Im still having problems with breathing , especially if the tune is fast and full of quavers throughout, eg Drowsy Maggie. I run out of breathe or my notes are inconsistant. Can anyone suggest any way of working at this. I try to catch a breathe from my diaphram whenever i come across a crotchet or similar small note/rest.
I guess its a case of performance anxiety!!

Please help me!

2

My only advice is breathe BEFORE you NEED to. That way, you decide where to take the breath and it can be a small one. If you wait until you need to breathe, you’ll be forced to take it at an inappropriate point in the music and it will be a big gushing yawn.
Cheers,
jb

3

Breathing before you need to is very good advice. But knowing when to take that breath is a little more complicated. The first piece of advice is to listen - lots! - to traditional flute and whistle players, and see where they breathe. You’ll gradually develop an instinct for what works.

That said, there are a few basic rules you can give yourself.

  • In dance music, you must never, ever hold up the beat while you take a breath. Which means that:
  • You must either shorten a note, or skip one entirely, in order to take a breath. In jigs, for example, you can often skip the second note in a group of three. You'll need to breathe fast!
  • Always breathe after a strong or important note in the tune, not before. Breathing before such a note will kill the flow of the tune.

There’s more that could be said, but these are good points to start with. And listen carefully to figure out what good players do.

ATB with your performance,
Steve

PS: Ideas for the tune you mentioned, Drowsy Maggie: in the first part, there are a series of crotchet (quarter-note) Es beginning the bars. You can take a breath after any of these notes by converting them into a quaver, snatching a breath, and then continuing with the next note without missing a beat. It may seem surprising, but the way many traditional players would do this would be to breathe after the very first note in the tune - particularly on the 2nd and 3rd time through, etc. In the second part (in the most common version of this tune), the first bar begins with a crotchet D and has a crotchet C# on the 3rd beat. You can safely convert either of these into a quaver and grab a breath there.

HTH,
S

[ This Message was edited by: StevieJ on 2001-07-31 10:20 ]

4

Hi Brownja and StevieJ, thanks for the feedback, ill try and put it into practice. I have a few days before my first “gig” on the whistle , so i better get back to Drowsy Maggie. After the gig, i might start a new post reflecting on a whistlers first gig and how it went and all that.