Phrasing

Whistle
1

When I’m playing, I feel like my repeats (going from the end of A back to the start of A) are too obvious. Any advice for making them more smooth/less obviously repetitive? I thought about maybe trying to play the second time through in a slightly different style or avoid taking a breath at the end of the last phrase in the repeated section…

2

You got it in one PallasAthena, take your breath before the end of any eight bar section or just after the start of a B section.
Off course you still have to pick the right spot or it will sound disjointed.
Check your PM’s.

3

There seem to be two different (though related) topics involved:

  1. the placement of “breathing places”
  2. variation

About breathing spaces, you’ll hear the old-style traditional players use various approaches. If I may boil these down to the two extremes, they could be thought of as:

  1. breathing in the same places each time in a given phrase, so that the breathing places in effect become part of the arrangement. (If you play an instrument that doesn’t breath, and you’re learning a tune from somebody that plays like this, you’ll have gaps here and there in the tune which you have to come up with notes for.)
    Many of the old fluteplayers would consistently take a breath at the end of each phrase, seperating the tune into clear segments. Though one would think that this predictability would be boring to listen to, in their hands it sounds “right”.

  2. breathing in different places each time a phrase is played, so that the breathing places become part of the tune’s variety, and the listener, over the several repeats of the various phrases, can hear the totality of the tune.

Neither is “right” or “wrong”.

About variation, most players vary the parts as they repeat them. Varying the breathing places is one of the many ways to vary a tune. You mention the turnarounds, or pickups, for each part. Changing those can also be part of a tune’s variations.

4

Well put.

Indeed some tunes have notes at the end of the section to clearly emphasize resolution, i.e., they’re “obvious” by design (and perhaps a little boring). Take, The Boys of Bluehill, and other hornpipes for examples.

5

With respect to breathing, there are choices, some better than others, depending on the tune. You can shorten longer notes and breathe therein or omit one note of a triplet, e.g. Don’t be afraid to experiment, but do be guided by fine players. Record and listen to what you’ve done to avoid wierd sounding bad habits or less than good ways to change up (I’ve worked my way through some of many of those bad habits, usually because someone else has said “Uh huh, I don’t think most people would do it that way” Translation = That’s rediculous, awful sounding, destruction of a lovely tune).

Philo