I’ve come to the conclusion that the next thing I need to work on mechanically is short rolls. I don’t put them instinctively, and my playing sounds like it.
The only instruction I’ve received in short rolls was on the whistle; my teacher pointed out that most of the time a short roll will be tongued. I’ve been listening for evidence of some sort of stop in the playing of some flute players, but I don’t hear it. That could mean it’s not there, but, more likely, that it’s just subtle enough that I can’t hear it. So I looked in Larsen’s book, and, sure enough he says that the short roll will begin with a tongue or glottal.
Do y’all agree with this, and if so, is it presumably just a matter of practice to get the rhythm to flow well and to make the stop subtle enough that the short roll doesn’t sound affected?
Also, what do pipers do? I have no trouble doing a short roll on an ascending note, but going, say, from an A to a G short roll just doesn’t work for me without some sort of stop.
Hi Charlie, I’ve been taught not to tongue short rolls, they after all start on the cut of the long roll so don’t really need it. If I did it I’m sure my teacher would mutter about overegging the pudding and gilding lillies! If I then said Grey Larsen said I should then he’d slap me round the head. I would tend to agree with him as I find Larsen’s playing fussy and contrived but his book is a great resource. Long rolls I sometimes tongue depending on where they are if the first note of the long roll is on the first beat of a bar then I might tongue the note before ie the last note of the bar before. I suspect this is something that’s very much up to your own personal preference but generaly I tend to avoid tonguing the first note of any bar either using a breath pulse or a cut to push the tune along.
I reckon you’ll get a few opposing opinions on this one!
Rob
I think the confusion lies in how you define exactly where a short roll starts. It’s common to put a stop (tongue or glottal) just before the roll, if you define the beginning of the short roll as the cut. The way I see it, there are four bits to a short roll, the cut, the note being rolled, the tap, and then finishing back the note being rolled…the rhythm sounds like only three bits: “diddly.” I don’t tongue or glottal anywhere within the roll itself, but I almost always put a glottal stop right before the first cut of the short roll…it gives the tune more lift.
The Limestone Rock is a good tune to practice this technique…there’s a series of short rolls right near the beginning. I put a stop right after the first G, right before the cut on the short G roll.
The rhythm of the opening phrase of the tune sounds like “deeh-daah-bip-da-diddly,” with the “deeh” being the second-octave d, the “daah” being the C natural, the “bip” being the B, the “da” being the G, stopped at the end with a glottal stop, and the “diddly” being the short roll on G (starting with a cut, then G, then a tap).
Actually on this particular tune I put a brief glottal stop between the d, the C, the B, and the G to separate them all, but the brief stop before the short roll is something I do almost all the time. If you listen to Catherine McEvoy on the flute, or Mary Bergin on the whistle, you’ll hear the same thing when they play short rolls, it’s part of what gives their playing such lift.
Depends on how you define a short roll. On pipes its an introductory cut on the note above and then a tap on the rolled note. Going from A to a short roll on G could be done by first closing the A finger, then bouncing the A finger, then tapping the G.