Welcome to our podcast, Band BFS.
The podcast where we make your music selection less complicated.
On today's episode, we are going to be discussing Ghost Ship, arranged by Michael Story.
Cheers to starting the conversation.
Okay, Ghost Ship is a great little grade one piece on the Texas PML.
It's a traditional sea shanty.
Absolutely.
You can't go wrong with a good old sea shanty.
All right.
It's about two minutes and 15 seconds long.
It's a really short piece, 70 something measures in three, four time.
It does have a key change.
It starts in the key of concert E flat or C minor and modulates to the key of F or D minor.
So that's a sometimes a pretty tricky key change for younger players.
For little trombones that can't decide between three and two.
It is single parts on clarinet, trumpet, alto, all of that.
The low brass and low reed part is unison.
Very minimal percussion.
While there are lots of percussion instruments, they are very rarely playing at the same time.
So this is a piece that you could get away with playing with a very small percussion
section.
Like honestly, probably three.
You could do it with three humans.
Yeah.
For sure.
Better with four.
But yeah.
Okay.
So this piece starts off very slow and then it gets faster after a little while with some
percussion effects.
It has like a little suspended cymbal.
It's supposed to sound like, you know, the waves.
Like the water rolling in and out.
So you want to be, I mean, I know it sounds silly, but you do want to make sure that your
percussionist, that's right.
You need to practice that suspended cymbal roll, ebb and flow so that it gives the musical
effect that we're trying for.
Like going from the edge of the cymbal towards the bell and back out and not overdoing it
to where you're like, what is happening?
Are they doing that on purpose or not?
Exactly.
It's kind of a special effect.
Right.
Yep.
At five, the flutes alone enter along with this continued suspended cymbal roll.
So you should not play this piece unless you feel really confident in your flute section.
And your clarinet.
Yes.
And your clarinet, I mean, sorry, flute only for about 10 measures.
Very exposed.
They play alone.
Yes.
Dotted quarter note and eighth note rhythms in three, four, but nothing ridiculous.
What I think makes it a little more challenging is the dotted quarter rhythm happens on beat
two instead of beat one.
So you're not feeling one and three, but you're feeling one, two and one.
Yeah.
So yeah, it feels a little different.
Your story did, however, give flutes like breath marks together.
So we're not having to work on phrasing through a bar line and things like that.
So he actually marked a lot of the breath marks in throughout the piece to make it be something
unified for the group.
Again, as Laura mentioned, lots of beat two dotted quarter notes.
It goes up to a B flat on the flute.
So it's not super duper high, but of course you would want to make sure that your students
can make a great sound since they're completely exposed.
And it is not even all tongued.
There are various articulations, some slurs, but nothing ridiculous.
After they end, there's like a little chime set with them.
And then there's one measure of silence with the suspended cymbal still rolling.
And then the majority of the rest of the band comes back, comes in at 15, but not everybody.
And the melody transfers over to trumpet and clarinet.
And Alto has a part with them as well, a harmony part, the alto and horn part.
The low brass accompaniment part here is really straight ahead.
You've got dotted half notes followed by a quarter rest and quarter notes on beat two
and three.
So I think the part itself is easy standing alone, but you have to make sure that those
dotted half notes touch the rest and that we're giving a good strength of articulation.
This is a very moderate tempo.
We're talking 80, 85 BPM here, but you want to make sure that the strength of articulation
on all of the notes is clear, especially some of the low brass have repeated notes in this.
So just making sure, again, that strength of articulation is clear and comes through
long notes always touch the rest.
Katie already mentioned the fact that Michael's story has written in a lot of the breathmarks.
While I think that's awesome and I very much appreciate it, I think it's still easy to
make it sound immature.
So you can still coach your students on how to take quick breaths.
We even, like I have an exercise that I do with my ensembles where we practice taking
different values of breath.
We do it in our daily drill where we are playing an eight count concert F and we practice it
taking a two count breath.
Then we practice it taking a one count breath, then an eighth note, an eighth count breath,
and eighth notes worth breath, and then a triplet, a third of a triplet breath.
So now with a non-varsity or sub-non-varsity, you might not want to go quite that far, but
I think it's important if we expect the kids to practice taking quick breaths, quick metered
breaths in music, you have to practice it in your fundamentals so that they are getting
that repetition.
And then speaking of breathmarks, because you know, that's what we're talking about.
I actually write in my parts when I mark them, I'll write in the beat that they breathe on
in their part.
So if it's marked in for them, in this case, they're breathing on the and of three.
I will write like one under the quarter note and then two and three, and then I'll write
the and right underneath the breathmark and circle them together so that way the students
know exactly where I'm going to take a breath.
Again, that kind of goes back to what you're saying.
It's teaching them how to.
How to meter it to and how not to just take like, it's a breath.
I'm just going to breathe forever, you know, and you know, that's a really good idea.
And somebody very wise once told me and I learned Pete Tolhysen.
Thank you so much.
He was teaching some students with me and he said the note before the breathmark should
always be longer than the breath.
And so that always sticks with me and I say that to my own students, but that is a good
way to teach younger students exactly when to breathe.
You're going to breathe right when your foot tap goes up and then you have to come right
back in and like those low brass kids, like you said with that dotted half note, one and
two and three and off to so they're really breathing on the and of one.
So I would go so far as to write the and and put a breathmark myself so that they understand
they're going to have a half count breath before they have to come back in on two, three,
one.
That's exactly right.
Yeah.
So that's good information, but hopefully that would help you in any situation with if
breathmark are written in for your kids, how to teach them to take it and not just, oh,
yep, breathe there, you know, exactly.
There are a couple of accidentals, just concert a natural accidentals throughout here only
in the melody part.
So that would be something I'd be intentional about making sure your students are aware
of and then find when the concert a flat comes back in and I that would be something I would
absolutely make sure is marked in their music.
Sure.
I'm a little bit measure 20 the same melodic instruments that had the melody before they
have quarter note quarter note breathmark three and in the three and of course are pickups
into the next phrase.
So that's another great instance where we would practice.
Ta, ta, ta, ta, so that way they don't clip the the quarter note that happens right before
which that's the biggest thing that we hear like yeah, yeah, big gaps in the sound.
I also talked to my ensemble about every end of a note needs to end and I got this from
Kathy Johnson since we're like sharing all of our yeah, that's what good teachers do
you steal.
So Kathy Johnson said this that your notes should end with an a h sound.
So we want them to end with a vowel sound and ah, and I love the idea of having that
h at the end of it because it's impossible to clip the sound if you think about it with
an a h ending.
So that again that would be something I would practice with the students so that it doesn't
sound clipped it doesn't sound choppy.
Yep.
And the low brass are continuing to play underneath that anyway so hopefully that would continue
to make the the seamlessness be there.
Then we have this like little transition moment where the melody are playing on beat one with
dotted half notes.
Bass and oboes have rest two three rest two three and we're crescendoing crescendoing
and this is where they have to watch you because then at 25 it's suddenly faster but faster
is moderate 112 so not crazy right yeah and it's like like a boat horn goes off because
it's called go ship.
So there's like the trumpets are in a major second and then the alto saxophone has a color
note with them too so it does sound like very much like a boat horn.
Yeah it's a cluster chord for sure.
And then the lows just have staccatos one and three and two and one but that's harder
to count than you think.
It feels weird like everything has been in three and you're feeling like four four.
That's right you're feeling these like I call my you know when my kids we talk about triangles
and squares you're feeling this triangle time signature but you're you're feeling this square
placed over the triangle.
Now this transition this would be something you need to isolate and practice a lot because
you're snare drummer is very active.
Yeah it comes in with you know one and two and three and one and two and three and one
so it's a they need to be right in time and then of course you have the low brass and
low reeds with their one and so that all has to line up perfectly with the percussion.
Yeah that transition is something that you will need to spend time practicing.
It's basically a two measure transition.
Once you get that down then you should be you know confident through the end of this
you'll maintain the same tempo.
So that first boat horn moment at 25 is forte then two measures later like Laura mentioned
actually pickups into it the clarinets take over the melody and this section also has
to be really good but it's written in a great range for the clarinet they're going to sound
really nice they can play a little bit more seamlessly and then two measures later the
boat horn comes back in again but this time mezzo forte so it's like the boat is going
out to sea.
That's exactly right.
So it's getting softer and softer clarinets just keep on trucking along they're playing
the melody two measures later we get a mezzo piano boat horn so it's like the lows and
the trumpet and horn and alto are just kind of actually the horns haven't even played
yet they're they're getting further and further away playing softer and softer clarinets are
just continuing to play their little sea shanty and then at 35 the boat is gone and it is
just the clarinet not even percussion or anything it's just clarinet so they're like they have
to be again pretty good not rushing their fingers when they have eighth notes.
This section is almost all slurred so it is a section that I would teach to my group that
the section right here at is this 35 35 where the clarinets are completely exposed it is
almost all slurred I would teach it to your students first articulated so make them tongue
make them get it right in time make them align their tongue and fingers and then take the
tongue away and make their fingers still feel the rhythm I talk so much to my students about
that your fingers have to physically feel the rhythm when your tongue is not involved
because we don't have the tongue to anchor the rhythm on right and this melody though
does not have any dotted quarter notes so it's just quarter notes and eighth notes throughout
their melody and then another pickup melody in flute and oboe this time at 43 and so now
the rest of the band joins in but they just have an accompaniment line half note rest
half note rest half note quarter half note rest so the upper woodwinds are continuing
to kind of let this sea shanty live on percussion is still doing a lot of nothing there's a
little triangle hits every once in a while but not a lot from them and then at 51 that
same group keeps going but now we're adding in a little counter melody yeah to and horn
and tenor sax and this part right here where the melody is going there's a lot of similar
to what the clarinets had early earlier a lot of slurred passages where it's quarter
notes of one two three all slurred and then one two three all slurred the tendency is
going to be for them to clip the last note of the slur right so working really hard to
make sure the last note of that slur is full value and leads into the next measure I feel
like when we play it's been a very long time but I either drew a tenuto on the last note
or an arrow leading to the next measure so that it sounds more seamless and then this
melody continues on and then we get to our key change transition two measures before
that we have a couple of accidentals adding in a meeting up to that change that's right
a big crescendo from everybody there's a full breath mark for the whole band on the
end of two and then the band comes in on a pickup note beat three and it's an accidental
for most everybody and then we have hit concert F D minor at 59 with flute oboe clarinet and
trumpet melody the accompaniment part is just hanging out on dotted half notes the
snare drum part is back in with that same active sixteenth note pattern that we had
when the tempo initially changed so just wanting to align the pulse between your percussion
your snare drummer and what's happening in the melody and in the the long notes making
sure that everybody is feeling that subdivision of the beat and moving together this is the
same melody just in a different key that we had earlier in the piece so all of the things
that you did earlier you can apply to this section we've just modulated we're just in
a different key this is again another great endorsement for marking parts especially for
younger students because this would be a great opportunity to mark like the new key signature
notes for the kids the first time they happen like trumpets are playing F sharp now making
sure that they play B natural you know as they go lower again you know in measure so
I'm trying to find it 62 they go down to a low B you want to make sure they get that
the trombones have a naturals now and e naturals so marking that for them so they can hear
that tonality I think is so important the quicker they learn it the better yep then
we continue this melody everybody's got to pick up into measure 67 again on beat three
the trumpet flute oboe clarinet upper people still have the melody we've got a couple more
accidentals written in another full band breath so this piece you would definitely want to
practice everybody breathing at exactly the same time and I would do like what that one
measure one and two three one and making sure that beat three has a tenuto written on it
or an arrow so that it leads into the next phrase when he really is to one and three
four absolutely and he is even written in here like right before the breathmark those
people that have a an articulated quarter note before the breathmark he has written
a tenuto mark on it so it's clear he wants that note to be as full value as possible
right so I mean it again it is something I know it may seem like crazy detail but it
is something I would spend time oh so that it that can make your group sound so immature
yeah and obviously that's not what we want now we're wrapping it up the last you know
closing it out with the same melody the same theme everybody moving together it's a little
more energetic everybody's playing at this point we end on a nice big long note a happy
little chord low voices coming back with that eighth note motif that we had earlier one and
three and two and and then all ending together you want to make sure that the last note resonates
and has a good sound you've got people tonguing on the last note the low voices tonguing on
the last note you have some mallet percussion chimes that are dingy right there or a chime
that is dingy right there at the very end that's the last thing you hear that's it and
it kind of sounds like a boat you know like a boat bell chime and then it's the last thing
so this piece is super cute it's fun it's deceptively challenging but it would be a great piece
if you want to look for something with minimal low brass minimal trumpet we didn't mention
that trumpets don't play hardly at all yeah and horns don't play very much either so if
you've got a good flute section a good clarinet section this might be a good one for you to
look at yeah to showcase to showcase those groups of kids yes well we hope you will consider
programming ghost ship in the future and thank you for joining us on this episode of band
for having editing videos the day after that yeah so we will now turn off this video