ISC)()D\MIAID AIC)'I"E: S THE BENEFITS OF WINDQUINTETS FOR YOUR BAND STUDENTS By MICHAEL BURNS Thisadicleis intended to encourage band directors to organize their talented woodwind and brass students into chamber groups. There are several advantages to your band programto be gained from such a venture: 1. The players will develop a strongersense of ensembleas they learn to balance voices, blend, playrhythmically together without conductor, etc. 2. The players will get to play one on a oart instead of in a section of many as with flutes and clarinets or being doubled by numerous otherinstruments and perhaps not really hearing themselves as with the double reeds. Thiswill in turn develoo their sense of pitch and intonation(there is nowhere to hide!), andtheir sense of playing soloistically at times and as accompaniment at others. 3. The players can experience some new and fun reoertoire and perhaps find repertoire that better fits their levelof expertise than is always possible withafull band arrangement. There are severalootions available lor wind chamber music. Probablythe mostcommon ensemble and that which s easiest to find repertoire for is the standard wind quintet (also sometimes :alledthe woodwind quintet even though t includes the horn) of flute, oboe, :larinet,bassoon,and horn. There are, lf course, many other varied types of ruindchamber ensembles but for the curposes of this article I would like to loncentrateon the quintet. The five instruments comprising a rvindquartet are quite diverse and this eads to challenges that must be faced lnd overcomeby the players. By contrast, a string quartet is .'ssentially homogenousin nature. The :hree different instruments (twoviolinsof :ourse)all work in the sameway and are rasically smaller and larger versionsof :he same instrument. The brass quintet is also more 'romogenous in nature than the wind luintet. Even though the trumpet and :rombone are both cylindrical bore and :he hornand tuba are conical. the method MICHAEL BURNS of playing and the essentialplaying characteristics of the brass instruments are very similar. But the woodwinds, they are quite a differentkettle of fish. The two double reedsprobably have the most similarities in playing characteristics. Both are naturally loudest in the low register and get softer as you ascend. The flute, of course, behaves in the exact opposite way. lts lowest register is softest and it gets naturally louderas you ascend. The clarinet is different again. lt has different volume characteristics within the registers but behaves quite differently from the other woodwinds. That darn cylindrical borethat is stopped at one end which produces the characteristic overblown 1 2th is a big partof the reason that the clarinetacts so differently from its woodwind colleagues. Then there is the horn. which. as the lone brass ABOUTTHIS AUTHOR instrument in the group, has quite z different methodof producing the sounc than the other instruments. Players in a wind quintet have to dea with very different pitch tendencies fron note to note within the group. A note that tends to be low on one instrumen may well be high on another. When the group crescendoes some instrumen tend to rise in pitch while other simultaneously go flat.The five instrumen have very differentabilities in terms o articulation: flute is great at multipl tonguing, oboe and bassoon are great fo a brittle staccato but getting all five instruments to match an exactarticulatio and note lengthcan be quitetricky. Dynamics are another area o diversity in a wind quintet.The poor horr player feels like they can never plal above about mf lor fear of drowning ou the rest of the group. Clarinet can tape away to a whisper whereasthe double reedsmay be left high and dry, unable tc diminuendo furtherwithout losing the note altogether. This list is not intende to be a complaintor to dissuadepeople from ever trying to play a wind quinte Rather, I think that learningto deal witl and overcome these many diverse challenges can be one of the mos rewarding aspects of playing in a quinte and your players will certainly becom strongermusicians in the process. lf you have a talented playe available on each of the five necessar instruments to form a wind ouintet then stronglyrecommend doing so. Thes playerswill learn skills that can then be brought back into the band as they si within theirsections and leadby example Michael Burns, Bassoon, holdsaBM with Honours from the Victoria University of Wellington,New Zealand, an MM from New EnglandConservatory, Boston, and a DMA from the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati. Currentlyhe is an Assistant Professor of Bassoon at the University of North Carolinaat Greensboro, andthe Bassoonist in the Eastwind Ensemble. He has held teaching positions at Midland College in Texas, and Indiana State University in Terre Haute. As a performer, Burns has played Principal Bassoon in the Midland/Odessa Symphony Orchestra in Texas, the Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, the Richmond (IN) Symphony, and numerous groups in his native New Zealand. In addition he hasperformed as a member of the Cincinnati, and New Zealand Symphony Orchestras. Currently he performs regularly with the Greensboro, Charleston, North Carolina, and Charlotte Symphony Orchestras. Burns' principal teachersinclude William Winstead, Sidney Rosenberg, Sherman Walt, Leonard Sharrow, and Colin Hemmingsen. Burns is a Yamaha Performing Artist who recently completed a concert tour of Australia and New Zealand, andhe will co-host the lnternational Double Reed Society conventionin Greensboro in June,2003. If you would like to submit an article for publicationin Woodwind Notesplease contact Michael Bums at the following address: Dr. Michael Burns, Assistant Professor of Bassoon, School of Music, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, P. O. Box 26167, Greensboro, NC 27402-6167, (336) 334- 5970; e-mail: mjburns @uncg.edu