Regarding our recent conversation about Baroque pitch nomenclature:
In the high school band I work with, we have an exchange student from Germany. She plays trumpet in our marching band. Recently, she’s been giving our other trumpet players fits. She insists that the pitch ‘B’ is played with first valve. Our trumpet players know that ‘B’ is second valve and that ‘Bb’ is first valve. That’s when they really thought she went ‘round the bend: Stephanie (our German player) says that ‘H’ is fingered second valve! Our little ol’ country kids had a good time with that. They’ve never heard of ‘H’. They only know A through G – no H.
There was much confusion (even the HS band director was confused) until I pointed out that European (esp German) systems use ‘H’ for ‘B’ and ‘B’ for ‘Bb’. The exchange program broadened the horizons of our kids here.
Woof, thanks for the story DrumGod. I never experienced that firsthand it must have thrown your students for a loop being raised with the Americanized version of pitch nomenclature. Being raised in San Antonio I had many students and friends who would pronounce Villa-Lobos as Veeya-Lohbohs rather than the appropriate Veal-a-Lohbohs. His name is Portuguese not Spanish. I have to admit that since I heard it so often that way that sometimes I slip and say Veeya.
Speaking of of mispronounced names I once went to a DCI semi-final in Houston and the announcer mispronounced all of the composers names. I can’t even tell you how he butchered Shostokovich. I laughed so hard because I couldn’t figure out what he was trying to say. All of the accents were wrong as well as the vowel sounds. It was kind of like if you inverted all the accents and then inverted all the long and soft vowel sounds and then it was still pretty far out there. He also fudged Ravel’s name calling him Rav-uhl. There were others but none as funny as Shostokovich. You would think that if he was the announcer for any type of musical function that he would have been at least professional enough to ask how to pronounce the names.
Really, I didn’t know that. I’ve always said veeya.
My first year here in this little German and Czech town, we played Symphony for the New World by Antonin Dvorak. I always pronounced that D vor jak, but some here insisted that it was D vor ak. I was never able to get straight the actual correct pronounciation.
Of course, I live in a state where the governor can’t say “subliminal” and seems insulted if it is suggested that he’s dyslexic.
Hey again, DG, I know what you mean. I was in Texas for a while while Bush was governor. I suppose if he gets elected I will have to do another Exodus away from him since he is such a retard.
We always said D Vor Jak. Hmm, interesting. I have never heard it pronounced D Vor Ak exept by non-musicians. I wonder how well their collective native tongues jive with the original? FTR, I believe that the composer pronounced it D Vor Jak. I think there is some type of accent mark thrown in somewhere in the spelling but since I am not European, I never use those new fangled things.
Being raised in San Antonio I had many students and friends who would pronounce Villa-Lobos as Veeya-Lohbohs rather than the appropriate Veal-a-Lohbohs. His name is Portuguese not Spanish. I have to admit that since I heard it so often that way that sometimes I slip and say Veeya.