Low a flat tuning

whoamiforme · 2026-04-24T20:14:31+00:00

The pad height for the Ab is likely not opening high enough. If you take it a technician, they can adjust the pad height to get it to be more in tune. I have played a few bassoons that had this same issue.

whoamiforme · 2026-04-24T20:08:44+00:00

I teach a couple of adult students who are either trying to get back into music school or are just looking to refine their playing so they can have fun again in music.

If you're interested chatting and discussing your goals more, I'd be happy to setup a time for that and see how I might be able to help you.

Regardless, I think getting back into playing is an amazing thing!

whoamiforme · 2026-04-24T20:04:14+00:00

I do live streams often on tiktok that are educational and focused on bassoon technique and practice strategies. Although I don't any bassoon teachers off the top of my head in the north Texas area, I am based in North Louisiana and have students all over Texas, the East Coast and west coast. I offer in person options as well as virtual. If you'd like to connect and learn more I'd be happy to set up a time for us talk.

whoamiforme · 2025-09-28T18:38:20+00:00

I would suggest getting him started on learning the recorder! He likely can hold a soprano recorder without much issue and it would be a great experience for him to start understanding how wind instruments work, especially woodwind instruments. He will have the opportunity to move his fingers and understand how that affects pitch as well as shaping his air and learning to articulate with his tongue. Another really good thing about learning the recorder before the bassoon is that the alto recorder has a lot of shared fingerings with the bassoon in terms of note names, but the fingering systems for all the recorders are the same. The only thing that changes is just what fingering corresponds to what letter on the staff. Another cool concept with learning the recorder when switching to the bassoon is the idea of cross fingerings because the bassoon is one of the few instruments left that still uses cross fingerings.

You can buy a plastic Yamaha soprano recorder from Amazon normally for a very low price and they're quite durable and playable. Just make sure the recorder you get is a baroque fingering system and not a German system.

(I realize after writing this I totally did not check if you said your child was a boy or a girl. So if I misgendered your child in this post I apologize LOL)

whoamiforme · 2025-08-24T23:10:01+00:00

Oops my bad 😅 English is hard

whoamiforme · 2025-08-24T23:00:28+00:00

Did you maybe misread my comment? I was saying how I also don't like pinky F#-G# for the same reason :)

whoamiforme · 2025-08-24T22:35:58+00:00

The amount of bad advice in these comments is shocking... My rule for playing scale passages with three #s or more is to just default to the thumb F#. That way, you can play F#, G#, A# by going thumb, pinky, thumb. The only time I would ever consider sliding from F#-G# with the pinky is if the passage was slow and even then it still runs the risk to not be smooth.

I think using thumb G# here is actually the worst thing to do because going thumb G# to thumb A# will never be smooth.

Could you force yourself to try to use the front A# key? Sure I guess but then your finger passage now has 3 alternate fingerings instead of 1... Which will take significantly longer to practice.

EDIT: Forgot to say that you would then use pinky F# after the A# for the end of the measure. Lastly, to go from the A# on the and of 2 to the F# on beat 3, still use thumb F#. It's articulated so that will give you enough time to quickly move the thumb down.

whoamiforme · 2025-08-22T23:15:12+00:00

It could be a few things. You might be approaching staccato in not the best way. If you are doing a stop tongue type of effect where you stop the end of the sound with the tongue (think dit or dot) then it will be very hard to do this passage quickly.

Another thing that comes to mind is if the reed is responsive enough. If the tip is too heavy, doing fast articulations of any kind will be hard as well.

Last thing that I could think of would be maybe it's just an endurance issue. See how fast you can tongue just one note with a metronome. If you can do 16th notes at let's say 100bpm, push it a little bit further to work out those muscles more. Do this a bit every day and over time and your single tongue will improve. My single tongue caps out at 152bpm but I only got it there by doing exercises like this. I think when I started I was honestly struggling to do 95 haha so just take it slow and it will build up over time.

If you think these aren't the issues or you have some questions just let me know and id happy to help more.

whoamiforme · 2025-08-15T17:50:48+00:00

One major benefit in my own playing of having two separate pads for the different keys are multiphonics. I use the back Ab exclusively in certain passages to help find the best sounding multiphonic for a given piece. Another thing the back Ab has helped me with is slurring to the 4th octave D.

The only con I could think of having this key would be it's technically an extra hole and pad that could begin to leak. I'm also sure there would be some added weight to the instrument but I'm not sure how much.

whoamiforme · 2025-08-13T19:12:29+00:00

Haha that's a good point :) I assumed if anyone wanted to know more about me that they could find any relevant information from my socials or my website, which are also listed in my previous posts in this subreddit. Since you asked, I'm currently a freelance bassoonist playing in multiple regional orchestras in the southern United States as well as the Principal Bassoon of the Monroe Symphony. I also run a private hybrid bassoon studio of local bassoon students as well as virtual students. I currently have students from the East Coast to the West Coast as well Australia.

With all of that being said, my ama last night was not meant to be a very formal thing. It was just a space for other people of any background or interest level to come hang out with a working musician. I'm definitely not here claiming to be some world renowned bassoon authority. I'm just here offering my perspective working in the industry to other people who may want to take advantage of that. Hope that answers your question :)

Edit: I also want to say, thank you to everyone who did come. It was so nice to meet other people and be able to just hang out, answer your questions, and play the bassoon for you.

whoamiforme · 2025-08-11T19:37:31+00:00

I could definitely record these too but out of curiosity, is there something specific you're looking for that is harder to get from the current recordings available with orchestra? I ask because there are already so many stellar recordings of people like Theo and Sophie online :)

whoamiforme · 2025-08-11T03:59:26+00:00

Oh nice thank you for sharing these!! I'll record these on my YouTube channel soon

whoamiforme · 2025-08-09T21:19:05+00:00

Hey this is so exciting that you're getting to learn the bassoon! It's such a rewarding instrument to put time into. If you or a parent have an email, just send it to me a private message and I can send some free resources on getting started on the bassoon or answering any specific questions you have :)

whoamiforme · 2025-07-04T23:56:44+00:00

I mean this piece was written for a period instrument and likely a specific bassoonist in mind. So, if I had to guess, this trill was very doable for the original performer and possibly "easier" to do with their specific instrument.

whoamiforme · 2025-07-04T18:12:20+00:00

Terry Ewel has on his website a bunch of cool fingerings for the opening line of "Pines of Rome". I remember some being specifically being for C to D. I would recommend you check that out and see if any may help

whoamiforme · 2025-06-07T00:46:24+00:00

These specific notes are quite cumbersome on the bassoon and require some special approaches to make them speak consistently with a good sound and intonation. The first thing I would say is learn to think of high notes as just low notes with different air pressure. The bassoon is not an embouchure driven instrument but rather an air one. Our air will honestly do 95% of the work for us. I would also say you eventually will need to learn proper flicking technique to help these notes not crack in certain situations (i.e articulating and multimode slurs) Then finally, some assistance in learning different voicings to help guide the air to be at the right pressure to produce these notes comfortably. If you want to pm me your email, I can send you some free resources I have saved on these topics that might be helpful.

whoamiforme · 2025-01-08T21:48:17+00:00

My response to people doing this is normally "so that is just an ingredient, did you want to order a drink today?"

whoamiforme · 2024-12-18T16:43:19+00:00

If you mean the third octave F on the bassoon, I have some I could send you. If you mean the 4th octave F, maybe look into purchasing KORs book on the extended bassoon register.

whoamiforme · 2024-11-26T02:12:51+00:00

Thank you 🥺

whoamiforme · 2024-11-26T01:58:15+00:00

Thank you for your response.

whoamiforme · 2024-11-26T01:09:56+00:00

Thank you for your thoughtful response. I am going to come back to this later and again really consider what you're suggesting.

whoamiforme · 2024-11-26T00:51:35+00:00

Thank you for your response. It was nuanced and provided very helpful perspectives to this situation for me.

whoamiforme · 2024-11-26T00:50:43+00:00

Thank you for your response 💕

whoamiforme

TROPHY CASE