Have you ever been in this situation?
Several portions of a band rehearsal have just been spent tuning each and every member of the woodwind section on a concert B-flat. Now that each instrument has been properly adjusted, the band is ready to make the first sounds. The students bring their instruments up to playing position, take a deep breath, and play the first few notes of the piece and… …the most horrendous sound is heard from the woodwind section! “How can this be?!” the director and students ask themselves. “We just spent twenty minutes making sure each instrument was in tune!” The director stops in frustration and proceeds to tune each and every woodwind instrument again, but this time not using a concert B-flat as the tuning note. Instead, the director asks each student to play the first note of the piece individually as he glances at the electronic tuner to see if students are still in tune. Sadly, none of them are. As the director turns to Sally, the first chair flute player, to have her play her first note of the piece, she looks up angelically at the director.
“But my concert B-flat is already in tune,” Sally states, innocently. “Once that’s in tune, don’t I just push the buttons and blow?”
