When Matt Marzano asked his teacher what he had to do to get 100 per cent in music class, Christina Bosco told him to circular breathe on the tuba for five minutes.
The talented teen did just that. (The video above is an abbreviated version, not the full five minutes.)
“I have never seen anything like this in my 20 years of teaching music,” said Bosco, a teacher at Twin Lakes Secondary School. “I don’t think I’ll have another student in my lifetime who can do this.”
Circular breathing, as Bosco explained, is “when you can play a note continuously while breathing in through your nose at the same time, hereby maintaining a constant sound.”
“I can’t find an instance of anyone doing it on a tuba,” she said.
She had a student circular breathe on a trumpet for 30 seconds in 2005, but the tuba requires four times the amount of air.
“I knew that it was really hard and I had no idea how to do it,” said Marzano, 16.
The Grade 11 student turned out to be a quick study, learning the technique the same day Bosco challenged him. Holding a note for five minutes, though, “took a fair bit of time,” he added.
“It’s not necessarily getting the air out that’s hard; it’s getting the air in,” he said. “The cheek muscles get really tired.”
Circular breathing “is not used practically a lot because it takes so much work and discipline,” Bosco said.
“It’s neat to see someone taking the initiative and learning to do it. He makes me want to try to do it.”
She has issued Marzano another challenge, one that, if he can master it, will earn him 100 per cent in Grade 12 music: “Move notes while taking the breath” and do so for more than five minutes.
“As long as it’s in my easy range, I think I can do it,” Marzano said.
Bosco is confident.
“He’s a very humble person, but he’s a music prodigy,” she said of her student, who, in addition to tuba, plays trumpet, guitar and tenor sax.
