[ziggurat]

Hi Everybody,

Like most of you in this forum, I am new to the duduk but I am a professional musician and have seriously studied and teach other musical instruments. In the few weeks that I have been playing the duduk, I have encountered the problems that all beginners face and I have a few observations to make, along with some suggestions. Maybe some of them will help other beginners.

On the Richter scale of musical instrument difficulty, the duduk is about an 8.5. The celebrated concert violinist Itzhak Perlman once said that the degree of difficulty of any instrument can be determined by the amount of time it takes a newbie to be able to play a melody on it accurately and precisely. A child can sit down at a piano and play a recognizable melody after just a few minutes. The duduk is going to take much longer, and much of your first week or so is probably going to be taken up struggling with the reed!

I started out with just one reed (which came with the duduk). After I finally got it to open properly, I found it difficult to get a decent sound from it and I had to blow really hard. I have heard at least one person in this forum say that he can only practice for a few minutes on his instrument because he gets out of breath from pushing so hard to get a note from it. I ordered some more reeds and quickly realized that they are all different. The duduk is a very "organic" instrument and you cannot just pick it up and play it the way you can a recorder or an Irish penny whistle.

If you are having to blow really hard to get sound from your duduk, and you are unable to correct this by opening or closing the aperature, then order more reeds. The reed is the engine that makes the duduk go. One thing I have noticed with professional duduk players (which I have only seen in videos and documentaries) is that they always have a selection of reeds with them when they play. I was amazed at the difference in the reeds. Not only are some much easier to play than others, but every one of them has its own particular sound and tone color. Get yourself three or four reeds for your instrument, and experiment with soft, medium and hard reeds to find out which you like best.

Another really frustrating thing about the duduk is staying in tune. Once you have adjusted the fit of your reed so the instrument is in tune, it really helps to practice with a reference tone. When professional duduk players perform, as everyone here has already seen, they do so with a second player who plays a single note (the "damkash"). I have a little 9 volt battery operated metronome that will play an 'A'. Since I am also playing an 'A' duduk, this tone can serve as a drone. If you have "perfect pitch" (which is very rare) then maybe you don't need a drone but I think most beginner duduk players will find a reference tone to be very useful. If you have a little synthesizer keyboard, or an electronic "sruti box" (the kind used for Indian music) these devices will do very nicely. Just make sure you are using the right note for the duduk you are playing.

I think the biggest challenge for most beginner duduk players is sticking with the instrument during the initial frustrations and realizing how difficult it is. Not many people play the duduk, so there are very few qualified teachers. Consequently, most students are self-taught (through books and videos) and must also be self-motivated. It is so easy to fall in love with a musical instrument after hearing a master player deliver a brilliantly moving performance. What you have to remember is that the master player has spent years learning to do what he does - and it always looks so easy!

DON'T GET DISCOURAGED. The duduk is lots of fun once you get over some of the initial hurdles. If you are lucky enough to have a teacher (which few of us do) then starting out is probably easier. If you have to learn from instructional videos, DVD's and recordings, STICK WITH IT because once you begin to get a really good sound from the instrument, and begin to acquire a decent embouchure, the duduk is a very rewarding and unique musical experience.

By the way, this forum and the people who run the duduk.com website have been a huge help with all sorts of questions and problems. Thanks guys.