- [Narrator] Good evening, and welcome to The Upper Cumberland Camera.

On tonight show, we'll take a look at the new music for children's series being produced by Channel 22.

And we'll see the current exhibit at the Cookeville Art Gallery.

But first, this story.

It's harvest time in the Upper Cumberland.

And one crop that doesn't seem to have suffered too much from the summer's dry weather, is the cane crop, from which sorghum molasses is made.

Channel 22 recently traveled to Muddy Pond near Monterey Tennessee, where a Mennonite community is in the process of converting their cane into molasses.

Visiting Muddy Pond is like stepping into another world into a less complicated time.

And even though the Mennonites don't own televisions, they were kind enough to let us bring our cameras to tape the molasses making process for our viewers.

(soft guitar music) (machine squeaking) (horse snorting) (people murmuring) (juice pouring) (people murmuring) Mennonite John Gunther explains the molasses making process.

- [John Gunther] Start off as the cane in the field and hot, strip the leaves off and cut it off.

Cut the heads off, loaded on the wagon then haul it, all in the air and stick it in the press.

And then the juice run from a plastic pipe into a tank and then we opened a speck in the bottom there and none on the pan make fire in the morning.

And then we just keep enough juice on the pan, and just let it, let it cook.

It gets taken off here in the end, wit the regulator, just scoop here.

Give to that, taking this to it.

Fantastic.

Look how it straining.

Deep it in and open this packet, when it gets ready that it run out.

Then when I'm standing there and scams all the time in the front, of the fire, I have a few minutes down.

I'm going to show you the fire yet.

You burn these slub woods.

- [Man] Where is your mother?

- [John Gunther] Burn it.

(background murmuring) The firefight pieces, And then out here and dry.

(fire cracking) (murmuring) Grants in every, from railroad ties has her railroad, is the yellow.

And gotta air hole in the bottom and we gotta take the ashes out to keep the draft.

Otherwise it melted.

It would melt steel out and then it's fired every few minutes.

The fire is great.

It goes all the way from the front of it back in the chimney.

Oops.

Let me take the shovel and carry that hot ashes off.

Anybody wanted him later on us to bring him out here.

You got Sargon for sale, whatever day.

We don't sell too many on Sunday.

But somebody comes just happens to come, we sell it to them anyhow.

- [Woman Narrator] Do you use some sorghum yourself?

And the rest you sell?

- We used not to eat, I guess we.

They merit 20 gallons a year.

And then for bacon, we put some in bread at whole wheat bread got.

(woman narrator murmuring) We sell a lot of bread, you know and he got the whole wheat bread got molasses in the district, makes it really a good.

we make cereals and put molasses in.

Makes good food.

My mother told me is um, - [First Mennonite Woman] Burning?

Sarah the doctor said he needs some iron.

And he said, he went to the drug store and to go and buy him some iron tablets.

And he said that he's seen that there is molasses.

And he said, well, he can do that, but he can buy molasses cheaper than he could buy them iron tablets.

And he went and he said a little while.

He felt really a lot better.

(woman narrator laughing) - He said (murmuring) (molasses boiling) - [Second Mennonite woman] Could you lock molasses log from here?

- [Third Mennonite Woman] Yeah you can stay with me.

- [Woman Narrator] You started at six 15 this morning.

When will you probably end tonight?

- [John Gunther] Oh, I don't know.

It might be six o'clock before we quit forgetting, (metals clanging) it's depends far and how long we press.

I think we got a pretty good juice today, and we may have a pretty good day.

- [Woman Narrator] How many gallons do you make a year?

Do you have any idea?

- [John Gunther] We might make 16 to 1800.

I don't know.

Lat year we made 1,450 maybe.

(baby cooing) - [Woman Narrator] Is Cain difficult to grow around here?

- [John Gunther] No, that's the cane country, is pretty good, it's fast at the sandy ground.

They don't need heavy loam ground, don't get too good.

But it's more surprising, it's pretty sandy and it's doing a great job.

(metal clanging) - [Woman Narrator] Is it done over here then it comes out over there?

- [John Gunther] Yeah.

When it comes out then we pour in that barrel there, Strain it again, then spin it again in a bowl there and put it in the bucket to seal it up.

- [Woman Narrator] How did you learn how to make molasses?

- [John Gunther] Oh, well look around a little and use a little common horror sense.

(chucking).

- [Woman Narrator] How long have you been making molasses?

- [John Gunther] I've been making 13 years.

So I like it, it's a pretty good process.

So there's this morning it works good.

And the dry weather has hurt us some, but not this too bad.

Last year, they had too much rain and too much juice and not enough sugar, this year we have maybe some plants not hardly enough juice and more sugar, and a little bit more problem get them thick.

Pretty good year for the season that we had.

We got a lot to be thankful for.

- [Narrator] The Mennonites, make molasses at the Muddy Pond Sorghum Mill every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday.

Visitors are welcome to come watch the process which goes on in muddy pond, just North of Monterey off the Hanging Limb road during the harvest season.

Next up tonight, children and music.

This week channel 22 began production of an instructional music series music in the making instruments of the orchestra.

The series featuring members of the Tennessee tech music department will go into full production in November and continue into 1984 and the children's concert in April.

Here's a look at the new series.

- Hello.

Today on "Music In The Making".

We're going to learn more about the tuba with our guests musician, Mr Winston Morris, Mr Morris, the tuba is another one of those brass instruments.

Isn't it?

- [Mr Morris] It's certainly is.

And a lot of brands, right?

This is the largest brass instrument.

It's the base voice of the brass family.

And as big as it is, it's the baby of the orchestra the baby, because it's the youngest instrument.

It's the instrument that last assumed its present shape.

It's barely 150 years old and that's not very old as far as musical instruments go, Is it?

Ah, now some of the instruments that you've talked about before, the woodwind instruments and the trombone and trumpet those instruments, we talked about how those instruments produced sound and what they did to produce tone.

So let's see what it takes to produce a tone on the instrument that we call a tuba.

Sometimes we refer to it as bass tuba sometimes contra bass tuba.

But let's see what it takes to get a sound.

First off, all grass instruments have a cup mouthpiece.

And this mouthpiece is sort of funnel shaped, shorter like a cup.

And we put our lips on there just like with the other brass instruments that you've seen and (buzzing sound) buzz.

We call it buzz or vibrate, our lips on the mouthpiece.

You take the mouth piece and insert it in the instrument, do the same thing.

Buzz your lips on the mouthpiece.

(buzzing sound) That's how the tuber produces sound.

It takes a lot of wind to fill this big instrument up a lot of wind and lips vibrating.

And we get a tone.

Now, once we get a sound, that's not quite enough we have to be able to change the sound.

Do you remember how the woodwind instruments change their sound by mashed down different?

They closed the holes and they changed the length of the instrument.

You remember the trombone last week?

How did the trombone change pitch?

Do you remember?

The slide?

Does anybody remember the slide?

And you moved the slide, you change the length.

Now what about the tuba?

Does anybody have an idea of what do we need to do on the tuba?

Yes, ma'am.

- The buttons.

- [Mr Morris] The buttons we call these valves.

Okay?

And we can call them buttons.

And as I depressed these different valves these valves here, they open up all this tubing that we have all this different length of tubings and each tubing is a different length.

And as I depress each valve, we get we can play scales on the instrument, for example.

(playing the tuba) And that's how we change pitch on this instrument.

As we just, we depressed the valves as we go down the scale.

So, and the range of this instrument now.

Let's talk a little bit about the range that the ability to play high on the instrument and the ability to play low on the instrument.

I have two excerpts that I'm going to play for you today so that you can hear how the tuba sounds when it plays high.

The tuba plays a little bit higher than most people think.

You know what?

You usually think that the tuber plays you know what the part usually sounds like.

It sounds like.

(playing the tuba) Now that's the typical tuba part that everybody thinks well that's how our tube was supposed to sound.

No, unless you're playing on a March.

If you play a March, the tuba sounds that way.

And that's a very important part because that provides the beat for the music.

But listen to a piece of music by a composer by the name of Vogner very famous orchestral composer.

This is a piece called the "MeisterSinger".

An important tuba solo and the orchestra, listen to this.

It gets fairly high.

Let's see what happens.

(playing the tuba) - Well, that's Mr Vagner and that's Mr Vagner in the Upper Register.

And he also wrote for the tuba in the very lowest part.

And why don't I go ahead and play another example for you of how the tube of sounds and the very bottom of the instrument, because it's quite a different sound.

And I think you'd like to hear the difference in these two sounds.

Okay?

This is another piece by the same composer Vagner it's called "Ride Of The Valkyries".

(playing tuba, ride of the valkyries) - Quite a different sound, very bottom of the instrument.

What are you hear any questions at this point about the tuba and what it can do?

Anybody?

Yes ma'am, do you have another question?

- [A Girl] Ah, what are those brode things around it?

- Oh, this is just tape that I have to keep from the key to protect the finish on the tube.

All right.

Stephanie, - Okay, you have sort like a valve (murmuring) - [Mr Morris] The slide up top here.

- Some notes that we play on the instrument are not as in tune as we would like for them to be.

It's just not quite right.

And if you adjust the slide by pulling it up and down sometimes you can make the note sound a little bit better in tune.

Yes.

Chris, - Why there is so much tubing?

Because it all goes to one place.

- It all goes, it starts right here and it all comes out in the bale.

And then between there 32 feet of tubing, 32 feet.

And when you play the low open tube, (playing the tuba) - 32 vibrations per second for that low note.

And so that's the difference between the tuba and the trumpet that you've seen in some of the other smaller brass instrument is that we have more tube and enlarge tube.

Let me play another excerpt for you, and then if you have any other questions, we will pursue it.

I like for you to hear just a very short excerpt of the tuber playing, something that's very lyrical.

We usually think about the tuba as being very bombastic and like that last excerpt that we played, boom, boom, boom boom.

You know, the "Ride Of The Valkyries" and you know Saturday morning cartoon kinds of music, but the tubers also capable of playing very expressive music and very lyrical type of music.

There was a composer by the name of Mahler, who used the tube before a solo and his, one of his symphonies, listen to this.

It almost sounds like a children's tune.

You might recognize some of this.

(playing the tuba) There's a children's tune.

I can't remember the name of it.

It sounds something like that or something like it's not London bridges, but something like that.

But you see how it lyrical that the tuber play.

I hope that you liked that because that to me is a very expressive type of plan that I enjoy doing on the tube of very much.

Now I have another extra up here of a different type of music for tuba, that gives it a very different kinds of sound.

And the legato lyrical plan that I just did.

And the opposite style of playing is detached or staccato or Marcato, all these are terms that mean that there is space between the notes, and when you play the tuba that way it brings on a different character.

This is a piece called "In The Hall Of The Mountain King".

When I get through with this, we'll see what kind of questions you might have.

So listen to this one, listen to the change of character from the lyrical smooth sound to the "Hall Of The Mountain King".

(playing hall of the mountain king) And that continues on, that sounds quite different from the lyrical.

Any questions we have just a few minutes left, yes you have a question.

- Is there a tuba more commonly used in a band or an orchestra?

- They are used in both.

You use one tuba in the orchestra and in the marching band you might have four or five or six.

If it's a large match, maybe eight or 10.

So you find tubers and all kinds of ensembles, German bands marching bands, concert bands, orchestras, brand squint debts, which you will see next week.

Question?

Yes, you.

- Which type of material used for there?

- This material here, I think I've already explained it.

That's to keep the, the finished protect the finish on the instrument.

Do you have a question on you?

- Right there the ring which you put in your thumb, is there a valve that put?

- Yes, there is another valve for you and this is a fifth valve on the instrument.

There are four up here and a fifth valve right here.

And that gives me some new notes.

I've got one other tune that I was supposed to practice.

The conductor said to be sure, in fact, it's this before the orchestra concert, everyone's coming to the orchestra concert, right?

Well, he said, practice this tune.

So let me play a little bit of this tune and then we'll see how much time we have.

(playing the tuba) Anyone know what that tune is?

"Stars And Stripes Forever".

And you've heard it before.

And you will hear it again all the way up to the orchestra concert.

Do we have time for some more questions?

Yes.

Chris.

- The tuba is really difficult to play?

- The tuba is sort of difficult because it takes a lot of wind and it's a very low instrument and it's difficult to hear.

It's very hard to hear.

So you have to listen very carefully.

Also, it's pretty big instrument.

So it'd be a bit too big for most of you people, right?

You have to get up a little bit further in school before you'd be big enough to play the tuba.

Any other questions?

Yes, ma'am.

- How many bows does the tuba have?

- Most tubers will have three valves.

This one has five, but it depends on how much money you want to spend.

(children chuckling) The more you spend, the more valves you get and each valve helps out a lot.

All right.

How are we doing?

Question?

- How much will one of those cost?

- [Mr Morris] Too much, many, many dollars a tube like this cost about $5,000.

That's a lot of money for an instrument in it.

So you might want to go back and think about playing the trumpet, (all laughing) which doesn't cost quite as much.

Does it?

Fine, any more questions?

I think we've got time for another question or so anything else I hope to see you at our brass quintet, ah, rehearsal that we have on a week or so and the orchestra concert, we'll be looking forward to that.

And when you hear the orchestra look for the old tuba player in the back row.

Alrighty.

Thank you.

- [Teacher] Thank you, Mr Morris, we hope you have enjoyed the program today about the tuba and have learned more about its importance in the world of music.

Remember music is for everyone.

If you're interested in learning to play the tuba or any of the other instruments we've featured in this series contact your school teacher.

Adaptations can be made for special conditions, and anyone can learn to play these instruments.

- [Narrator] Although channel 22 has produced many educational and informative specials.

This series, "Music In The Making Instruments Of The Orchestra is the first instructional series we've produced.

We're pleased to be working with the tech music department on this series, bringing musical education to the children of the Upper Cumberland's.

Finally, tonight, this month's exhibit at the Cookeville art gallery.

The October exhibit is the work of Martha Ren Henry.

Here's a look at her paintings.

(soft upbeat music) The work of Martha Ren Henry will be on display until the end of October at the Cookeville Art Gallery on South Walnut street.

Gallery hours are one to 4:00 PM Tuesday through Friday and on Sunday, admission is free.

And that's The Upper Cumberland Camera for this week.

Next week at this time Becky Robertson will present studio 22 with more stories of the people and events of the Upper Cumberland's here on channel 22.

(soft upbeat music)