Trombone to marching baritone/euphonium

[ChuckTbone]

I’m wanting to try out for a Dci Open Class group to get my foot in the door before I’m eligible for the world class but I currently play trombone only. I am quite good (so my teachers say) and am planning on going to college for it. I’m currently still in high school though and I need to play marching baritone for any Dci groups I want to be in. How would you recommend the fastest way to get good. At baritone or euphonium. As I’m almost one year away from being too old for the DCI open class age limit of 17. I’m on a time crunch but with the similarities and my skill with trombone I believe I can do it.

Thanks so much!

[bbocaner]

arban book, metronome, hard work

[OneTon]

Learn how to play a Bb major scale. Play eighth notes up, repeat the tonic, come back down, play the major triad up to the tonic and back down and end on the major third of the scale. When that is under your fingers, instead of ending on D, follow the D with Eb on the first beat and play the Eb scale. Keep on adding each next circle of fourths scale until you get back to Bb.

When you have mastered that, repeat the process with:
Mixolydian
Dorian
Natural minor
Melodic minor
Harmonic minor
Whole tone

That should take about a week. You can start sight reading every piece of trombone music you’ve got. And you will have to get baritone or trumpet books in treble clef to learn how to transpose on the fly. If you can borrow baritone parts from somewhere read as many of those as you can. You should be able to cover or “double” on baritone in about a month. Polish your baritone skills until the audition. Use an arban’s in G clef as much as possible.

The slide positions map to valve fingerings. Right or wrong I use 1&2 valve in lieu of third and it seems to get better intonation results. It looks worse on paper than it is to do. Get a baritone and have at it.

You may speed things up by writing these scales on staff paper. I would get that under my fingers in bass clef and then start transposing.

[Burgerbob]

I'm not sure there's a hard limit on age for open class, they have plenty of age outs every year. Don't feel in a rush or even limit yourself to open class.

[BGuttman]

There are valve to slide comparisons. They all are basically:

1st Position: no valves
2nd Position: 2nd valve only
3rd Position: 1st valve only
4th Position: 1st and 2nd valves
5th Position: 2nd and 3rd valves
6th Position: 1st and 3rd valves
7th Positoin: all 3 valves.

Note that combining valves generally is a bit sharp compared to a trombone position. Sometimes you can adjust a valve slide or the main tuning slide to compensate; much like the trumpeters do.

If OneTon has a problem using 1st valve for 3rd position, he may have the tuning slides pushed all the way in. I find I need to pull out all the tuning slides on my Euphonium.

I tune the 1st valve so that Ab is in tune; the 2nd valve so A is in tune; 3rd valve is a little flat for 1+2 (you almost never use 3rd valve alone). If there is a 4th valve I tune it so C in the bass clef is in tune and use 2-4 instead of all 3 valves for the equivalent of 7th position.

When I started playing valves (coming from trombone just like you) I played all my exercise books with the valve horn. Eventually you will internalize the valve combinations and won't have to think them through.

Note that a lot of Euphonium or Baritone players allow the valves to create articulations for different notes. I found my habit of legato tonguing every note impossible to break and I still do it on Euph. It will limit your rapid notes.

Good luck. And if you have any questions, Aidan (Burgerbob) is the guy to ask. He played in a top quality DCI.

[OneTon]

I mapped the slide to valve positions the same as you, Bruce. My wording may have been sloppy. Thanks for the clarification. I am not sure DCI existed when I was young. I was also overseas. Aidan is the expert.

My audition was not in a soundproof room. My peers said that I played better than the person I competed against. They were somewhat upset when the position was given to the other person. I think the director did not want me playing baritone. I went on to playing any trombone part in a jazz band, wind ensemble, and orchestra. And I have had a blast doing it. Sometimes it pays not to take ourselves too seriously.

[timothy42b]

Here's how I learned fingering, with a practice keyboard and the scales section out of Arban.

Fingerboard1.JPG

Fingerboard2.JPG

[DCIsky]

From another trombonist who marched a few years of DCI (finally the username gets to be useful!):

- Daily practice with valves is going to be your friend. Arban's exercises, scales, chromatics, etc. are great for developing your finger dexterity. My personal means of euphonium upkeep consists of isolated intervals or valve combos: half notes, then quarters, then eighths, then sixteenths, all while maintaining the fluidity and consistency of a slow note change.

-To establish the sound concept in your head--as a trombone sound concept and approach to the horn will not suffice--listen to a lot of euphonium soloists. Steven Mead, Demondrae Thurman, Glenn van Looy, Thomas Ruedi, Hiram Diaz, and the list goes on. Listen to how smoothly they play everything, and work to emulate that in your own fundamentals.

- If you are serious about marching baritone or euphonium, you will want to be physically prepared. A Yamaha marching baritone weighing only 6 pounds doesn't sound like much, but the marching arts are all about musical and visual responsibilities that pile on top of each other, and you want your physical strength to be good to go. Nothing worse than being unable to perform at your best because you can't stop thinking about your aching biceps!

Enjoy the process! If you have any questions about marching, feel free to PM me.

[calcbone]

- If you are serious about marching baritone or euphonium, you will want to be physically prepared. A Yamaha marching baritone weighing only 6 pounds doesn't sound like much, but the marching arts are all about musical and visual responsibilities that pile on top of each other, and you want your physical strength to be good to go. Nothing worse than being unable to perform at your best because you can't stop thinking about your aching biceps!

...not to mention, you will be using completely different muscles to support a marching baritone (left arm supporting weight of instrument out in front of you) than you do when you march with a trombone (weight much closer to the body's center of gravity).

I never got to march DCI, but wanted to (parents were making me get a summer job instead)... but I did go to the first camp of the year for a corps when I was a senior in high school (just to get a taste of the experience).

This was 1999-2000, so they were still using the bugles in G. Plus, I had brought a large-shank mpc with me, so they handed me one of the big "euphonium bugle" horns. I had been marching trombone for 4 years, including my fairly heavy large-bore Blessing B88 at the time, but nothing prepared my arms for the burn I felt after holding that thing up in front of me for just a couple of days. I could play the thing just fine, but I felt physically worse than I did in 9th grade rookie camp trying to hold it up by the end.

[Burgerbob]

It's actually the same large muscle groups, the lats in our back that hold up both horns. But with very different impact!

[goldendomer04]

Big +1 to @DCIsky. When I tried out for the Madison Scouts (about 20 years ago) I auditioned on my bass trombone. After my audition they asked if I would be ready to play on the baritone day 1 of rehearsals. I said yes and that was that.

The transition to playing baritone/euphonium was a lot easier than I imagined, but I was completely unprepared physically. Holding my horn up for long periods of time kicked my butt…. If possible, I would practice on a marching baritone and practice with a timer standing at attention.