TromboneChat

It has, regrettably, come to my attention that there is noticeable shaking (a quivering inconsistency) in my sound. Might any of you have any suggestions about how I might work my way out of that?

That is a fairly common thing to happen, almost always caused by instability in your setup. If you would like to do a lesson by Skype, I can take a look at it.

In addition to investigating w/ Doug, I’d encourage you to thoroughly investigate the methods and teaching of James Stamp. There’s a lot of good info available free from people like Roy Poper, Malcolm McNab, Michael Sachs, Jon Lewis, Bob McChesney, Bob Sanders, and many others.

I think any teacher would need to listen and observe your playing before giving you a diagnosis and action plan. There are multiple variables that lead to a sound that is vibrant and steady (no shaking or wiggle)……..something that I believe should be part of every brass player’s daily practice routine.

Something that concerns me is that you state it as……”it has come to my attention.” This implies that you have possibly not noticed it, but others have. It order to fix the details in one’s own sound, it is imperative that the PLAYER hears and feels every detail about their tone production and tone quality. So, I ask this question…..do you hear the shaking in your sound, or are you getting the diagnosis from someone else?

I work with private lesson students daily on tone quality and the ability to hold notes absolutely steady. One of the things that I repeatedly say is a snippet that came from one of my teachers (I am about 95% sure it was Per Brevig that told me this)……..There are two levels of control when it comes to holding long tones steady. The first level is when an observer with a well-trained musical ear cannot hear wiggle in you sound. The 2nd and highest level of control is when the player and the observer hear no wiggle in the sound AND the player FEELS zero wiggle in the sound.

When I practice, I aim for that higher level. I play long tones at all dynamic levels and try to hear no wiggle and FEEL no wiggle. It sounds simple, but it is not. It requires much self-awareness or mindfulness (a term that has been overused in the educational community in the last 5-10 years).

My recommendation is to connect with a teacher and get some feedback and ideas. Also, consider how mindful (sorry, but I hate using that term) you are of the steadiness of your sound. Are you just playing and hoping for the best, or are you listening carefully and trying diagnose things? If you are able to diagnose problems, do you have a game plan for making things better? This is where a good teacher can give you direction.

I am certainly less qualified on this specific topic, but still some thoughts:
- Shaking sound in my experience/opinion very generally speaking can come from not enough or too much (physical, which can have of course be coming from mental) stress in your playing. This could be not enough or too much mouthpiece pressure, posture issues, breathing, overall level of tension etc
- So you would need to find an understanding of what is missing and what is the right balance for you
- What typically helps me sorting this kind of things out - apart from of course some analytical thinking of what specifically could be wrong - is doing some sort of flow studies in a well controlled manner, and really focusing on having good airflow, steady feel and good sound. this can also be just some Bordogni etudes