TromboneChat

Hello,

I am seeking to get some advice on a problem I tend to have. In the Bass Bone part of Heldenleben, at 55, I have a hard time going from E2 to G4. I tend to always feel SUPER TIGHT no matter what I do. I can play through scales fine, but for whatever reason that part is giving me trouble. It also happens in a lot of other areas in my playing. Any exercise that you would recommend would be helpful!

Intervals building from straight scales to intervals in thirds to bigger intervals up to an octave or a tenth. Also arpeggios. The old Arbans book has a section on intervals that is good to work through. Start slow and build speed. Also helps your accuracy and hearing the notes before you play them. Concentrate on keeping the chops as steady as you can. Work toward flash octaves, where you drop or raise an octave in a 1/8th or 1/16th note. It's not the kind of thing you perfect in a week or two, it takes a lot of time to get there. But if you never start, you'll never get there.

hyperbolica wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 1:57 pm Intervals building from straight scales to intervals in thirds to bigger intervals up to an octave or a tenth. Also arpeggios.

Seconded.

Concentrate on keeping the chops as steady as you can.

I'm not sure if this is the right idea for everyone, primarily because everyone can have a different idea of what "keeping the chops steady" might entail.

I would add a suggestion to do the interval exercises both as articulated and as "rips" that cleanly go through every partial on the way up and/or down. I think a lot of players add articulation that they're not aware of in "legato" large intervals, and I think the focus on this kind of "rip" helps to clarify that potential problem.

Can you slur from E below the staff to G# above? Either in 2nd or in 7th, hitting all the partials cleanly and easily.

Yeah! I just feel like sometimes when I am playing low for a while, it takes moving mountains to go high. I can play a B4 comfortably.

I'd slur that the other direction- start at the top note. Then play that excerpt without taking the horn off the face. You might find you're playing the low range differently.

Burgerbob wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 5:31 pm I'd slur that the other direction- start at the top note. Then play that excerpt without taking the horn off the face. You might find you're playing the low range differently.

What Aidan said.

Two Big Things, Equally Important:

- Angle of the airstream. If you're a downstream player the airstream needs to go down more for the high register. This can be helped by sending the front of the instrument up. If you're an upstream player you go the other way.

- Tongue arch, also often thought of as vowel formation. OOO-EEE or AAA-EEE. Watch this video:

GabrielRice wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 6:07 pm - Angle of the airstream. If you're a downstream player the airstream needs to go down more for the high register. This can be helped by sending the front of the instrument up. If you're an upstream player you go the other way.

I don't think that's quite what changing horn angles while changing registers is doing. How the musician alters horn angles is more personal than upstream goes one way and downstream goes another.

Wilktone wrote: Sun Apr 06, 2025 8:47 am

GabrielRice wrote: Fri Apr 04, 2025 6:07 pm - Angle of the airstream. If you're a downstream player the airstream needs to go down more for the high register. This can be helped by sending the front of the instrument up. If you're an upstream player you go the other way.

I don't think that's quite what changing horn angles while changing registers is doing. How the musician alters horn angles is more personal than upstream goes one way and downstream goes another.

Fair enough - I chose the words "can be helped" carefully...but the subject deserves more nuance than that.