I have my old mouthpieces. Which to restart on?

[SeanB]

So I haven't played in about 7 years. I have a Schilke 17D4D, a Bach 1B, a beat-up 5C, and an as-of-yet-not-found 1C.

Any recommendations? When I stopped playing, the Schilke was my go-to.

[Comeback]

Welcome to TH, Sean, and to the Comeback Players Forum. I suggest you simply spend a little time practicing with each one. One of them will probably suit you best in a fairly obvious manner. I listen first for sound quality. Do I like what I hear on my end of the horn? Next I focus on performance across my range. Are there serious intonation issues at some point? Are several notes distinctly poor in sound quality? Articulation is my next area of focus. Are my attacks clean on every note? I caution you against immediately choosing that mouthpiece that seems to best facilitate your upper register and encourage you to let your sound be your guide.

Have you had good instruction in the past? Are you receiving such instruction now? It is always a good thing to avoid choices in gear and method that have the effect of delaying progress down the road. Good luck.

Jim

[Richard III]

What kind of music were you playing before? What do you want to do now? How much time will you devote to practice?
_________________
Richard

King 1130 Flugabone
King 12C mouthpiece

[SeanB]

Thanks for the advice!

I had collegiate-level private lessons for about 3 1/2 years (trumpet major), but am not taking lessons at the moment. I actually don't have a horn yet (had to sell the Kanstul that I was using in school). I'm not really worried about upper register stuff. At my best I could manage a consistently strong high C, but nothing above that was reliable (so I have little hope that I'll ever be another Maynard ).

The "delaying progress down the road" effect was my main reason for the post. I wanted to see if anyone had restarted on a large and/or "advanced" mouthpiece and had it feel good at first, but cause problems down the road.

[SeanB]