practice mute backpressure solution

[Troy Sargent]

Ok I am a college student who is living at home with my parents. I am majoring in trumpet performance and as a result I love to practice and practice ALOT.Now because i live with my parents I origionally thought that I could not practice as much as i wanted. Then i met the silent brass system which is amazing and i love it. (yes i do know that i need to work on the open horn which i do 90%+ of the time. The practice rooms at my university are just not open over the winter break.)

The backpressure though can be killer. And this isnt just a silent brass problem I have seen many threads on this and other forums about backpressure and practice mutes

I think i have a strange but elegant solution

Open your tuning slide water key and keep it open with a hairtie


I know this sounds weird but i was playing with my silent brass today and i realised that the problem was the horn was essentially sealed so i popped open the water key and BAM!!!! the horn was just as silent but it responded LIKE AN OPEN TRUMPET WITH NO MUTE!!!!! The backpressure was gone

in fact the only problem seemed to be that i got a slight hissing sound from air excaping the water key. The sound still stayed just as muted as before or near so ( neither my father or I could tell a difference) so this is really only practical for a practice mute

now i only have done one short practice session doing this and have not fully explored the horn using this method because this was my last session of the day and was essentially a warm up then down then putting the horn back in its case (i am planning a more through exploration tomorrow and will add notes to this post) and i was wondering:

Has anyone else noticed this "trick"?
Has anyone noticed any harmful effects of using this trick?
Is anyone now going to try this trick when using their respective practice mute.

And if anyone else does try this I would love to hear your input on how it changes playing (if at all) as far as mechanics.
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[Mark Curry]

Hey Troy!

I just never thought of that. I can't see how it might hurt things too much. I'll try it out tomorrow with my Best Brass practice mute.

Oh, and put a towel on the floor:)

mc
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A mouthpiece never missed a note by itself!

[Rob Rothman]

I thought the whole point of the "whisper key" was to reduce the volume without the need for a practice mute.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4Z-BQitMuc

Rob Rothman

[crzytptman]

Renuz-it mute is great.
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[Troy Sargent]

ok so i did my first practice session of the day using this trick and honestly im pretty impressed

the airy sound was a touch annoying but it wasnt thhat bad

the backpressure was gone

the sound was stilll just as quiet

the only thing was you had to use a bit more air which isnt much of a problem really

for me this works great even with warmups partials and orchestral stuff

obvsouly its not perfect but its a hell of a lot better than without the trick
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[Troy Sargent]

oh and a cloth on your legs or on the ground is a must
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[RicardoSigari]

[etc-etc]

Troy,

Great idea - will try it out soon.

[João]

Thank you, Troy! I have two little girls. One with 2 years and another with 10 months... (And a violin player! My wife), at home.
I will try it this weekend...

Question: Do you practice with the silent brass headphones?

Kind regards

Joao
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2 in one: Yamaha HGS bell and Bach Stradivarius 37 lead pipe.
Mouthpiece: Shilke 13a4a, V. Bach 1C ...

[RicardoSigari]

I said you saved mi life, but that didn't work when I tested, that is really sad. My mute is from a brazilian guy that started making mutes recently, and they are really horrible, BUT it was what I could afford. I think I'm buying one made by Dillon...
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Bb - Bach Stradivarius 37
C - Bach Stradivarius 229 25H MK tuning slide
Eb - Bach Stradivarius 304

Austin Custom Bras HH mouthpiece

[oxleyk]

I have to ask, Troy, what kind of trumpet to you have that this works on? I've tried it on all of mine and I can't get a note out on either of them.

I use a Bremner Shhhmute and have very little trouble with back-pressure.

Kent

[thadjones1213]

It does create less back pressure but it changes some of the physics, especially those notes that line up with the water key hole, so you have to bring the vowel shape forward more like mouthpiece buzzing.

The "brighter" the sound concept the better it works, keeping it very focused.

[Troy Sargent]

this could also be my horn design

the crook on my horn is a rounded crook rather than a box crook

also i have water keys (the push buttons) rather than spit valves (the levors with cork)

another thing that i noticed is if i play with the open horn and open the water key nothing really changes then either. so it could be that my horn has a bit of an ideal setup for his trick
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[Troy Sargent]

i play on a french besson Bb

and Thad i thought that some of the physics would change and they do but for me it spaces the change between the open horn and the (silent brass) muted horn so its somewhere inbetween those

@joco yes i sometimes do but not always
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