Cause of Harsh Tone? Desperate college student

[BbTrumpet1]

Hello,
A bit of background information: I am a college music ed major. I transferred to a university after finishing community college and my trumpet teacher is not giving me my lessons. My jury is on Wednesday and my teacher first heard my solo piece this last Friday during run-throughs. I am dealing with a lot of stress because of this and have been working all semester to get the lack of lessons resolved but in the meantime am having complications.

My sound is typically very dark and full, to the point where strangers would come up to me and compliment me when I was warming up and playing scales. It got me a lot of money at this school. However, as of mid last week things have not been feeling right. I feel very tense and my tone sounds very harsh and airy. It's the worst in my upper register. I am worried that I am doing something wrong and due to my lack of lessons, I have nobody to help diagnose this. I am meeting with my old teacher over break who plans on helping me, but in the meantime as I prepare for break, what are some things I should look out for?
It all started with a couple of "stiff" playing days after I (semi-successfully) auditioned for the top ensemble here. I haven't had a comfortable playing day in three days which is unusual because I have been doing nothing but longtones, easy slurs, and low etude which usually cures me pretty quickly. I know I'm not giving much to go on, but has anybody experienced anything similar before? Do you have any advice of how to avoid making things worse? Any good exercises?

Any ideas are greatly appreciated. [/b]

[brassmusician]

The most likely explanation for what you have experienced, in my opinion, is that you have overworked your chops and not recovered fully yet. Time should bring improvement but one exercise you could try is playing second line G's, one per bar at quarter note = 60, using breath attacks, for minutes at a time. This helps to improve your response. If it was me I would be doing gentle pedals and small amounts of mouthpiece buzzing but I wouldn't do them they are not already part of your routine. Less likely and harder to fix scenarios would be you have inadvertently changed your embouchure somehow or torn a muscle in your lip. Be worth checking your trumpet is in complete working order and your source of trouble is not missing cork on a water key or something stuck down the bell. There are expert 'chop docs' out there like Pops or Jeanne Pocius-Dorismond who can give you much better advice. You may be able to get a skype lesson or just phone them.

[david johnson]

!! I feel very tense and my tone sounds very harsh and airy. !! you have described much of your trouble in that statement. Clarke 4 RELAXED will help. Loosen the shoulders more. Harold Hill's 'think system' is good, too

[dstdenis]

Might be overwork—try tapering off your effort level. And do some easy lip bends.
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[Craig Swartz]

"Sing along" in your mind as you play and concentrate on the pitches in your head. It's essential we hear what we want to sound like before we produce the sound- if we react later it can cause all sorts of problems and anxiety. Oh, and perhaps back off just a bit. Good luck fixing a bad habit by Wednesday...

[JoseLindE4]

Since you say your sound has gone from good to bad, what's changed?

Practice amount?
What you practice (have you scrapped your fundamental routine to work on jury music more)?
Where you practice (is your perception of sound different)?
Health?
Weather?
Diet?
Sleep?
Equipment?

My guess is that your answer lies somewhere in these questions. Have you recorded yourself?

[dkwolfe]

Good Morning;

You've been given a lot of great advice already, so I won't repeat what others have said. What I would add is two things; first, find Malcolm McNabb's interview on Brass Chats and give it a listen. He provides some fantastic advice on how to get your chops back to working, after playing hard, day in and day out. Second thing I would say (and I had to learn this from experience) would be to stop thinking about what you are doing when you are playing. Listen, and concentrate on getting the best sound you can, but DON'T THINK ABOUT HOW YOU ARE DOING IT! You really cannot create and analyze at the same time (none of us can, it's a brain wiring thing), so don't try. Relax, play soft and easy, and just focus on the sound.

D

p.s. My jury is on Wednesday as well, good luck.
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Nullius in Verba.

[trickg]

I'm going to pile on the same bandwagon with everyone else - you've overworked your chops, and your level of mental stress hasn't helped either. Right now your chops aren't functioning at their optimum, so you are pushing them harder to get the same result, but because they've been overworked, it just can't happen.

The mental stress you're going through is undoubtedly causing body tension, and that's also going to compound the problem.

There's not much to be done between now and Wednesday except to rest your chops. You can still work them, but you'll have to take things down to base fundamentals with a lot of easy, soft, low, reduced mouthpiece pressure playing, and at this point, you've only got a day and a half.

This is one of those things where an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure.

Here's another kind of weird idea, but I've heard people who have success with it.

Get a few shot glasses - they have to be small - and fill one with very cold water, and one with warm/hot water, and do alternating soaks of your chops for a couple of minutes each. I suspect that it's more that just your lips though - you've probably overworked most of the muscles around your whole mouth.

You could also do alternating hot and cold compresses of the whole area - don't get either one too hot or too cold though - you can do damage with both. Always end with the cold - the heat will increase the body's inflammatory response.

Keep us posted - I hope things click back in.
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[John Mohan]

It seems pretty obvious you've overdone it. Frankly, I'm surprised this wasn't obvious to you. But that said, your thoughts are probably clouded by stress and worry. Try to relax, take it easy on the playing and you'll bounce back.

Best wishes,

John Mohan
Skype Lessons Available - Click on the e-mail button below if interested
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Grease, The Producers, Addams Family, In the Heights, etc.
Ex LA Studio Musician
16 Year Claude Gordon Student

[rufflicks]

Tension and stress are killers! They take our life and our sound. Find a way to get rid of the stress and the tension. This is key!

Best, Jon
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Remember this is supposed to be fun.

[BbTrumpet1]

[BbTrumpet1]

[BbTrumpet1]

[BbTrumpet1]

[HERMOKIWI]

When your sound goes bad the problem is often that you've suddenly changed the relationship of your lower lip to your upper lip in some way. Another problem could be that you're suddenly applying excess pressure which is interfering with the lip vibrations.

The trumpet is controlled by the lower lip. The upper lip essentially takes instructions from the lower lip and just does what it's instructed to do (which sometimes is make a bad sound). So whenever there is a problem I always want to rethink how I'm using my lower lip as my first effort to diagnose the problem. This involves not only vertical placement but roll in/roll out as well. You should be extremely familiar with what works best for you in these regards as a reference point.

Something that can help me get back on track is to switch to flugelhorn and practice on that for awhile (30 minutes or so) and then switch back to trumpet. I typically find that the problem doesn't happen on flugelhorn and, if that's the case, this reinforces my belief that the problem on trumpet is lower lip positioning and not excess pressure or fatigue.

If you have access to a flugelhorn try it and let me know what happens.
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HERMOKIWI

[trumpet.trader]

If possible, and it probably is just take a day or two off. There is nothing wrong, and you won’t “ruin your chops” or endurance by taking a break.

No long tones, pedal tones, soft exudes, lyrical work, no sitting on a random note for 20 mintutes, no exercise books, nothing. Just put the horn down.

Put the horn in its case and focus on anything other than trumpet for a while, give yourself a time to heal or even just get a reboot when you pick it up again.

Go work on a different project for a class you’ve neglected, go to the library, go play beer pong, go chase girls, go protest at what I’m sure is some active protest happening every day at your school.

Just put the horn down and I’m sure things will be better after a little time off.

[Rod Haney]

[BbTrumpet1]

Thanks to everyone who replied. I've been taking most of the day off and just ran through my jury piece and felt a lot better. Even my accompanist had a look of shock on her face (she was probably very worried after hearing me these past few days ) and said I sound amazing. Break is starting soon and I will be able to relax, take a mini break, meet with my old teacher, and just play things that are fun.
I'm taking down all of the advice given for further reference!

[JoseLindE4]