• FAQ  • Search  • Memberlist  • Usergroups   • Register   • Profile  • Log in to check your private messages  • Log in 

Favorite tone development book?



 
Post new topic   Reply to topic    trumpetherald.com Forum Index -> Literature
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Author Message
Graysen Winters
New Member


Joined: 08 Feb 2019
Posts: 10
Location: Lake Jackson, Texas

PostPosted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 1:07 pm    Post subject: Favorite tone development book? Reply with quote

Just looking to improve my tone a little bit. Any suggestions? Thanks
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Richard III
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 22 May 2007
Posts: 2611
Location: Anacortes, WA

PostPosted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 1:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Listen a lot to a player you really like and play like that. Seriously. If your question was a real desire to improve your tone, you have to listen, really listen and hear what is happening. Both with them and with you.
_________________
Richard

Conn 22B Trumpet
York Eminence Model 4028 Cornet
1903 Conn The Wonder Cornet
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
kehaulani
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 23 Mar 2003
Posts: 8964
Location: Hawai`i - Texas

PostPosted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 1:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Concone Studies
Chicowitz Flow Studies
_________________
"If you don't live it, it won't come out of your horn." Bird

Yamaha 8310Z Bobby Shew trumpet
Benge 3X Trumpet
Getzen Capri Cornet
Adams F-1 Flghn
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Didymus
Veteran Member


Joined: 19 Dec 2017
Posts: 306
Location: Minneapolis, MN

PostPosted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 3:12 pm    Post subject: Good Advice, One Lingering Question Reply with quote

I will not question the advice given, that an important part to developing a good tone is to listen to trumpeters/cornetists who have exactly that. When I was younger, it greatly helped me to listen more to professionals like Wallace Roney and Hakan Hardenberger and less to the high-note hero peer sitting a few chairs away from me in band.

It also helped to take lessons and have a professional musician playing right in front of me for an hour a week, showing me in real time how it is done.

A lingering question remains. Have pedagogues found an efficient way to guide a student once the student has found a model to emulate? Or are the physical factors involved still considered too complicated or mysterious to give any guidance beyond, "Try to sound like what you are hearing."

For example, years ago I noticed that Charles Colin sold a method titled, "How To Develop Your Sound". I never had the opportunity to browse it, much more buy it and use it the first time I tried to do the comeback trumpet player thing. However, it makes sense to assume that it went beyond simply giving student-level players a list of musicians to listen to.

Perhaps that is a part of the question OP had in mind: Once you find the sound you want to emulate, what's the best way to go about emulating it?

Has someone written an outline or systematic guide to achieving the goal once it's in the mind? If the student's teacher doesn't have a clear answer, is there someone out there who does?
_________________
Enjoy the journey.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
JayKosta
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 24 Dec 2018
Posts: 3274
Location: Endwell NY USA

PostPosted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 3:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

kehaulani wrote:
Concone Studies
Chicowitz Flow Studies

----------------------------------------
I use the Concone 'Legato' and 'Lyrical' studies. The legato is primarily for french horn, but many can also be played on trumpet (french horn low range goes lower). The lyrical ones are all fine on trumpet.

A key 'performance' consideration with the lyrical ones is that even tho some seem very simple, really strive to make them musical so they 'sound good' - yes it can be done! Don't just 'play the notes' - make phrases that connect together into something enjoyable to hear.

Both can be found downloadable online (pirated copies?), and orderable from various sources.

In any case, you first have develop the ability to easily 'play the notes' without undo concentration or effort. After you 'have all the notes', you can work on tone, phrasing, dynamics, lyricism, etc.

Jay

Jay
_________________
Most Important Note ? - the next one !
KNOW (see) what the next note is BEFORE you have to play it.
PLAY the next note 'on time' and 'in rhythm'.
Oh ya, watch the conductor - they set what is 'on time'.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
JoseLindE4
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 18 Apr 2003
Posts: 791

PostPosted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 5:03 pm    Post subject: Re: Good Advice, One Lingering Question Reply with quote

Didymus wrote:
A lingering question remains. Have pedagogues found an efficient way to guide a student once the student has found a model to emulate? Or are the physical factors involved still considered too complicated or mysterious to give any guidance beyond, "Try to sound like what you are hearing."


I don't think it's necessarily a question of being too complicated or mysterious but rather emulating can be the most efficient way of achieving the goal. There obviously can be other issues that can introduce unwanted tension into the system that might be addressed more directly, but the mind's ability to lead the body to the desired result is pretty astounding. Think of it as the way artificial intelligence learns based on rules and lots of repeated trial and error. It can be incredibly efficient.

To the OP's question:

Imagination
1. Listen to great trumpet players until you can reproduce their sound loudly, vividly, and at will in your imagination. This will take you a lifetime.

2. Listen to great singers until you can do the same. This will also stop when you pass on.

3. Listen to great instrumentalists until you can do the same. Your mind's ear is the most powerful tool you have.

4. Read Bruce Adolphe's The Mind's Ear and practice the exercises. Your imagination is key.

Awareness
5. Practice things which allow you to really listen to yourself: flow studies, long tones, lyrical studies. Spend some time just listening for the harmonics in the sound. You should be able to pick out the octave above your note, the fifth above that, the next octave, the third, and so on. Look up the harmonic series if you're unclear. You should observe each of these harmonics and learn how to bring them out to color your sound. Think of it like balancing an ensemble.

6. Record yourself regularly. Play, record, listen back, adjust, play again...

Wind
7. Eliminate unwanted tension from the breath. The Jacobs breathing exercises are a nice way to learn how your body breathes well. Jacobs taught to imagine breathing in and out from the lips. Breathing exercises work best when the goal is observation rather than building some unknown breathing muscle.

8. Keeping with the breath, find ways to visualize the wind. Blow pieces of paper, pinwheels, all of the Jacobs gadgets, on your hand, etc. It's hard to really feel what good use of the air feels like and what we feel can be misleading, so externalize it so you know it's working.

If there's something broken about the way you address the instrument (embouchure, etc.) and you have a teacher you trust, listen to them, but many players - even "broken" players - can accomplish their goals using the above approach.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
MrOlds
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 25 Apr 2003
Posts: 720
Location: California

PostPosted: Fri Mar 08, 2019 9:05 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Deep and detailed listening is the key. Listen to the masters of the instrument. Listen at all levels. Listen for all the big and small details of how they make musical statements. Listen for all the big and small details of how they make the instrument sound.

Then learn to vividly hear all those details in your own musical imagination.

Before you play an exercise or a piece of music try to imagine in the richest detail possible how the masters of the instrument would sound playing it. Every detail from the musical content to the technical details.

Then let your own mechanism do what it needs to do to match the model you have in your head.

The sound comes from you rather than a book or exercises. You just need to fill your tank.

Listening is hard work. But don’t stop.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail
timothyquinlan
Veteran Member


Joined: 07 Jun 2007
Posts: 267
Location: Victoria, BC

PostPosted: Wed Mar 13, 2019 9:54 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

There is some extremely interesting stuff in here, in case you have never seen it ↓

Thieck's Common Sense Lip and Tone Development
_________________
Check out qPress for the largest selection of trumpet books on the internet.
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
roccotrumpetsiffredi
Veteran Member


Joined: 04 Jul 2015
Posts: 169

PostPosted: Wed Mar 13, 2019 11:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

You will not develop tone from a book
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
jhatpro
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 17 Mar 2002
Posts: 10202
Location: The Land Beyond O'Hare

PostPosted: Wed Mar 13, 2019 1:25 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Forget the book. Just play, listen, play, listen. Record yourself. Experiment with your sound by playing the same notes with different dynamics.

Strive to, as Wynton Marsalis says, "Get the metal out of your sound."

Listen to his playing and also players like Hardenberger, Nakaraiakov, Lee Morgan, and Blue Mitchell and find the sound you like best and make it your own.
_________________
Jim Hatfield

"The notes are there - find them.” Mingus

2021 Martinus Geelan Custom
2005 Bach 180-72R
1965 Getzen Eterna Severinsen
1946 Conn Victor
1998 Scodwell flugel
1986 Bach 181 cornet
1954 Conn 80A cornet
2002 Getzen bugle
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail Visit poster's website
Tpt_Guy
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 16 Jul 2004
Posts: 1101
Location: Sacramento, Ca

PostPosted: Wed Mar 13, 2019 2:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here's a good exercise:

http://jayfriedman.net/articles/trompete_

Jay Friedman's site is a goldmine of great information about brass playing. Peruse the rest of his articles to see what you can find.

If I ever make it out to Chicago, I would not hesitate to look him up for a lesson.
_________________
-Tom Hall-

"A good teacher protects his pupils from his own influence."
-Bruce Lee
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Matthew Anklan
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 12 Jun 2007
Posts: 1085
Location: Cincinnati

PostPosted: Wed Mar 13, 2019 2:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Books can offer the “what to play,” but the “how to play” is far more important. Listen to great trumpet players live as often as possible, and listen to recordings of great trumpet players every day.
_________________
Matthew Anklan
www.matthewanklan.com
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Jay Lichtmann
Heavyweight Member


Joined: 08 Apr 2005
Posts: 659
Location: Avon, CT

PostPosted: Wed Mar 20, 2019 3:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

kehaulani wrote:
Concone Studies
Chicowitz Flow Studies

Concone with accompaniment and it's free:
http://www.wwjdo.com/concone/
_________________
In his retirement he had become that most dreaded of former athletes, the one who always remembered how much harder it was in his day "when ships were made of wood and men were made of steel."
Samuel Abt on Eddy Merx
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail Visit poster's website
jmcclaymusic
New Member


Joined: 14 Jan 2019
Posts: 5
Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Sun May 26, 2019 5:48 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Flow studies. Clarke studies. Adams.

I like focusing on playing clarke studies 1-3 playing as musically and beautifully as I can focusing on maintaining a good sound, articulation, and timing at whatever tempo and I will always slow down an exercise in order to master playing it with a better sound and increase the speed slowly.

Also when playing flow studies or Adams exercises, do plenty of air/breath attacks (light "p" articulations) to help focus the clarity of your normal articulations. It helps with response and getting to the core of your sound faster. Tom Hooten spent some time on this at a clinic a few months ago where after asking what the secret to good sound was and providing his answer of a good articulation. A bad articulation can get in the way of your good sound. So just my 2 cents
Back to top
View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Post new topic   Reply to topic    trumpetherald.com Forum Index -> Literature All times are GMT - 8 Hours
Page 1 of 1

 
Jump to:  
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group