Jim Thompson teaches essentially the same thing as VerMeulen about flexibility. In fact, buzzing basics exercises 3 and 4 are explicitly designed to help the student create and feel that "pop" as the slur finds the resonance in the horn. "The path" is just another way to conceptualize and practice the same thing: finding the minimum effort to make the most resonant sound and navigate the intervals the most efficient way, without "steering" or "muscling" anything. Tony Prisk was just on Ryan Beach's podcast discussing and demonstrating the same thing. Virtually all highly skilled brass players have this approach to tone/flexibility.
100% I almost mentioned the same about Thompson's approach but ended up leaving it out (because I thought the word "buzzing" would derail the thread, but here we are). I agree, "all highly skilled brass players have this approach." It is essential to playing well. However, many people view "flexibility" as a totally different thing (you see it often on this forum).
Basically, flexibility means being able to quickly and
accurately move among notes of different pitch, and especially different ranges.
Isn't this the goal of all the flexibility books/exercises: Bai Lin, Collins, Irons, Stamp, Thompson and many others?
The objective is easy to define, the hard part is to achieve it.
Whichever path you choose, nothing will get you out of a ton of hours of practice. That's the real secret of the truly great ones (and I'm obviously not among them), their dedication and hard work. _________________ Notice!!! Amateur musician without formal studies
Trumpet: Yamaha 8310Z
Mouthpiece: the great Yamaha11b4
Sax tenor: Yamaha YTS 23
Mouthpiece: Otto link tone edge
Whichever path you choose, nothing will get you out of a ton of hours of practice. That's the real secret of the truly great ones (and I'm obviously not among them), their dedication and hard work.
All the more reason to use the proper approach. Few things are quite as frustrating as spending a lot of time on something only to find out it was the wrong way to do it. _________________ 1975 Olds Recording trumpet
1997 Getzen 700SP trumpet
1955 Olds Super cornet
1939 Buescher 280 flugelhorn
AR Resonance mpc
In light of recent information, I have edited my posts removing mention of Bill Vermeulen. @JayKosta if you wouldn't mind removing the quoted portion of myself on you post as well.
Joined: 01 Jun 2005 Posts: 306 Location: Pittsburgh
Posted: Fri May 24, 2024 5:23 am Post subject:
abontrumpet wrote:
In light of recent information, I have edited my posts removing mention of Bill Vermeulen. @JayKosta if you wouldn't mind removing the quoted portion of myself on you post as well.
It's totally possible to be a terrible person and correct about how flexibility works at the same time. Lots of trumpet players who are worshipped on this forum daily were/are vastly better trumpeters than humans.
In light of recent information, I have edited my posts removing mention of Bill Vermeulen. @JayKosta if you wouldn't mind removing the quoted portion of myself on you post as well.
It's totally possible to be a terrible person and correct about how flexibility works at the same time. Lots of trumpet players who are worshipped on this forum daily were/are vastly better trumpeters than humans.
Totally agree! I just decided to lean on the side of caution. My reasoning is that if he has caused any trauma, then I shouldn't be spreading/perpetuating his voice. As you mentioned, the concept is available via other avenues, so there is nothing "necessary" about his particular voice. Yes, his teaching was incredibly valuable for me, but it seems that for others, that education came with a serious price.
Those that are curious about the concept via Bill Vermeulen can still find the video in this thread.
I was doing some "flexibility" this morning and wanted to figure out the best way to illustrate "lack of control"/"let"/"path" etc.
A great illustration of the concept is the beginning of the Del Staigers Carnival of Venice (below). The beginning shows the vibration is continuous; the player does not purposely "lock" into the pitch - but rather allows the horn to help lock him in. If you can logically understand what it takes to play the beginning in the manner below, you can begin to master "flexibility" (i.e., a fundamental part of brass playing).
Some things to help understand is, when you are on your way from point A to point B, you should hit all the notes in the overtone series in between. So from Low C to G on top of the staff you would hit C G C E G. Then you would shorten the amount of time those other notes "sound" so it "sounds" like C G but really it's C (gce) G. Same for going down. If vibration never stops then, by definition, there is a glissando between any two notes which means all notes of the overtone series "sound" in between notes. If you commit to this idea, you will master "flexibility" and on your way to master brass playing.
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