Range and endurance problems

trumpet4God · New Member Joined: 17 Jul 2002 Posts: 1

Hello everyone. I have been a trumpet herald reader for quite some time. I always am looking for tips and tricks from the people that actually have a clue what their doing on the horn. I have been playing 1st trumpet in a church orchestra for about six years now. I can't seem to expand my range above a high D ( first D above staff) and after about 2 hours of playing my lips are ready for the morgue. I play a Bach intermediate horn with a Giardinelli 10M mouthpiece. Can anyone give me any advice on what I can do to expand my range and endurance? My tone quality and volume are not the issue.
Please help.
Irishtrumpet

Goldenchops55 · Posted: Thu Jul 18, 2002 6:50 pm Post subject:

Welcome!
There are several ways to improve both range and endurance at the same time. The main thing is making sure you are breathing right. When inhaling make sure the portion below your ribcage expands. After you have taken in the air, tighten your abs as much as possible. This will cause compression, the harder your squeeze, the faster the air, the higher the note. Also, remember to always keep your corners tight. These to things will help you more than anything. As far as excersises go, for endurance I would do long tones. Do them for long amounts of time, but never to failure. WHen your lips get tired, stop, or you will do more tearing down than building up. To increase range, do lip slurs. A great book to get is "27 groups of Excersises" by Earl D. Irons. Good luck.

histrumpet · Posted: Thu Jul 18, 2002 7:50 pm Post subject:

Also consider the compression that you need may also include the lips. Without lip compression you can use your abs and only produce louder notes.

_Don Herman · Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2002 6:07 am Post subject:

I find that much, if not most, of the time my endurance is suffering I am not taking in enough air often enough. Hard to remember to do on those long passages -- better (for me, anyway) to break them up and get more air in so the sound is riding the air, rather than mashing my lips with my mpc to compensate for the lack of fuel (air). Also, and especially in church, I lay out when I can -- play first (melody) and last (descant) only on hymns, don't play some of the hymns/ballads or just play a little bit, etc. In our PT I let the guitars and keyboard carry the load some of the time!

For me, a decided amateur now, two hours of playing is a lot. Especially in church, when it can be almost constant.

Finally (whew -- sighs of relief all around) the #1 (most often, by my count) suggested endurance builder is to follow Caruso -- check out the Caruso Forum.

HTH - Don
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Don Herman/Monument, CO
"After silence, that which best expresses the inexpressible, is music." - Aldous Huxley

vivace · Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2002 6:23 am Post subject:

To quote the words of my teacher who was quoting his teacher, Charlie Schleuder:

"if you miss a note, it is not because of your chops or your horn. It is because you didn't have enough breath support."
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Goldenchops55 · Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2002 9:04 am Post subject:

CARUSO, of course how could I have forgotten! Musical Calisthenics for Brass is THE book for range and endurance. Get a copy of this as soon as you can. I have been using it for a while now and have seen some good results.

Emb_Enh · Veteran Member Joined: 29 Oct 2002 Posts: 455

Learn to play with less mpc presure than you do now in the lower-middle registers.....that should translate to your upper register immediately.

Roddy o-iii<O
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Al Cass · Regular Member Joined: 27 Jun 2002 Posts: 81 Location: USA

I'm not sure about that "tighten your ab muscles for compression" advice. If he means what I think he means this is a way to squeeze out out of tune high notes with a poor sound. You never want to think about any kind of squuezing when playing trumpet. Probably the best way to improve your endurance is just to make sure you're playing every day(at least 2 hours). Do a consistent warm up routine and a good balance of soft/loud, high/low playing.

Goldenchops55 · Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2002 12:32 pm Post subject:

Al Cass,
By tightening the ab muscles I literally mean TIGHTEN THE AB MUSCLES. Do this as if anticipating a punch. BTW, tightening the ab muscles seems to work great for Scott Englebright:)

dbacon · Heavyweight Member Joined: 11 Nov 2001 Posts: 8592

DSR · Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2002 7:25 pm Post subject:

You MAY be using the "smile" method of corner manipulation. This implies a stretching back of the mouth corners to access the upper register. It works to a certain degree, but over time its limitations on range and endurance will make themselves known. When the lips are stretched back, there is little cushion between the teeth and mouthpiece, thus endurance is limited. I have witnessed good orchestral players that use this smile embouchure (probably subconciously) but they can never seem to get above that high D, and their endurance is limited.

Instead, adobt what is called the lip pucker. The corners, upon an attack, are tightened down on the teeth. As a result of their circular formation, (the teeth) the corners will snap forward toward the RIM of the mouthpiece. This forward push or firmness (exactly the opposite of a smile) increases as the performer ascends into the upper register. Carrying out this vital manipulation creates a "cushion" on which the mouthpiece can rest, vastly improving endurance.

Don't interpret "pucker" as a kiss-type pucker. If one attempts to pucker in this fashion, lip flesh will enter the cup and a choke or impediment of the tone will be the result. The lips do not roll out as the pucker increases, they roll in. (Since ascending into the upper register demands that lower lip be rolled in.)

On some players, (ie: Maynard) the lip pucker is so developed, and the facial muscles so powerful that it looks like a large bulge emerges from their face. On strong lead players, the mouthpiece looks as if it has a "socket" that it plugs into. From lip puckering, the facial flesh is actually wrapping around the rim of the mouthpiece. We get screaming range!

Then again....that may not be your problem. I don't know.

Just consider the above.

Thanks.

[ This Message was edited by: DSR on 2002-07-19 22:31 ]

histrumpet · Posted: Fri Jul 19, 2002 8:23 pm Post subject:

AMEN!!!

ByroTrumpet · Regular Member Joined: 10 Jul 2002 Posts: 77

An easy way to go about playing higher and longer is to play high and play long. Start playing stuff in your method books up an octave.

A good way to expand your range is by lip slurs, seeing how high you can go. Nothing real complicated, just playing high. Also scales and chord exercises up into the high register are good. Keep pushing yourself.

For endurance, caruso stuff is good. And another exercise my trumpet teacher taught me is to take one of the 5th studiy exercises in the clarkes technical stides book and play it 20 times with 15 sec rest in between. see if you can do that. and then after that take the rest time down so its only 10 sec, then keep taking it down and then maybe you can even do it w/o any rest at all, just a breath. Or you can do it with scale exercises, just make sure you try to get into the upper register as well

just some ideas,
Byron

jonnydb · Posted: Sat Jul 20, 2002 9:09 am Post subject:

I would go get Jeff Smiley's book "The Balanced Embouchure." This book is great. It will teach you with certain exercises and smart practicing how to achieve a closed embouchure setting which is more effiecient. This will lead to great improvements in your playing. Not only in range but endurance, flexibility (and technique, because you can practice what you need to and not what your lips demand).

It is not a quick fix but will help you. Go take a trip down to the superchops forum and also start talking to Lee Adams, Bruce Lee and Tom Turner (and many others) They know a whole lot about Superchops and Jeff's book.

Good Luck,
Jon

John Mohan · Posted: Mon Jul 22, 2002 1:44 am Post subject:

Big Jake · Regular Member Joined: 14 Nov 2001 Posts: 47

The excellent trumpet books by Bill Knevitt are an upgrade and often considered superior to Claude Gordon books.
The systematic lesson plans are better in their design than Gordons.
Bill Knevitt is well known as a former Claude Gordon student. Claude Gordon himself made fabulous endorsements about Bill Knevitt such as.
"Of all of the trumpet teachers that I know Bill Knevitt is simply the best"

With that coming from Claude Gordon himself then checking him out would be a good idea if you are going to investigate the Gordon ideas.

I understand why Mr Gordon would be proud of him because he expanded and improved on the Gordons ideas and Bill never makes negative public comments about other people or methods. Bill is a good Christian man.

Contact Ultra Trumpet Ministries
http://www.ultratrumpet.com
Cheers
Jake

dbacon · Heavyweight Member Joined: 11 Nov 2001 Posts: 8592

Keith Wood · Posted: Thu Nov 14, 2002 9:16 pm Post subject:

Hey Irishtrumpet,
I know what you mean! I play in a church orchestra myself, and it can be tough playing at times. Here's something that worked well for me about seven years ago:

Back in 1996, I was lead trumpet for a show in Branson, Missouri. We played 436 3-hour shows in 9 months. I did NOT survive. I started the year out (in March) feeling like a "burly he-man", with A's, B's and even a double C on piccolo trpt at the end of the show. Well, that didn't last long, and by the middle of June, I couldn't play an Eb. By September, I could not play a note. Needless to say, I was not re-hired for the next year.

One of my former students was studying with Jay Saunders (Kenton's "Capricorn" album), and he mentioned this "MINIMAL PRESSURE SYSTEM" that Jay teaches. Hold your horn cradled in the pinkie and thumb of your left hand and just use the tips of fingers on your right hand. Start by slurring between second line G and 3rd space C using only AIR and TONGUE ARCH to move the notes. (Measure the distance from the G to the C and you'll find that it's less than an eighth of an inch!) Feel comfortable with all the valve combos and do this for a week. Then do the same from C to 4th space E and all valve combos. You can do chromatic scales and even--Melodies! this way. Do all your practicing and warmups this way, then do the gig how you normally would. Before long, you'll notice that those D's are popping out rather nicely. All the best,
_________________
God's Peace,
Keith Wood

Pops · Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2002 10:21 am Post subject:

[ This Message was edited by: Pops on 2003-05-13 11:16 ]

groovinhigher · Posted: Sat Nov 23, 2002 9:05 am Post subject:

Range and endurance, always an interesting topic, specifically in the demanding world of trumpet playing. A lot of great advice in here so far. While some of the approaches or basic methods for developing and keeping your chops up, all providing good results, a consistent theme when you look at any of them, is play and rest. Most great players play and rest several times a day, or break up their sessions. Many adovcate playing no more than 30-40 minutes, then taking at least a half hour break. I find that two sessions a day, around 25-30 minutes, then come back later and do a rehearsal, or a gig, or work on some other stuff later, seems to work best for me. Maynard and guys like Scott Englebright have a great saying, don't play long, play shorter and often, several times a day... and with the chops those guys have, might be some good advice.

For a great method for chops, check out Frank Minears book. You can contact him at: fmtrptman@aol.com

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Rich Wetzel
Trumpet Artist / Band Leader / Holton - Leblanc Clinician
"Rich Wetzel's Groovin Higher Jazz Orchestra"
http://www.richwetzel.com
http://www.groovinhigher.com

[ This Message was edited by: groovinhigher on 2002-11-23 12:08 ]