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I have given MouthpieceExpress.com almost $350 in the last 2 days. Granted a good chunk of that was for a gold-plated Bobby Shew with some custom detailing (that won't even ship for like 3 months) but still. I have a problem.  (the problem is Abilify, which I started taking again to help my rear end find a job, although it also has a history of loving with my money choices. And my weight. And possibly my testosterone; we're still running tests on that.)
I. M. Gei fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Nov 10, 2023 |
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Nov 10, 2023 00:06
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imo that kind of post is better in for instance e/n.
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Nov 10, 2023 00:20
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I'm experimenting with some new mouthpieces to see if I can find something that fits me better on my new horns than the Bach 3C did on my old one. So far my biggest observations have been "Schilke fuckin owns" and "Schilkes are loving comfy as hell to play on" and "wait wait wait hold up, how the gently caress is a Schilke 14A4a a screamer I thought screamers were supposed to hurt WHY COULDN'T I HAVE FOUND THIS poo poo IN HIGH SCHOOL?". I'm also starting to think that there's a link between similarities in mouthpiece and instrument (particularly leadpipe) geometry and how comfortable, functional, and easy to play a mouthpiece is, and so I'm trying out several different mouthpiece configurations to put that idea to the test. Part of that $350 I mentioned above went toward a Yamaha screw-on top and backbore for just that purpose. You laugh, but this is an area I'm giving serious thought to researching academically at some point after I go back to college. Most of what we think we know about the subject of brass resistance in general is based on theory and anecdotes from various brass players, but very little of it has ever been explored or tested experimentally, and I recently came up with a way to test it that I'd really like to pursue if by some miracle I ever get into post-grad. I. M. Gei fucked around with this message at 01:59 on Nov 10, 2023 |
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Nov 10, 2023 01:34
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many lead pieces are super comfy, just shallow and tight and if you don't have the embouchure they'll sound like rear end. big fan of buying a bag of cheap kelly pieces, that's how i landed on the shew jazz
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Nov 10, 2023 01:36
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I finally started practicing again a couple of months ago and HOOOOOOOOOLEEEEEEEEYYYYY poo poo did I fall off the wagon on the fundamentals. I knew I'd need some time to get my chops back into shape, but I didn't think basic middle school poo poo like abdominal breathing was gonna be a thing I'd forget. I just got a private lesson instructor who gave me a list of books and exercises to look at and he's already taught me a few really helpful tricks in just my first lesson. Only problem is he can't fit me in on a regular schedule, and he had to reschedule that first lesson twice. Luckily I know another lesson guy who can fit me in pretty much whenever if I need extra help. I also bought a few exercise tools, including a P.E.T.E. embouchure trainer which I'm wondering if anyone here has any experience with, and, uhh........... this thing: 
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Nov 11, 2023 03:40
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figure out an instructor you can actually see regularly imo. gadgets are less important than that
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Nov 11, 2023 04:07
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I have a PETE and use it if I’m away from home and can’t play every day, especially if I have a show coming up. Otherwise I don’t use it. It makes no sense to use it in addition to practice, as you could just play more instead. The anti-pressure device is dumb IMO. edit: to be clear, I'm not saying you're dumb for buying it - I love gadgets too, but I've learned to channel that into horns, mouthpieces, mutes, etc. I think that specific device doesn't make a ton of sense because buzzing is not a good exercise and not really related to how we actually play the trumpet. I think it's dumb that we teach beginners to buzz into their mouthpiece instead of just playing the horn. Wayne Bergeron does a better job explaining it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzB7r9C_LrU Too much pressure is definitely a problem many trumpet players (including me) struggle with, but I think a better fix is actually playing long tones and flexibility exercises on the horn while concentrating on setup, and the Stevens-Costello palm exercise. It's a hard problem to fix, but I don't think a spring-loaded plastic doodad is the way to go. Erwin fucked around with this message at 16:08 on Nov 11, 2023 |
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Nov 11, 2023 15:43
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Erwin posted:I have a PETE and use it if I’m away from home and can’t play every day, especially if I have a show coming up. Otherwise I don’t use it. It makes no sense to use it in addition to practice, as you could just play more instead. My first time using the P.E.T.E. I felt DOMS in my face and jaw muscles 24 hours later that I never get from playing, and that alone tells me it's doing something. The problem is it can gently caress up your actual practicing and playing if you go too hard and/or use it less than a couple of hours (or even a day or two if you're just starting out on it) beforehand, so you have to time it just right which is why I haven't used mine that much yet. I think I'll probably stick to using it at the end of daily practices for now; that way my chops can recover from both at the same time. My main question is should it be used dynamically (i.e. moving your mouth muscles repeatedly over and over again in "reps" of like half a second each), or by holding my mouth in a fixed position for as long as I can? I'm thinking dynamic is better, like with dynamic stretching and isometric flexing for weightlifting, but maybe face muscles work a little different? I mean I'm not doing "reps" when I actually play, so... Erwin posted:The anti-pressure device is dumb IMO. I maaay have been motivated a little bit by the product name when I bought it. Warburton is supposed to be a pretty good company, and here they have a thing called the A.P.E. ..... and I'm over here wondering if they even focus-tested that name at all, and then the label has a fuckin' gorilla on it and that's just the cherry on top. Like, sure, gently caress it, have my money. I'm already buying a thing called the P.E.T.E., so might as well throw that on the pile too. Like... what do you make a joke about first? Donkey Kong or Bonzi? Erwin posted:I think that specific device doesn't make a ton of sense because buzzing is not a good exercise and not really related to how we actually play the trumpet. I think it's dumb that we teach beginners to buzz into their mouthpiece instead of just playing the horn. Wayne Bergeron does a better job explaining it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzB7r9C_LrU I think I told the story about the high school jazz band clinic I went to where Wayne Bergeron told us how he once played so hard he exploded some of his cheek muscles, and then he showed us how he could now puff out his lower cheeks and jaws in a way human beings aren't supposed to be able to do. I. M. Gei fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Nov 11, 2023 |
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Nov 11, 2023 20:01
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Okay I've been posting a lot in this thread over the past few days, and now I have another question. This time it's about Yamaha Silent Brass mutes, which I assume at least some of y'all are familiar with, although this question may also be suited to one of the gear threads. I got a Silent Brass SB7X mute kit for Christmas last year that I haven't played on until just recently because I was worried the added resistance from it might gently caress me up on my new horns at a time when I'm both out of practice and still getting used to the un-muted resistances on them. I finally played on it for the first time a few days ago and... well the good news is the resistance doesn't seem to be a problem. The bad news is that it apparently makes any and all intonation problems about 100 times worse. That's almost not even an exaggeration; the first note I played on it was a low C below the staff and it came out so flat that it sounded like a B below that. Maybe even a Bb. It literally didn't sound like a C at all. Then I tried playing a one-octave C scale and almost ALL of the notes sounded one note below what they should've been. I played the same scale a few more times while adjusting my pitch higher, and it started sounding more like a C scale except a few notes that were so sharp they sounded almost like the next note UP, and others that were the opposite. Is this a known thing with the SB7X? I'm wondering if it's something to do with the reverb AI multiplying the sound output in a way that also multiplies tuning issues, and maybe I'm just having more trouble with it than most since I'm out of practice. Maybe the new SB7J doesn't do it as bad? I guess what I'm asking is, is this something other people experience on Yamaha Silent Brass, and is there anything I can do to remedy it? Or did I just get a hosed up product out of the box?
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Nov 13, 2023 04:50
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any mute is going to gently caress with intonation, and not just by shortening the length of the horn. what you are experiencing is one of the many issues with a high-resistance mute. find a way to get lots of practice without it in, along with finding a regular instructor
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Nov 13, 2023 23:16
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I. M. Gei posted:I got a Silent Brass SB7X mute kit for Christmas last year I was messing with mine last night and found that I was blowing a half step up so trying to blow an E was showing as an F on my tuner. I pulled the slide all the way out and got it kinda in tune but it's going to be a battle. I am not trying to play out just record at home so I hope I can make it work.
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Nov 14, 2023 00:33
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Ohtori Akio posted:any mute is going to gently caress with intonation, and not just by shortening the length of the horn. what you are experiencing is one of the many issues with a high-resistance mute. find a way to get lots of practice without it in, along with finding a regular instructor well balls I'm one of those people who really REALLY hates playing at home to the point I try to avoid it as much as I can, and the only place in town with practice rooms I can use is closed on Sundays and holidays. So basically you're saying I have no choice but to play my horn at home bareback and be self-conscious as gently caress about it for at least 2 to 3 hours a day, one or more days a week no matter what. That is gonna take me some time to build up the balls for. ...... I suppose I could try that thing some players do where they stuff their bell in a Crown Royal bag to dampen their sound a little. It won't be *as* quiet as a Silent Brass mute but it'll probably be a lot more in tune. Hopefully it won't scare my cats who've never heard me play a trumpet before. 
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Nov 14, 2023 03:07
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I. M. Gei posted:well balls memorize your music and go practice in a public park. but why are you practicing for 2-3 hours at a time, Bud Herseth didn't practice that long a more reasonable practice rhythm especially for a returning player is 30 min/day every single day
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Nov 14, 2023 03:23
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Ohtori Akio posted:but why are you practicing for 2-3 hours at a time, Bud Herseth didn't practice that long Anytime I practiced multiple days in a row on my old horn (if I did my full warmup and post-practice routines properly every single day), 2 to 3 hours was about the minimum amount of time I needed to practice to actually get better each day (except on the first day which was more like 1.5 to 2 hours). My warmup routine alone lasts about 40 to 45 minutes, including the rest I have to do between that and actual practice. I actually wrote out my full warmup ritual to show to my instructor but we haven't gone over it yet. Now that I'm on normal-sized horns and not the .464" behemoth I was playing on before, I really need to workshop both that warmup sequence and my practice regimen as a whole.
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Nov 14, 2023 04:21
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y'all making me real glad I live on 11 acres on a dead end road. If I get bored of indoor acoustics, I just go outside.* Also, I grew too much weed last summer so my grow shed has been converted into an office/practice room in those cases where it's too cold to play outside. I'm not very diligent but I've been playing 20-40 mins 3-5x a week because it's fun and it's so easy to just start blasting on a lunch break or w/e. I need to find an instructor, I believe. I think I may be approaching the same level I was at when I put this stuff down in 1999. * often, the degree to which we are isolated is inconvenient. Your conversation has made me see the huge advantage in something I had basically been taking for granted, since people also just blast guns etc out here, no one cares about horns One of my neighbors loving loves cannons much more than I find reasonable, but I might consider approaching him for an 1812 rendition, if not for the giant gently caress BIDEN flags  Without getting into politics, anyone who wants to wear something that toxic on their sleeve isn't a jamming buddy of mine. I have two much closer neighbors who I know to be hardcore Trump people but I only know this second hand because they are smart enough not to talk politics with the weird technophile dude who dresses like a 16 year old cyber ninja wannabe.
Cabbages and VHS fucked around with this message at 18:12 on Nov 14, 2023 |
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Nov 14, 2023 18:08
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I. M. Gei posted:...... I suppose I could try that thing some players do where they stuff their bell in a Crown Royal bag to dampen their sound a little. It won't be *as* quiet as a Silent Brass mute but it'll probably be a lot more in tune. Hopefully it won't scare my cats who've never heard me play a trumpet before. Trip Report: holy poo poo the Crown Royal bag trick actually does work! It dampens your volume just slightly and takes just enough edge out of your sound that it doesn't bleed through the walls as bad, which is great if you don't want to bug your neighbors but also don't have the option of playing softer. My practice works my breathing and diaphragm muscles and so I have to play loud, so this is incredibly handy for me. Best of all, it doesn't gently caress with your intonation, because it doesn't alter the resonating length of your horn since the bag is nice and soft! Also no added resistance!  If you want just a felt drawstring bag but don't want the lovely booze or Crown Royal logo, fret not! Torpedo Bags makes an even nicer (and slightly cheaper) bag mute for trumpet and trombone called the GnatCatcher. Highly recommend! EDIT: ...... or you could also ask your local liquor store if they have any extra CR bags lying around. Apparently one of the ones near me has a whole bin full of them and just gives them away for like .50¢ a pop. I. M. Gei fucked around with this message at 02:23 on Nov 25, 2023 |
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Nov 18, 2023 20:38
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How much posting in this thread is considered too much? I really wanna gush about a new perfect fit mouthpiece I just got on this Black Friday, but I've made something like half the posts here in the last 3 weeks and I'm worried it looks weird.
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Nov 25, 2023 02:15
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I. M. Gei posted:How much posting in this thread is considered too much? Go wild, just because we ain’t posting doesn’t mean we ain’t reading. Most of my purchases and practicing has been on guitar lately but I’m a winds guy at my core.
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Nov 27, 2023 17:27
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I. M. Gei posted:How much posting in this thread is considered too much?  Super enjoying my YTS-62, even if I am only managing to play 20-30 mins 3-4x a week. I am going to look into local lessons soon.
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Dec 3, 2023 18:47
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one of the cats yakked on my (closed) horn case. I take that as "don't quit your day job bud"
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Dec 3, 2023 21:01
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I’m writing a concert band piece that starts with a clarinet repeating a B-flat concert before the rest of the woodwinds start to layer in on top. Every time my cat hears this, he runs away growling. Dude has absolute poo poo taste in music if I do say so myself…
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Dec 3, 2023 21:51
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I was afraid my cats were gonna get spooked by the sound of my horn playing but they haven't given a single gently caress about it since I started practicing at home again. Sometimes they sit outside the door just waiting to come in. 
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Dec 3, 2023 22:02
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My neighbors' dogs absolutely hate even just seeing the tuba, there's a couple of them that'll start doing backflips on the leash trying to get at the case to attack it Another time I brought a contrabass bugle to my parents' house and demonstrated it for them, and their two dogs crawled on their bellies to the corner and covered their faces and started whimpering
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Dec 4, 2023 02:49
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My cat hates my saxophones and clarinets. Once she hears the click of the metal case latch, she repositions herself to at least two rooms away. Flute, she doesn't give a crap. Makes me think it's a volume issue. My flute case is a cheap plastic thing with cheap plastic latches, so she can just loll about wherever and not care, knowing it is not one of the Dread Instruments that is about to toot.
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Dec 4, 2023 04:08
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bagina posted:I’m writing a concert band piece that starts with a clarinet repeating a B-flat concert before the rest of the woodwinds start to layer in on top. Every time my cat hears this, he runs away growling. Dude has absolute poo poo taste in music if I do say so myself… Makes sense Percy Grainger would be a goon
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Dec 4, 2023 23:43
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Hazo posted:Makes sense Percy Grainger would be a goon
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Dec 5, 2023 01:17
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To the Forums!
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Dec 5, 2023 02:19
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Hazo posted:Makes sense Percy Grainger would be a goon  
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Dec 5, 2023 02:25
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Anyway I was gonna post whole love sonnets about my new Schilke 12A4A, and how it fits me like a glass slipper and gives me quite possibly the fullest buzz, easiest high notes, and most mistake-free playing through tricky passages I've ever experienced in my entire life, and how the cup depth is like an almost-perfect magical goldilocks zone between a Schilke 13A4A and 14A4A with an inner diameter closer to the former and a nice wide rim and oh god I love it so much best mouthpiece evar!!!1!1! ... but then after about 4 days in a row of practicing on it exclusively, I started noticing my chops were getting stiffer at the start of each day and my once-robust buzz was becoming thinner and more difficult, and that they only improved when I switched back to my usual Bach 3C. That was when I realized that as wonderful as the 12A4A is, its wide rim, narrow inner diameter, and overall screamer properties might make it ill-suited for everyday practicing. Also that, in retrospect, playing on it for 2+ hours with a practice mute on the first day (even though it felt and sounded great) probably wasn't a very good idea. Also it made the lowest 2 or 3 notes in my chromatic a little bit harder to hit, but...... eh 
I. M. Gei fucked around with this message at 23:11 on Dec 5, 2023 |
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Dec 5, 2023 23:08
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Ohtori Akio posted:To the Forums! Goddamn lmao
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Dec 5, 2023 23:18
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My (new) private lesson instructor just sent me this. It's 32 pages and comes with a VHS/DVD.
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Dec 13, 2023 22:02
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Breathing Gym is good stuff, like every drum corps brass line teaches it directly or indirectly
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Dec 13, 2023 23:11
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The Chairman posted:Breathing Gym is good stuff, like every drum corps brass line teaches it directly or indirectly It's real good but drat that cover just oozes '90s work training/self-help seminar energy and so does every page inside. It kinda rules.
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Dec 14, 2023 03:28
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wind pedagogy is so small and insular that there's no incentive to move on from the first time someone presented the right way to teach breathing. it's kinda like how we're all still practicing from the Arban book and Colin flexibilities
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Dec 14, 2023 03:31
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I. M. Gei posted:It's real good but drat that cover just oozes '90s work training/self-help seminar energy and so does every page inside. It kinda rules. "Tai Chi for Phil Collins Fans"
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Dec 14, 2023 03:40
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I'm noticing some pretty significant chop stiffness anytime I practice multiple days in a row and I'm wondering what might be causing that and how to fix it. It's bad enough that it's affecting my playing. It seems to happen any day after I play my full warmup and get through at least the first of the exercises my private instructor gave me to practice (Cichowicz flow studies 1 through 10 if anyone here is familiar with those, although I only play a few lines per page). It's mostly in the cheek and jaw areas, basically the same muscles that get worked whenever I use my P.E.T.E., and it hurts my playing bad enough that I have trouble just doing warmups the next day, much less anything after that. It doesn't seem to affect my lips; just the facial muscles around the lips. It doesn't seem to be affected by what mouthpiece I play on. This past week I've only been playing on my Bach 3C, which has been my one regular playing mouthpiece for years and years, and I still had soreness. I'm wondering if the flow study might be a factor? Maybe it's just DOMS but in my face muscles? How do I address this? Am I working my mouth too hard? Should I power through it and keep playing until it goes away? Would it go away at all if I keep playing, or would it get worse? I'm gonna bring this up with my instructor at my next lesson, but I thought I'd check and see if this thread has any input on the matter before that.
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Dec 20, 2023 05:03
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Definitely check with your instructor but it does sound like you're just overworking your embouchure and not giving yourself enough time to recover
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Dec 20, 2023 05:10
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You might just be getting old for how you are used to playing. Embouchure recovery time has definitely gotten worse for me over the years. I first noticed it in my mid-30s and, yeah, it kinda sucks. I can't play more than once a day for "real". I used to practice every day, for example, whether or not I was playing in the evening, but now it's one or the other. Classical/concert band is the worst for me, the long rests in jazz while someone is soloing for 32 bars or whatever really help a lot, but still, I need my old dude rest time. You can also do other useful music stuff instead of playing the horn, like memorizing charts or doing chord progressions or fingering notes on the horn without actually playing. Or if you can, modify your embouchure or playing in some manner to not be so hard on yourself. I use softer reeds nowadays, for example, and have the mouthpiece usually cranked alllll the way in so my lips don't have to work so hard. No idea how brass could adjust in that way, though.
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Dec 20, 2023 06:33
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I know I need to come up with a shorter and less strenuous warmup routine, but the routine I use now is the only thing I ever found that made me consistently play and sound good on my old .464" Besson, and it's kinda become the only life I know and I'm scared to leave it. But it also takes something like 40 or 50 minutes to do every single day, and I doubt I need to beat my lips up that much anymore now that I'm playing on a horn with a smaller, more standard bore size that I don't sound like total poo poo on (compared to the Besson) if I haven't played it in a couple of days. I just don't know HOW to modify my warmup, or what to do differently on it besides "make it shorter". But I think just shortening that by itself would go a long way toward fixing the problem. I. M. Gei fucked around with this message at 07:21 on Dec 20, 2023 |
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Dec 20, 2023 07:18
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I think that's plenty to bring back to the instructor. "this full warmup plus the studies is too much for my chops right now, what do we cut?"
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Dec 20, 2023 09:57
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