Range and How We Use the Air in the most important thing to think about when we are playing high notes on the trumpet. Here are some tips to help us master the high notes.

1. Too muscle based. How We Use The Air For Range is the # 1 tool of a brass player.

2. Compression + compression + mouthpiece pressure = NO aperture for the air to go through. Basically the tight muscular chops create such a small lip aperture that any other help closes and seals them. The pressure needed for a seal between the lips and the mouthpiece is not a lot but it WILL have some affect on the lips. Added to that the air column needed to play high is trying to blow the chops open. This actually blows them forward and that puts some of the embouchure inside the cup of the mouthpiece. This also closes the lip aperture. Lastly there is feedback added to your lips from the pressure wave inside the horn returning to your lips. This feedback from the horn stops at around a high g. The reflecting boundary is pushed out farther and farther as you ascend. And this causes a lot of players to have a break in range. When you add all of this together you have sealed them shut.

3. I was where you are now. You have all of the tools but you need to relax the chops so that the sound can be released. It is possible that you could accomplish that in a short time. It is possible that it also takes forever. This is now about overcoming the severe handicap of thought.

You know the facts. High notes need compression……. How We Use The Air For Range is important so you make an effort to add compression. Along with this some extra air support, a little more mouthpiece pressure. These things are what keep 95% of all high f and g players from being triple high c players.

At some point you have to not only stop adding pressure but actually take some away. That’s why Stevens and Mendez both told people of the ability to play a “No pressure note”. For the sake of a good sound you don’t want to go that far. You do want to pull the mouthpiece away and allow the lips to respond to the air. I use less mouthpiece pressure to play a double c than I do to play a g on top of the staff. If I use the same as I do for high c the note will NOT sound. Make an effort to pull the horn away from your top lip as you play higher.

1st lesson for range

Well the real key (To Think About) is to move the air faster and farther. Thinking and reality often differ. But thinking about actions or outcomes really helps to play. So I think about How We Use The Air For Range.

To keep abdominal reserve strength work on a natural approach below 4th space e. If you place your hand on your stomach and sing a g or c you will find that you do not tense your muscles. Check to see if you are using this same relaxed approach to playing. It only takes a day or two to learn this and you have more strength to speed up the air in the high c area.

For the mental part there are several points. Low notes are more non-directional than high ones. All you want to do is let them roll out of the bell onto the floor. Nice and relaxed using warm breath (haaa). The higher notes are directional and you want to shoot them through the horn to the back of the room. Use cold air like cooling soup. Music is an expressive art not an athletic event. Don’t go for records work on painting a picture.

As for the chops always set them for a g on top of the staff. This can prevent dozens of problems. Plus it is only an octave to high g over high c and an octave and a half to low c. Most problems come about because the set was on a low note like second line g. Now you have to muscle two octaves to get to g over high c. This is really a big deal. It is easier to set for the upper register and relax for the low notes than to set for the low ones and fight the high ones.

Make sure that you have a close (lips touching) embouchure then let the high notes out. To get a feel for what the lip needs to do in order to play higher try this. Put your teeth together and place a pencil between your lips. Let the eraser touch the front of the teeth. The other end (unsharpened please) will stick straight out in front. Raise and lower the end of the pencil using only the lip muscles. Raising the pencil takes lip compression (lip against lip) as do higher notes. This is also used by some as an exercise to strengthen the lips.

95% of the people that ask about endurance and range exert too much overall pressure (chops, abdominal, mouthpiece) and the notes can not escape into the horn. Relax the chops and pull the mouthpiece away from your lips as you ascend. The extra compression and force of the air column are already trying to blow the lips toward the mouthpiece. Pull away and give them some room to buzz. It may sound strange but I’ve seen it work hundreds of times.

Pops

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Are there really embouchure problems? Can’t air fix all of them? So, is it an Air or Embouchure Problem?

Proper breathing IS proper breathing. It does not matter if you learn from a sax player, tuba player, singer or even a trumpet player. I say proper because trumpet does have a few differences that are not related to the before mentioned musicians. For instance, the sax does have a REAL octave key and a tuba doesn’t play in our double register.

The tuba in its upper register only needs 1/8 th the pressure that a trumpet player needs to play a high c. And our notes do go up from there. (Ever see a tuba player pass out while playing? NO, a trumpet player should NOT pass out but it can happen.) In theory it does work in the same way so clearly a tuba player could teach air usage. However, I think that a trumpet player would understand our needs and requirements more fully.

As for air curing embouchure problems it is true that some problems can be taken care of by learning how to breathe and use the air. In fact, it may be that 50% of all trumpet embouchure problems are related to a poor use of air. It may be that all tuba problems can be fixed by air usage. There is 5 times the room for error in regard to mouthpiece placement. And while it is easy to pin down the lips with a trumpet mouthpiece the same is not true of a tuba mouthpiece.

I’ve mentioned several times on the net about my first lesson with Jacoby. It was ALL breathing and air usage. That first lesson was one of the most important trumpet playing lesson of my life. My first teacher had me lip buzz and mouthpiece buzz and those are the other basics of playing.

Some players however, can have great breathing and breath control but have some playing issue that they can’t get past. They can have a real Embouchure Problem. They could also just need a few tweaks like learning anchor tonguing or work on learning to use a “Lip Setpoint” (TM).

Pops

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This pulls the lower lip slightly out of the mouthpiece and for some it looks like this.

 The lower lip can not go back to its normal playing position. So it tries to continue playing by rolling the soft inside tissue into the hole that was made during the breath.

That not only looks vastly different from this normal shot but also affects tone, range, endurance.

Make sure you are NOT destroying your embouchure when breathing for trumpet playing.
Some will take their first breath and then set so they are doing greatbut then when they breathe the embouchure changes.
Here is one reason why that happens.The mouthpiece takes up about half of our overall lip length.
When we try to corner breathe through both sides we stretch the lipsinto a smile and often pull them apart.

Place your index finger gently on your lips in their normal restingposition (this is how many of us look when we play).
Now breathe throughboth mouth-corners at the same time. You will feel the lips shift andseparate plus if you use lip curl you will feel them uncurl some.

Well when you do this and the mouthpiece is there instead of the finger;the mouthpiece doesn’t let the lip go back to normal. They stay apartslightly and uncurled.

Now place the finger back on the resting lips and breathe through only 1side of your mouth. There is much less movement, no separation and nouncurling of the lips The embouchure stays put.

The easy way to fix or prevent this is to only breathe through 1 mouth-corner. That keeps you from having to stretch the lips and allows the embouchure to stay in position.

Pops

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The airway must always be open both in inhaling and in playing.

One problem is posture. I’ve seen many experienced players slumped over while jamming. I’ve seen them with their heads down and their arms against their ribcage. If we give this its proper importance then we see that these things WILL lead to a closed throat, shallow breaths, and poor support.

If the jaw is pushed forward slightly this will cause the throat to be more open than it normally is. Try it. Move the jaw forward slowly and check if you can feel your throat open up. Think of the effect that can have on your tone. The more forward jaw position will also make your lower lip take on more of the workload. This increases endurance (after you get used to it).

Another key feature in maintaining an open airway is a pivot. You could write hundreds of pages about this. But that’s already been done. In a nutshell, by raising or lowering the bell of your horn while you are playing you can maintain a more open airway and clearer tone.

As you play higher and lower notes the air stream will slightly move in the mouthpiece. If we can keep it lined up with the throat hole the sound is better.

The SLIGHT bell movement will produce an opposite movement or realignment of our lips to the mouthpiece.

Now which way do you move the bell? Try this test. Play a low g 1-3. Move the bell up then move it down. One way should improve the sound. When you move to a lower note from now on always pivot in this direction. The opposite direction will aid the upper notes. This is a good movement whenever you have to leap between notes.

The tongue arch has been used for years to speed up the air to play higher notes. Most people arch to the point where the sound quality is affected.

Instead of arching up to eeee try aaaaa. This is a more open sound yet it still compresses the air slightly.

After all the tongue arch cannot give you an extra octave. It is merely used for rapid note movement. The abdominals compress the air for your range.

As for the tongue arch using a long aaaaaa sound instead of an eee is a more open-mouth position and therefore a fuller sound. If you are playing 3 octaves over high r# then you use whatever is needed to stay there.

As for a specific vowel for below middle c, middle c to Eb … that is not strictly the case. All lip trills, slurs, and leaps are accomplished in part by using a tongue arch. If you have maxed out your tongue motion at Bb below high c how do you plan to continue going up? The tongue arch is like an elevator it should help you to compress and thereby speed up the air to achieve higher notes.

Surely if you did practice out of the Irons book this was apparent. So you start out on the low c to second line g and lip slur back and forth. Both of these notes are below middle c yet a tongue arch is useful in speeding up the exercise. Likewise, if you are playing a high g and want to slur up if you are already in the extreme eeee position where do you go? My suggestion is to attempt to substitute a long aaaa when possible and save the extremes for a reserve.

Pops

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We all know that high notes require more support (compression) than low notes. This need increases with the range. A low c needs x amount. A middle c needs 2X , high c 4X and super c needs 8X the support that low c needs to sound.

Along with this added air compression is a need to increase the lip compression to fight the air stream and produce the higher notes. If we blow a fast air stream against lips set for a low c then a low c comes out. ( Most of the time Look at overblowing the octave at the bottom of this message.) There are several systems taught here. The main point being that the lips need to form a smaller aperture and be strong enough to resist the air. Compression comes about when the lower lip pushes against the upper lip. In some schools (Stevens and Super Chops) the jaw moves up slightly and aids the lower lip in this action. This need for compression is lessened by adding an inward lip curl. The lip curl adds to the strength of the lip and since it acts as a one way valve less overall compression is needed. The air way MUST remain relaxed and open at all times. The air support can be helped by the use of a modified tongue arch and a pivot action. This long aaaaa tongue arch speeds up the air some without affecting the tone. While the pivot keeps the airstream lined up with the throat hole in the mouthpiece.

As far as aperture size and range go there is an important point to remember. Range is a result of some combination of fast air being blown through a small aperture. This can be accomplished in different ways.

1.The aperture can be made smaller by lip compression. (Using only this method may make it difficult to peel paint as it can impede airflow.)

2. Making the vibrating surface shorter by pulling (bringing ) in the mouth corners.

3. A combination of 1 & 2 which works very well.

4. Mouthpiece pressure (Well there ARE people who use this as a real technique even though it has a number of drawbacks.)

5. What I like to call the Trumpet Octave Key. AIR.

There are several ways air can be used. Everyone talks about air speed but few go into any detail. Remember a very important aspect of lip apertures is that a low note needs a big aperture and a loud note causes a big aperture. If we play a soft second line g there is a certain lip aperture size. If we add air to play louder then the aperture increases in size but the note stays a second line g. If the aperture size stayed the same then the pitch would go higher. This rarely happens on second line g. That note is too familiar to us. However we have all increased the air and over shot notes above the staff. One of the only “important” findings from all of the lipless trumpet machine experiments was finding out about lip tension / aperture size / air ratios.

A simple analogy is overblowing the octave on a childs recorder. That $ 2 toy that some kids learn to play in school. The high octave is overblown by air. This is not as easy on the trumpet but we have all done this to some extent. We learned this technique when we worked on our lip slurs. It smoothed them out and enabled us to play arpeggios like middle c to high c while blowing past that pesky Bb.

What good is this?
Well with practice it can be used to help you learn to peel paint. Try this play a high c at a moderate dynamic level and then add air instantly. One of 2 things will happen. If you allow the aperture to get bigger then you have a very loud high c. If you keep the aperture the same size then you will overblow the octave. Hopefully you can use this feeling and technique to learn to open up the aperture on your upper notes.

Pops

The post Air: The Real Trumpet Octave Key appeared first on BBTrumpet.

1. AIR (you need compression for those high notes)
2. AIR (you need to blow faster air for those high notes)
3. AIR (you are overblowing)
Most people confuse air speed with air mass. If you take in a great deal of air (big breath) it is TOO hard to compress the air and let the speed assist you in the upper register. Your breathing apparatus is overworking due to poor technique and it is a breathing issue rather than a chop endurance problem. I say this because you describe such a STRONG high c. And a sudden loss of range from high f down to c.

This overblowing is usually caused by….
4. TOO MUCH embouchure tension. There is a mental image of high notes being difficult. And this causes most people to OVERDO the chop setting.

Look in a mirror and play a lip slur from low c to second line g. Could you see your chops set differently?
Now look and play a lip slur from middle c to g on the staff. Could you see a change here? I can’t.
Look in the mirror and play a high c. Stop playing and play a high f or g.
I bet you see yourself really working the chops.

This is completely backwards.

The higher you go the less change is needed. We thought it was hard so we made it hard.
Take a look a guitar. Play an open string and then put your finger in the center and play it again. That 12″ finger movement was 1 octave. If you slide the finger up 6″ you have your next octave. If you slide your finger up 3″ you have the next octave. Notice how each octave has half the movement of the one lower than it. The same thing happens when playing the trumpet.

Each octave requires half of the embouchure change that the one below it needed. 99 out of 100 players don’t realize this and prevent themselves from having a good range. It is this extra tension that causes lots of problems including a poor range and endurance.

Pops

The post High Note Endurance appeared first on BBTrumpet.

Learn the Power of air vs embouchure change. There are thousands of variables in trumpet playing. I have had and will continue to have people who add anywhere from a third to a fifth in an in-person lesson. The octave is rare but does indeed happen. 2 octaves never. I know of other teachers who have had the same thing happen.

Don’t underestimate the power of the airstream. I’ve seen players with degrees up to AND including DMAs receive great benefits from an AIR lesson. Also playing pros, teachers… This includes players with up to 60 years of experience. (My oldest student to date was 74.)

My lesson on Monday did NOT add a single note during his lesson. I took the airy sound out of his tone, fixed his tonguing problem, taught him to relax, and freed up the sound of his lower register. I helped him to reach his current top notes with less pressure and more power as a note rather than a squeal. But he did NOT add to his range.

Still all in all I consider it a great improvement for him as a player.

I teach players to relax in the lower register using a similar approach that was presented in an ITG masterclass by Vincent Cichowicz.

I teach the visualization of range that was presented by Mike Vax at the same convention.

AND I teach the compression that was taught by Brisbois in the 70s for the upper register (currently taught by Bobby Shew).

I learned all of these from Don Jacoby who was mentioned at an ITG masterclass.

Many people add to their range suddenly by this approach and do not change embouchures. That is WHY the people I just mentioned and I teach AIR, AIR, AIR.

Undergoing an embouchure change is a completely different matter altogether. You have to spend a great deal of time in the mid and low registers as the facial muscles have to strengthen and adjust to new demands. I have NEVER said an embouchure change is easy. And I try everything else first before I do one in person also.

As far as lip size goes the guy who taught me had the smallest lips I’ve ever seen. I have thick lips. I use a smaller percentage of my lip in the curl but the same amount of curl as he did.

The Stevens is an AHA type of embouchure. It requires a great deal of tiny adjustments that vary from person to person. It would take a book several thousands of pages to try to describe them all. And nobody would ever read that detailed account. A lesson is the best way. Hundreds of tiny AHAs will one day become a big AHA and then you have it. I’ve seen it learned in 4-5 lessons AND I’ve seen people who never got a handle on it. They played it but not well. Hey, I can’t play golf. Why is that?

Air is a much faster and easier approach. Perhaps a minor fine-tuning of your current embouchure and a more economical use of air is what you require.

Written by Pops

The post Air Vs Embouchure appeared first on BBTrumpet.

Do a stomach lift (without playing). Then you will understand why a half breath works and can use it quicker.

Take a full breath, pull the stomach as far in as possible and try to lift it toward the lungs.

You can’t do it.

Take a full breath and blow most of it away. Then try the lift. It is easier to do.

This way I can prove to you that a full breath PREVENTS the abdominal muscles from properly compressing the air for high notes.

The compression (bringing the stomach in) will speed up the air. The lift (pulling the stomach up to the chest) will force air from your lungs.

Practice half breaths and the stomach lift WITHOUT a horn. Just work on the breathing.

Use both the lift and timed (half) breathing together.

Be a breath centered player not a face centered one.

Pops

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When I first went to ‘Jake’ I was ‘playing’ in the symphony and leading in the jazz band. I had already long since switched embouchures from Farkas, to Maggio to Stevens. With the Stevens, I could ‘play’ Super G at will.

My first lesson was a complete letdown. I was only allowed to play a simple lip slur from second line g to middle c. I was told that I would need to learn how to breathe and when to use support.

He had me place my hand on my stomach and play the lip slur. I took a breath turned the air around and played a supported g-c lip slur.

I was told not to use my abdominals on notes that low. He played a lip slur with my hand on his stomach low c-g-c-g- high c. I felt no tension at all until he went to high c.

What I learned was that there is enough pressure being applied already to your ribcage in all directions from the air to properly support low notes. If we think of letting a low g roll out of the bell of the horn rather than blowing it out the sound is very free. Likewise, a low c might travel a few feet in front of us. A middle c would travel still farther….

‘Jake’ advocated no abdominal pressure at all under middle c. This can not happen as our muscle system is always under some tension but he meant no extra intentional pressure.

This left more strength in reserve for the upper register. The higher notes are to shoot out of the bell and drill a hole in the back wall of the concert hall.

Was this simple lesson learned in an hour or a day? No, it took a while to stop kicking in my abdominals until I got over the middle c. Even then to learn the difference between some pressure and a lot of pressure took more time. After all fourth space e does not need the kick high c does. We all know this but until we test ourselves by playing with our hand on our abdominals we may not be doing what we know.

Pops

The post Reserve Power: Maximize Upper Register Strength appeared first on BBTrumpet.

I’m not exactly sure what is meant by tweaking to get notes.

If you are playing a g to play a f you only have to push a valve. (NOT)

The pressing the valve idea works on a very basic level. We strive to make every note match in sound quality and to be in tune. THIS REQUIRES TWEAKING EVERY NOTE.

Some of these are done with the chops, some with the air, some with the tongue level and some using all three. But every note is tweaked.

If you mean some kind of embouchure shift. Then I can tell you that I don’t shift my embouchure. It is the same from one end to the other. Most people who play with a embouchure shift share these common problems.

1. They do not use enough air.

2. They do not use enough air.

3. They do not use enough air.

4. They compensate with mouthpiece pressure.

5. The set note is in the lower register instead of on top of the staff.

The first 4 explain themselves.

For #5 try this example. Pick up your horn and set for a low c. Now play a low c. On the same breath add air and slur to g, middle c, g, high c, and high g. That is two and a half octaves over the set point of low c. Most people would not be able to do that.

Now set for a g on top of the staff. Play that g and then slur up to high c and high g. On the same breath slur down until you get back to low c. This should have been easy as the top note was only 1 octave higher than the set point. The low notes will come out free as well.

This takes a day or two to get used to but it is a lifesaver in real performance.

That’s how I play NO embouchure shifts.

There are only 3 reasons not to be playing high.

1. The lips separating as you blow allowing the air to hiss through. This happens as you play higher and higher; the lips blow apart and instead of a note you hear air. (This is rarely seen.)

2. The chops / mouthpiece pressure closing the aperture not letting any sound out. As you go higher the lip compression makes the aperture smaller and smaller. You also add some mouthpiece pressure to seal the chops. This pressure closes the aperture down even farther. This has NOTHING to do with lip strength or power. It is a combination of TOO MUCH lip compression, TOO MUCH mouthpiece pressure and NOT ENOUGH AIR to blow the lips apart. (This is the most common.)

3. Not enough air speed / support. This speaks for itself.

The quickest solution is to teach the student to use very little mouthpiece pressure and to use more air.

I had a new student start last Friday. He has a BM and has been playing for 16 – 17 years. I had him play some real music first to check on his tone, flexibility, tonguing. I even had him sight read. (I DO NOT teach poor players to play high. They have to work on the basics first.) His playing was fine. His range was poor.

I gave him an AIR lesson.

1. We used the warmup from my book. I had him blowing arpeggios working on the air and NOT the lips. Take 2nd line g, 3rd space c & g on top of the staff. Play this as a slurred passage of whole notes. There is a tendency for the 4th space e to want to be played or touched as a passing tone.

Use air to blow past this to the g.

Think about blowing the notes out of the horn. The 2nd line g goes out 5 feet. The c goes out 10 feet. Make the g on top of the staff go out 15-20 feet.

(I’ve had students blow out matches before. If I hold a lit match a foot from them they barely blow. If I hold it 20 feet away they blow like a hurricane.)

2. I had him lip trill a C scale starting on middle C. C to E, D to F, E to G…… High C to High E. Keep going up if you can. His last good trill was A to High C#. There are closer harmonics but we are using airflow to push through harmonics. This is an AIR. exercise.

3A. I played this lip trill exercise and let him hold my trumpet. So he could see how little pressure is really needed.

3B. I held his trumpet as he worked on range. After a minute or 2 I let him hold it himself. He then play a Concone study 8va. After he played a good high G. He said ” Is that a high G? That felt like a 2nd line G to my lips. I could do that all day.”

His learning about the upper register has just started. It is has NOTHING to do with how smart a person is. I’ve taught people who had DMA’s in trumpet. It has to do with someone teaching you the RIGHT way to do it.

This is SO easy in person. I hope that this written lesson helps.

Pops

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