The Study of the Trombone

Upcoming MISO concerts.

2009-12-03T10:44:00.000-08:00

Check out the Miami Symphony Orchestra concerts this Saturday Dec. 5 at 8:00 pm and Sunday Dec. 6 at 8 pm. I will be playing principal trombone the entire evening. Click here for ticket information.

Video of Frost Wind Ensemble

2009-11-27T06:31:00.000-08:00

This is a great video of the Frost Wind Ensemble from our concert in Festival Miami in October. The piece is Raise the Roof by Michael Daugherty. The timpani soloist is Svet Stoyanov. This is a great clip and the trombones stand up at the end!

Frost Wind Ensemble

2009-11-24T05:21:00.001-08:00

There is a Frost Wind Ensemble performance this evening.

On the program is

Prelude, Fugue, and Riffs - Leonard Bernstein

Symphony Dances from West Side Story - Leonard Bernstein

Symphony No. 8 - David Maslank

The concert is at 8 pm in Gusman Hall and there is no admission fee.

You can also listen to the concert free on the UM website. Click Here

Miami Symphony Orchestra Review

2009-11-23T16:07:00.000-08:00

Here is the review, by Lawrence Budmen, of the concert I played with the Miami Symphony Orchestra on Friday Nov. 20 2009.

My next concert with MISO is on December 5th with a repeat performance on the 6th. We are playing a lot of great music including the Ride of the Walkyries.

Here is the MISO website.

Consistent Tone Quality

2009-09-13T05:46:00.000-07:00

I have come to recognize the biggest problem with my playing. My tone quality from D, in the middle of the bass clef, on down to low E. I have been told that my sound is "cold" down there and needs to be "warmed up." I have been told that when I get down there I blow to hard. I have tried to fix this problem by playing lots of Remington studies and lip slurs, if I do this in a practice session after a bit the sound will start to improve but only after much effort. I think that this exercise is not addressing the actual problem though.

There is another indicator that I think could be an insight in to this problem. I have noticed that I have inconsistent intonation in that range, and I don't think it is related to the slide. Take this situation for instance: When I am working on lip slurs that go from down to up, when I get to fifth position I notice that my low G-flat/F-sharp is flat. So I move the slide up a bit for that low F-sharp and then move it back out for the rest of the partials. But when I return to that F-sharp and go back to that higher up slide position my F-sharp is now sharp. So it is not a slide problem.

It is clearly some kind of other problem realated embouchure and/or air.

I am currently working on the Ewazen Sonata and played the last movement for my teacher Tim Conner. The last movement has many passages in this problematic range. Prof. Conner said that it sounds like I am having explosions on each note in that range. I thought about this for a moment, and I realized that the beginning of this problem starts with the kind of articulation that i use in this range of the instrument.

Here is what I have come up with. If I use a little less tongue and still let the air rush past my embouchure the tone quality gets better. But I have noticed that if I firm up the corners and keep the embouchure firm the tone quality gets even better. (This is what I think is affecting the pitch and flatness down there.) The whole process of playing like this feels a little akward.

I really need to address this problem because I know that I have a great sound on the rest of instrument. My Bolero always gets lots of compliments and my Requiem is good. I think this is related to years of striving to play better in the high range. I have a strong high range, but at some point my tone quality in the lower part of the instrument has suffered.

I know this seems like a lot of writing, but I like the idea of putting this all down so that I can just get it out. Then when I am pracicing I don't have to spend so much time thinking about what the problem is. I can spend all that time actually playing and working it out.

Fantastic Website

2009-09-04T06:17:00.000-07:00

I just found this fantastic trombone website from a link on Brad Edward's site:

http://www.kimballtrombone.com/

Slide Technique/Finger Placement

2009-09-04T05:26:00.000-07:00

Since I have gotten my new horn I have had a bit of pain in my right wrist. I never had this before with the Bach. Moving to the new horn has been a hard transition because of the way the instrument balances in my hands is totally different. I think the pain in my right wrist is realted to two problems:

1.) I think I am at times supporting some weight of the instrument with my right hand. I know this is wrong but something about the new blanace has made it difficult to avoid.

2.) I think my finger placement on the slide brace has gotten a little lazy . The way I was taught was to make the vulcan symbol with your right hand then put your index and middle finger on the brace with the thumb on the other side. The first knuckle of you 4th finger supports the bottom of the slide and acts as a kind of pivot. But I have noticed that both my index and middle finger are on the bottom of the slide and when I go back to the "correct" way that I was taught it is rather uncomfortable and hard to control.

So it appears that I need to revisit my slide techinique a little bit but I am at a loss for a good place to start.

Here are some links on the subject:

http://www.trombone.org/articles/library/outofthecase1.asp

http://paws.wcu.edu/dcherry/files/Slide%20Technique.pdf

http://www.joedixonstudio.com/2008-12-Dixon%20TBA%20Article.pdf

This is just a start of the amount of information on the subject. After looking at some of the items that a google search pulls up it is clear that the entire subject needs to be broken down and evaluated.

Berlioz Tempo

2009-09-01T16:34:00.001-07:00

I was going to wait a bit before my next post but I wanted to go ahead and put another topic up in hopes of garnering more feedback from other trombone players out there. At what tempo should one play the Hungarian March excerpt. It seems to me that the tempo marking of 88 bpm is pretty consistant in most editions. I have noticed a great variety of tempi in recordings and from other trombonists.

I play it right at 88 bpm, of course I can play it at a variety of tempi, but what should the performance tempo be? How does one support the decision of taking a faster tempo when the marking is clearly 88?

Thoughts on my last Audition

2009-09-01T07:21:00.000-07:00

I recently auditioned for the Gainesville Chamber Orchestra. I did not play very well though I felt I was well prepared. Here is what I got to play for the panel:

Tomasi-MVT I opening

Mozart-Tuba Mirum

Berlioz-Hungarian March

Rossini- La Gazza Ladra

Mahler-Symphony No. 3

Below lists some problems I had in the audition.

1.) A sense of relaxation-I felt very tense while playing the Tomasi which is not a problem that I typically have. It is one of my stronger pieces and I know I can play it, but while playing this piece in a performance situation I always feel uncomfortable. It feels like I am working very hard physically to play the music. This is not something that I encounter when practicing the piece; just in performance.

2.) Bad Attack on first note of Mozart. I know how I want it to sound and have practiced the attack many many times. I want it to sound full, present, as if I was filling a large cathedral with sound but not harsh or blasting. Yet in the audition I took a large breath and choked right before the attack. I might attribute this to the fact that I really want to play that opening phrase in one breath. It was a very slight imperfection in the attack but an imperfection none the less. I find it troubling because I somehow doubted my self in the last instance before I started to play.

3.) I practice this excerpt and try to focus really hard on the intonation within each scale. I usually practice the excerpt backwards starting with the final run. I always practice it slowly and try to really lock in all of the pitches. I do this and find when I push up the tempo I feel very secure. But often at an audition there is at least one cracked note and I feel like I am NOT in control once I start the excerpt.

I feel while I am preparing for an audition that I am preparing in a very thoughtful way. I record myself a lot, I practice hours, and I take notes so that I can try to remember what it is I am trying to achieve on each excerpt. I really do feel very well prepared, but when I get to the audition site I am always suddenly filled with self-doubts. Perhaps my tempi will not be liked, perhaps my sound is not really that great and so on.