ilikethetrumpet

Hi Ed,
The pats game is sure going to be a good one.

At least on this forum, you seem to address finger technique more than most teachers I've had. I think every teacher assumes that the teacher before "taught" you finger technique, and of course I realize that nobody can teach my fingers but me. That said, I'm at an impasse. Years of muscle tension and neglect for hard keys are staring me in the face and making double tonguing/triple tonguing in keys like B or C# or you get my drift impossible. I kept chasing a chop/ear solution to this problem--why am I fraying so many damn notes?!--but I have found that I can buzz them just fine--looking in the mirror and on video showed me that my third finger was the culprit behind so many errors that I had once attributed to embrochure or airflow.

I feel naturally clumsy with my motor skills, and I had to take time off from playing for tendonitis a couple of years back, but my back and everything is much looser than it used to be. It is just a devil of a time teaching my right hand memorizable motions, and I know this is the easiest part of playing for most players. This honestly seems the most fixable problem, but it's probably the biggest obstacle for me becoming the player I want to be.

I've been working the first half of Arban's, Clarke, and (you reminded me about this one that I had bought years ago and, tisk tisk, never used) the Macgregor superslow, but I don't seem to be improving. Have you seen "Mo Better Blues," the spike lee movie? I remember a great scene with Denzel Washington's character as a boy (or maybe his, Bleek's, son) just doing really slow interval studies/clarke studies and not being able to play. I wish that had been me!

Although this is a broad topic, how do you address hand position/finger technique with new students? Any rules of thumb or common problems that you identify? What color are my shoes? Any axioms to throw my way?

All the best,
Peter

Khora

I'm not Ed, of course, but I noticed that there had been no response to your post so thought I would jump in. But first, what exactly did you notice in the mirror about your third finger?

Is your pinky somehow locked (in the ring, or against the valves or anywhere else) in a way that restricts your 3rd finger?

Is your 3rd finger not able to rest directly on top of the valve? Sometimes it just doesn't, due to injury or body structure; and then trying to force it into position can lead to wrist tension, etc., which then slows it down even further.

My rule of thumb with new students is to have them find a comfortable position, with the pinky loose and the tip of the thumb either under the leadpipe or between the 1st and 2nd valves. Not the very tip of the thumb, but some portion of that section - so much depends on the physical structure of each student.

Of equal importance is having the left hand supporting the weight of the instrument completely. I like to have the bottom of the valve casings resting on the bottom of my palm directly below my pinky - that helps keep my left wrist straight and my hand relaxed. Most important is to keep the left hand relaxed as well.

One thing I've done to improve dexterity in my right hand, after being sure to have everything relaxed is to allow my right wrist and forearm to help out my third finger - especially on trills and such. I can't think of a good way to describe this right now - I'll keep thinking on it if it makes no sense.

Another thing is practice Clarke studies slowly using your left hand on the valves. It sounds silly, but developing a motor skill on the opposite side of the brain makes it that much easier on the usual side of the brain.

I dont' know if this helps at all, and I'm sure I'll have more ideas later - off to practice myself now....

ecarroll

Peter,

Yikes. Your thread passed without me noticing it (thank you Khora for jumping in and bringing it to light again).

I'm off to a rehearsal and will try to answer later today.

In haste,
EC

andredub

I hope im not posting too early, but I couldnt resist!
Here are some things that have worked and still work for me.
I have found myself that this sort of technique takes a while to develop, and after any amount of time off (especially one that was a result of an injury) things feel different, and personally almost always they feel "tight" or clumsy as you said.
This is something to try to get over the uncomfortable feeling.

a.) Dont put your fingers too far on the tips. Alot of people seem to mistake good finger position for playing on the finger nails! Keeping that fundamental position in mind, just let your hand relax to the most comfortable position (so if you were to fall asleep standing up thats where they would go.) Get that position to be the norm, drill it into your head. This is just to get everything back to neutral. After you get that done, don't second guess it, give it time to feel as comfortable as it used to, it wont take too long, but it wont be overnight.

b.) I have found for myself, fingering and tonguing takes lots of time to develop. Don't ever get stuck on any studies, do them all. Though its always good to play them slow and build them up like that, after a couple of days, let yourself play them at the extremes. Endless repetition at a slow tempo can give you great control, but you have to push yourself to the limits regularly to get to them. What really helped me early on was warming up on scales. Try playing them as you normally would, then afterwards, try ripping through them, and then finish up at a controlled pace. Push yourself daily, your fingers will quickly get used to flying. (remember, keep your fingers on the valves as much as humanly possible)

c.) For tonguing in particular, try doing this exercise on the mouthpiece alone with a stopwatch.
1.)1 minute of double tonguing at a comfortable quick tempo that
you can keep up for a whole minute. Take a short break, repeat on triple.
2.)30 seconds of the fastest tonguing you can do. It'll be broken up,
but keep it as even as you possibly can without sacrificing the tempo.
do double or triple, take a short break, do the other.
3.)end with another 30 seconds of nice even tonguing with both
double a triple.

Take enough time between double a triple to be able to complete the next one. Dont be too legato. If its done a little sharper, it will get your tongue used to clean and fast articulations, allowing you to be more precise when adding the fingers. After these times get easy, bump it up. Once this exercise becomes simple, try not tonguing on only one note on the mouthpiece, change it up.

Try supplementing all your technical studies with some cornet solos. Get them up to fast tempos, they work wonders!


Guh, thats alot of typing! I hope this works for you!

-Andre

p.s. Check out the Vizzutti book, it has really great finger studies!

ecarroll

Peter,

I defer to Andre, who has one of the fastest right hand/tongue connections that I've ever encountered.

Best,
EC