| I never met Cat or read the book but I am familiar with the 20 minute routine. However as I understand it - at least this is the way its been explained to me - the middle G should be played 'sub tone'. In other words quieter than the softes note imaginable - like a ghost of a note, just the merest hint of a sound with no 'trumpet' overtones. It sounds a bit like some one playing a really quiet note on a clarinet in a closed room down the corridor, a pure uncoloured tone - like a sine wave.
Its quite hard to get it going on some days, depending on the state of your chops but `I have found it to be an excellent conditioning workout for the embouchure.
If you don't understand what I am trying to describe you could try breath attacking a G pppppp and gradually increase the air speed until the note begins to speak. If you listen really closely you will find that just at the point before the note speaks there is a ghost of a note. You have to try and hold the air supply at that point and keep that tone with out allowing it to flare out into a true trumpet sound. This is a great excersize for breath control and projection too. It will only happen if you are exactly in tune with the horn, ie. on the slot so I feel it is useful in centering your sound and improving your feel for the correct pitch of notes on the horn.
Maybe somebody who knows can come back and let me know if this was in fact part of what Cat advocated.
Either way its proved a useful excersize for me personally.
All the best, Noel.
__________________ Noel Langley - Eclipse Artist noel@eclipsetrumpets.com
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