tonidimitri

hey guys,
honestly speaking, iv'e been pretty pleased with most aspects of my playing up until this present moment.i focus on producing great sound projection, crisp tongueing, but have felt that my endurance has always been a weak spot... i usually practise in about 3-4 1 hour segments daily, but have troubling getting from start to end of an etude (for example charlier #35 - 36) and cannot understand why... any suggestions ????

rowuk

Toni,
what do your 3x 1 hour segments look like, how do you fill them?
What happens when you try to play through the Charlier? No high notes possible, face muscles tired, fuzzy tone?

Chopbuilders for my students are getting breathing together and then long tones and then slurs (like the Irons book). These exercizes are done FIRST with no tonguing. This is a very important concept as the tongue can be very destructive!!

Another thing that comes to mind is what Dave Monette calls "playing high on the pitch". This means essentially lipping everything up because the tuning slide is out too far. One gets used to this state and actually fights the horn for every tone produced!

It is hard to remotely diagnose your playing, but these are some universal problems that I often run into! Much better would be getting your playing looked at by somebody local. That picture is worth 10,000 internet words! 3-4 hours of practice daily and limited endurance shows a need to modify the what whens!

Or maybe you should use one of your "good horns" to practice.

__________________
Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.

Patric_Bernard

I have an idea. Its kinda like what happens to me when it comes to marches haha. I can play fine for a long while, but when I play marches, it kills me towards the end. I'm sure its because of the octave jumps and playing strait for 5 minutes, but it still gets me.
Heres what you do. Just Practice this, it seems simple, but soon, you will see its pretty damn difficult.

Just play a concert F, (G) in the staff. Play it for 20 minutes strait, taking time to breath of course, unless you can circular breath, which is a good thing to learn, ( and fun ) Play at a mf. This gets really really difficult, but it will improve your endurance. I'm not exactly sure why, but it does.
(Learned it in drum corps, and never explained why it works... anyone know?)

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Adam Smith

My endurance problems were all about playing more efficiently. I would get all tense when I would play through a song, especially when I would go higher. I would get all "wound up" and when I came back down I would be high on the pitch and fighting the horn. When I don't do this, my endurance improves greatly.

TisEkard

it is all about playing without any tension. the more tension you have, the harder you have to work to play. if you can learn to play effortlessly with zero tension (especially in the breath), than your endurance problem will disappear.

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Drake F. Peterson

tonidimitri

well "rowuk", to answer your questions.
i always fill my practise hour with a variety of fundimentals included with etudes and pieces (as i think playing music is important rather than just excercises).
i always begin my day with pedal tones, followed by some clarke or vizzutti ( just to mix it up abit) slowly warming up through the entire range of the instrument. then scales would proceed and so forth...
i find that for example if i was to be playing an etude and would begin to get tired towards the end i would take the horn off my lips for a few seconds then continue and it would be fine (but you can't exactly do that in a performance or audition can you) so..

pipedope

A good local teacher is a good thing.

You might try playing more songs and longer excersizes. Remember to rest enough. There will be fewer rests but they should be longer.
Playing more softly can help you get through the pieces as you build up.

__________________
No substitute for music through the horn.

rowuk

TD,
have you tried opening a session with etudes? Of course, after some heavy chopbuilding or Clarke double toungue studies, we are somewhat "weakened". Going into Charlier weakened will show exactly that!

Another common cause of lacking endurance is a phenomenon called playing high on the pitch. This means that we are not playing on the resonant center of each note, rather are effectively lipping up everything. This is caused by body tension (stress), bad habits that could have been with us since we started trumpet or breathing that is not together.

You mentioned that you are getting lessons with a good local player. Have him play your horn, and take note if he has to push the tuning slide in or pull it out to play at the same pitch as you. If he has to push the slide in, we have found something significant! Most non-pro players that I know, work harder than they have to. This is a VERY common problem!!!!!!!!

__________________
Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.

tonidimitri

well pitch is not the problem, just my sound gets weaker but i will give etudes a go straight off (after warming up of course) as i usually don't do that. i guess i want to be strong enough to play them after ive done my daily building excercises but at the same time is strenious.
oh by the way rowuk i think you'll be highly pleased to know that i am no longer playing on a "shitty" jupiter haha. fate ocurred and it fell of my table and isn't worth fixing. im now playing my bach #25 large bore. which is a much greater instrument to play.
i was thinking of also performing long notes in the high register at pp volumes as a way of building upper range??

rowuk

yes, yes, yes! Add lip slurs too! Clarke technical studies an octave up at ppp also help! After the Charlier though!

The Bach large bore will take some time to get used to. It is much more work than the Jupiter, but SOOOOO much more comes out of the front! The tendency when switching to a large bore instrument is to pull the tuning slide out too far and that creates a need to lip up everything. The reason that we do this is that our ears are used to a "thinner sound" and the habits drilled into our brains are a very powerful factor. Lipping up maintains the thin and bright! Try pushing your tuning slide in a bit and relaxing to maintain pitch!

__________________
Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.