Joe N.

I want to know things that anybody on here has done to successfully boost range. I'm not bad right now on range, I can hit E's and sometimes F's, but I want to do some work on this to hit some high notes easily. Don't tell me to buy something, tell me what has worked and exactly what you do. By the way, I'm not a guy who just is concerned with high notes, I've really never worked on it much until now and I want some good advice from people who can actually hit notes up there in the double high c range.

Luis M. Araya

Joe,

I am going to tell you what it has worked for me, maybe a lot of people would disagree with this but your free to experiment and see what happens.

1st. Using the Louis Maggio System for Brass method. (This book encourage the use of tongue arch)

2nd. Trying to keep a firm "pucker" with the embochure muscles, try not to smile, this will give you kind of a strong cushion to apply the right amount of mouthpiece pressure. Bear in mind that firming the embochure muscles does not mean to tight the abdominal muscles also, the air must remain free and fast, if you feel the air bottled up it is not going to help you, I like to think of the air as a car of a coaster going down thanks to its own weight and not because it has external propulsion (tightening the abdominal muscles conciously). Something I found very helpfull in Hickman's trumpet pedagogy book is his advice of not letting the bottom lip to go behind the top lip, just keep it horizontaly in line.

Another interesting excercize is the famous pencil ex. I would ad that you try to breath in and out through the nose in a very relaxed way while doing the excersize, this is very difficult because the tendency is to relax the embochure while you are exhaling, I find the feeling of exhaling very fast through the nose to be very similar when I play high notes, just be carefull not to let any nasal fluid come out of your nose

__________________
Music is my life

skankin'dan

Here's what I do.
Play long tones on all the notes you are comfortable with. Not above or below. A mistake many people do is play higher than is good for them.

Try lip slurs, scales, long tones, and you should be good

masterfulmusic29

Try Bending notes. Play a G in the middle of the staff at a forte and using your lips bend the note down to a f# while doing this cressendo to Double or triple Forte. Do this for between five and ten minutes after your warm up and then rest for fifteen minutes after the bending. This is like olympic weight lifting for trumpet players. After you get good at bending half steps bend whole steps. Much harder.
Good luck and good playing. See you in the stratosphere.
James

rowuk

Joe,
the interesting thing about the internet, is that you have no idea if the anonymous advice ever really helped anybody and if the poster in fact has a useful double C.
That being said, here is my anonymous advice:
A real, audible, in a playing situation, at will double C is NOT a series of embouchure exercises, it is NOT bending notes, it is NOT lip slurs or any other specific exercise! I cannot imagine suggestions like this coming from anybody that has ever gotten there! (Boy, I bet I just made a lot of friends!)
If you have a reliable high F or G, you actually have everything that you need for a double C. Why? If you can play those notes, but nothing above comes out - you are probably using too much force. The lips do not just stop vibrating at some note. Most players use a lot of pressure to squeeze the lips into submission. Your breath support fights back and most likely the high F is the comprimise that your body is offering you. If you reduce that pressure, you should notice that you can play much higher, albeit the volume of tone is dependent on your breath support. Inadequate support=skinny tone. Whether or not that high range is in tune, has to do with your body usage. Poor posture generally makes the high end as flat as poor breath support. Tongue position in the mouth can be trained to aid the high register.
You can try to tackle this on your own - good luck. I couldn't even get my body use straightened out alone. I wasted a lot of time and money on books and free advice! If you do not deal with the situation in its entirety, you will FAIL!
What I did for my double C:
Hatha Yoga and a VERY good trumpet teacher that understood the rest. Yes, there was a combination of posture and breathing execises, slurs, longtones and etudes. IN THAT ORDER. Most of my high range study was done on the piccolo trumpet.
Most players that can really play the stratosphere got there because they had a good portion of natural talent AND the right teacher at the right time. They generally cannot help us. The rest of us need at least a little talent and a lot of teacher. THERE ARE NO SHORTCUTS!
I've read that a loud Double C requires 3 atmospheres of pressure. That is 44 lbs per square inch. I guess one could start practicing at the gas station.............................

__________________
Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.

camelbrass

I may be way out of line and I'm sure I'll be criticised for saying it but what makes this particular site so enjoyable and a very efficient source of information for those of us that are interested in making music is the maturity of both the questions and the replies regardless of the age of the poster (very long sentence).

Please, I'm a very selfish, simple old(er) soul so for my continued enjoyment could we keep the topics intelligent and the responses even more intelligent. If you don't know, don't guess...keep that for the other site.

Bad tempered rant over.

Regards,


Trevor

Luis M. Araya

Could you be more especific? Which post are you referring to? the initial? or the laters?

LMA

__________________
Music is my life

stchasking

I am trying what Luis suggested. If that helps, I am in the same situation as you. You will see from my posts that I am working on endurance and if range comes with it, I'll take it.

I use the Maggio Method because I can't use the Maynard Method. My lip is not straight across so I can't get the Maynard Buzz. Maggio works for me.

The jaw forward is something I learned a day or two ago. It might be the reason I can't get over a high F. Along with the Maggio pursing of the lips I am making progress. Like blowing through a straw. I am buying David Hickmans book because others have suggested it.

I think we get pretty good advice on TM. But, it takes time to develop the coordination and concentration to implement all of the suggestions.

__________________
"I was performing professionally at age 17 and have never had a real job." Allen Vizzutti

http://cdbaby.com/cd/mcking

Luis M. Araya

I meant verticaly in line, sorry.

__________________
Music is my life

camelbrass

Luis,

My apologies I wasn't talking about most of the responses. I should have been more specific. I assumed that those that can't and have responded will know.

Again my apologies.


Regards,


Trevor