"Sauna" strategy for practice
You know the sauna thing, where you sweat in the heat for a while, then take a cold plunge, then head back into the heat? A delicious contrast.
These days I do trumpet technical practice for about 15-20 minutes or until I notice a loss of freshness. Then rather than just taking a chill break, I pick up my tenor trombone and play a little - scales, arpeggios, slurs,, a tune or two, whatever I feel like. And after a few minutes I go back to the trumpet feeling relaxed and fresh again. Rinse, repeat.
Okay, it's not exactly like the sauna. But the contrast between trumpet and trombone is refreshing. I guess playing the trombone is a bit like cooling down with pedal tones on the trumpet.
2 replies
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Hey Stuart, I was hoping you were going to ask about using the sauna as a way of helping trumpet playing haha... I don't know that one but would be interested to test it.
Lots of pedagogues have talked about using bigger cup mouthpieces to cool down or warm up on. You can't be tight when buzzing a tuba mouthpiece, for example - so it teaches you how to just let it all relax. I do think there's something to be said for the method you propose of alternating between horns, and it definitely functions like pedal tones. However I do think taking true time off in between practice might be even more valuable. A bigger mouthpiece will activate more muscle in the face, so there is still muscle engagement happening - and fatigue will begin to creep into your playing unless you're truly resting the face.
I used to buzz on a trombone mouthpiece when I was doing an embouchure change and found it very helpful, but have never played trombone more than a few minutes in my life. So I can't speak much from personal experience - only what I've heard!
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Interesting and it sounds perfectly sensible. I need to get a trombone.