General Questions

[Kessinger]

Hi im new here and I have some questions that I just recently discovered after playing about 4 years

1. Has anyone here had the experience of playing fast and going back to first position and the thing that happens with me is that I just bang my slide into my horn a lot of times and I feel like there is a better way of doing this

2. i recently noticed that when I play my horn moves a lot on my shoulder, this doesnt affect my embouchure but i would rather it stop moving

would appreciate some soltions thanks

[harrisonreed]

1. Push your tuning slide in. Bring your "tuning" Bb further away from your face. There aren't too many notes that should be played with the hand slide completely closed, maybe just high Ab and low F with the F attachment. The whole instrument is a tuning slide, so you can push the bell tuning all the way in.

2. Use the strength of your left arm to hold the trombone. It shouldn't be completely resting on your shoulder -- you have to control it. This is why a lot of people use braces or straps. Having a well lubricated slide will also help control lateral motion.

[BGuttman]

Also for #1: Make sure you have working bumpers at the end of the slide. A bumper is a cork or felt ring put into the cork barrel so the slide hits it going into 1st position. Some Conn trombones have springe there. If the bumpers are old and compressed (or removed) you will pull in the slide and have it bang into your face. Not fun.

[hyperbolica]

The slide should have some cork or other cushion, but you should get in the habit of playing with the slide slightly off the bumpers, and learn through muscle memory where that stop is.

The horn bouncing on your shoulder should improve with practicing smooth slide technique. You might want a teacher to watch and listen to you play to help you with that.

[ghmerrill]

Maybe your horn isn't balanced quite well enough for you. Perhaps a counterweight would help with that. I know that I must have one on my bass for it to feel comfortably balanced. And even my little Olds Standard feels front-heavy (fairly heavy slide) to me without one (though since I don't play that horn much, I haven't added a counterweight).

Follow Harrison's recommendation to sharpen the horn's pitch so that you're not playing (except for exceptions) up against the bumper. Think of "calibrating" your slide to a "default 1st position offset" from the totally closed position. Also remember that the hand slide is an analog instrument and not a digital one (with clearly pre-defined "slots" or "locations"). To some degree, you can make those positions be where you want them to be (at least approximately, and up to a point).

[tbdana]

First position is NOT all the way in.

None of the weight of the horn should you bear with your right hand. The left hand holds all the weight, the right hand actively avoids holding weight and is just used to move the slide back and forth.

[Savio]

1. Push your tuning slide in. Bring your "tuning" Bb further away from your face. There aren't too many notes that should be played with the hand slide completely closed, maybe just high Ab and low F with the F attachment. The whole instrument is a tuning slide, so you can push the bell tuning all the way in.

2. Use the strength of your left arm to hold the trombone. It shouldn't be completely resting on your shoulder -- you have to control it. This is why a lot of people use braces or straps. Having a well lubricated slide will also help control lateral motion.

Exactly!

Also consider when playing fast it's better to make the arm and wrist a little more loose. I think all of us have experienced how it hurts when the left little finger is in between the outer slide and inner slide in 1st position? Because we adjust the 1st position.

Leif