The best part about playing trombone in high school band was not having to learn concert pitches. Concert F? I play an F. Concert Bb? I play Bb. Suck it, trumpets!
Spoiler: trumpet section DGAF. Cocky bunch, we were.
What I've learned about the trombone
71–80 of 83 posts
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#72I recently learned that valve trombones exist [0], where there is no slide and the notes are selected via valve-presses like a trumpet. [0] https://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical_instruments/winds/tr...
Similarly, so do slide trumpets!
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#73I recently learned that valve trombones exist [0], where there is no slide and the notes are selected via valve-presses like a trumpet. [0] https://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical_instruments/winds/tr...
That's wild. I suppose it's just a long baritone?
No. It has a trombone look but more important, it is not as conical as a baritone so it doesn’t sound as rich.
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#74I recently learned that valve trombones exist [0], where there is no slide and the notes are selected via valve-presses like a trumpet. [0] https://usa.yamaha.com/products/musical_instruments/winds/tr...
I have a bunch of them, but I prefer to play marching baritones because I’m less likely to bang them into a music stand.
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#75No one has yet mentioned that getting good tone quality on a trombone is perhaps its biggest challenge.
The same as true with violin and viola. The older and more primitive and instrument is, the more work you have to do.
Contrast this with the trombone’s cousins, the baritone and euphonium, which have infinitely better tone quality with little to no effort at all.
I will get downvoted for this, but modern players like Trombone Shorty have nowhere near the tone of players like Tommy Dorsey. this is clearly a matter of preference because he could nail that smooth smooth sound if you wanted to. I just don’t like the blatty sound.
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#76> This system ensures that every key and every note sounds equally good, but it sacrifices the purity of just intonation.
Bach wrote two books of the Well-Tempered Clavier over 300 years ago that explain musically why that sacrifice is worth it:
* Book I: pick a prelude/fugue in any key and it will sound ok on a keyboard that you tuned ahead of time
* Book II: modulate anywhere you want[1] in the middle of a piece and it will sound ok
That same system works all the way through high-Romantic Wagnerian operas and atonal pieces of the 20th century. Use equal temperament and let the singer/violinist/horn player "sweeten" a third by ear where applicable.
Edit: well, anywhere Bach wanted. Hee hee.
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#77A couple of comments: > But any instrument that’s not the piano or guitar can actually make micro-adjustments while playing a song You can make micro adjustments on a guitar, but only to be sharper[1] > But for now, one obvious advantage is that this allows us to do “real” glissandos, where the pitch smoothly transitions from one note to another For a famous example of a "fake" glissando, the opening clarinet solo of…
You can make adjustments on a guitar to make a note flatter by pushing the neck/headstock forward, relaxing the strings slightly
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#78I've been trying to square the physics and my experience. Pedal B flat is the fundamental, low B flat is the 2x, F 3x, mid B flat the 4x, D the 5X, high F is 6X, G half sharp is 7X and high B flat is 8X. The position your music teacher most likely will have told you to adjust is 2nd position - you play it slightly sharper for an A vs the E or C sharp it's also used for. Why is that? It's the major 3rd that has the la…
Most instruments tend to pitch sharp or flat depending on the partial. I don't recall any music teachers giving advice that specific positions should routinely get adjustments, but instead that notes in a particular partial should be adjusted. For example, F above middle C should be flattened when played in 1st position to compensate for 6th partial tending sharp. Or the G in 2nd position above that F needing to be p…
I like how you say 6th partial is "tending sharp" and 7th partial is "tending flat", like they're comparable. I don't know about your horn, but on every one I've played that 6th partial is pretty close but the 7th partial is so far out that we refer to positions on the 7th as half positions. Euphoniums don't even play the 7th partial because it's so far off. They'll play the F# and G from 8th partial.
(Didn't mean to imply you didn't know that, I just was humored by you using the same term for both).
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#79One trombone feature not mentioned here is that the length of the pipe apparently affects the timing enough that they have to compensate for it.
This is a feature of every instrument. Even with piano you have to start pressing down a key slightly before you want to ring out or you will be behind time.
Yes, but for trombone it varies markedly from first position to seventh.
Re: What I've learned about the trombone
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your trumpet maybe, but my trumpet from 1957 only has tuning slides, which cannot be used while playing.
Interesting. A student horn I guess? I've never owned one that didn't have at least a third valve slide ring. I think they were widespread around the time that the trumpet really took over from the cornet, around 1900-1920. My pre-War Olds has moving slides.
I know a few cases where slides were added later. I don't know when they became common but impression is layer.