i play trumpet and i'm trying to get my range higher. can anyone give me some help full exercises?

Question

i've been told to have a good tone, but i'm not satisfied with my range. is there any good exercises that can help me?

Answer 1

It is all about maintaining a high speed of air velocity through your horn while keeping your lips vibrating. Contrary to the popular myth, screaming has NOTHING to do with changing embrochures. In fact good trumpet players practice their entire range trying to maintain only one embrochures so that they can learn to jump from one note to another quickly, without cracking it. It takes years of practice to learn to go from a low G (under the staff) to a high G (above the staff).

TO PLAY HIGH NOTES, the number one thing that you should make sure that you do every time is to have solid breath support. Make sure that your air supply is coming from your gut and not from your throat or chest. In fact this goes for any note you play. If you skip out on this, your high note will not last more 5 seconds and it will sound like a goat more than a brass instrument and it will feel like your neck is going to explode.

The second thing you should do is open your throat so that you can let the maximum amount of warm air flow from your gut (I know, i know lungs, but people think of chest when i say that) through your lips and out the horn.

I would be lying to you if I said that "you should never tighten your lips to play high notes". The old trumpet crooner guy tells you this because they realize that jamming the mouthpiece into your teeth and tightening the lips does give you a high note. But doing it this way does two things: it will kill your ability to play anything else after your high note and secondly can "blow out your chops"-- which means significant tissue damage that can put you out of playing anything for a few days up to a few week, not to mention that its like having a brain aneurysm. THE FACT IS: to play any note on the trumpet you MUST have SOME tension, because without any lip tension, you would never be able to produce a vibration. However, like any good person should do, you must learn to produce the best sound with littlest effort. Meaning, you must learn to be efficient.

As far as excersizes, my trumpet professor gave me something called the expanding scales that has helped me be very consistent with my range. Consistency is most important when practicing high notes and for endurance, because that is where you know your limit is. You start with the root note (very low G) go to 2, back to 1, to 3 to 1 to 4 to 1 to 5 to 1 to 6 (and hold) to 1 to 5 to 4 (and hold till breath expells from lungs) all in one breath. Then you change the note chromatically up. So that you start with C# and run up the C# scale. You keep going higher and higher until you cannot produce a good tone.

There you should stop and rest and play pedal tones. The best excersize that I learned from my professor for this was this excersize:
start: mid C to G to E to low C (hold until out of breath, then take a deep breath and) low C to low G (hold until tone is good) to E to low C to mid G to E to mid C (hold until out of breath)
go down in half steps and repeat same excersize.
start: mid B to F# to Eb to low B (hold until out of breath, then take a deep breath and) low B to low F# (hold until the tone is good) to Eb to low B to mid F# to Eb to mid B (hold until out of breath)
after this point you cannot finger any of the lower notes, so you will have use a combination of you embrochure and fingers to pop out all of the pedal notes. You go down chormatically (with all 6 configuration and back up).

This will build your range as well as endurance down and up there as well as tone control. My high school director always said: "Its like building a house, you must have more foundation in the earth to put another floor on top."

Answer 2

Most of your problem is thatt wonderful three letter word that is the base of most problems with trumpet. A I R
And when you play a high note some of it is mental so if you don't think about how high you actually are playing and push alto of air that is one big steep that will help with a few notes. also you should try lip slurs or just slurs until you can do lip slurs in the upper register. Start on the G above tha staff and go from that to an A slowly and then sped it up and continue going up chromatically like that and over time ti will help you reach higher.

And for the Quick not so good fix a shallow cup mouthpiece, and putting More of your top lip in the mouthpiece and pushing the mouthpiece into your lip. only do this if this is your last resort , try the other options first.

Answer 3

I'm a trombone player, not a trumpet player, but I'll do what I can. start by playing the highest note you can squeak out. Note, not play, but squeak. Then, without tounging, slur down (no valves necessary, just do this open) and then slur BACK UP. You won't be able to get as high as you started but do the best you can. Do this both with the trumpet and with jsut the mouthpiece. Remember SLUR! Remember to keep the corners of your mouth firm, you posture straight, and your air stream constant. Aim you airstream above your throat and blow down into the mouthpiece. Keep your throat open.

Find a piece of music that is just out of your workable range. Play a little bit each day, but not enough that it will hurt your lip. Practice until you are tired. The piece I used was the transcribed trombone solo in J.J. Johnson's "Smokey" This is a good piece to use as all the higher notes are at the top of passages that lead up. If you can find this, I reccomend transcribing it for your range and instrument if you have the capabilities. I swear this all works. I added nearly an octave onto my range doing this.

Answer 4

I don't mean for this to be a correct answer; I'm just flapping, but:

My (dearly departed) father, a "big band" trumpeter and band director, imparted to me that playing the lowest notes on the trumpet's register was a great all-around lip-flexing exercise. Obviously, that's not a direct solution to going high, but it stands to reason that the more lip control and muscle memory there is there, the better.
High notes were always tough for me, but I was better at it than my peers, and that only came from trying and trying (teaching the embouchure over time to tighten up more and more) but I found no magic formula.
There must be some trick, however; those guys like Chase always blew me away.
It's also interesting to hear alto (I think) trumpets play classical music. I caught that on the local Catholic channel.
Thanks for letting me rant.

Answer 5

I'm not sure on your question, but not to burst your bubble, but just being able to play isn't a show of natural talent, It was probably the way you held it, your tone anything like that, Its easy to find trumpet tutorials on the web, obviously i can't show you on here how a tone sounds, but what other questions do you have?

Answer 6

Right on, everyone! What can I add?? Not much. Listen to them, man. They all got it right. Plus, it wouldn't hurt to take lessons from a professional trumpet player for awhile. They have knowledge that you need. Call your local music stores, colleges, etc. and shop around for a teacher.

Good Luck. Peace.
VT

Answer 7

Do flow studies and slur exercises. These really helped me improve my range. The slurring really gets you focused on your airflow and tongue position. These other guys gave great advice too.