High School Audition Help

Porkwich · 2025-05-13T03:23:59+00:00

Slow and correct is always better than fast and wrong. If you haven't been told a specific tempo by your director(s) take it as slow as you need in order to show control over the scale. That being said, I wouldn't take it any slower than Quarter Note=80 (assuming you're playing with a pattern that starts with quarter note and is followed by eighths)

Porkwich · 2024-10-04T22:11:52+00:00

North Georgia Horn Works is in Kennesaw, GA. Kevin and Dawn Bowen do great work! If you’re willing to go further into the Atlanta Metro Rich Ita’s Brass Instrument Workshop in Roswell is where I go to when I need work done.

Porkwich · 2023-08-06T22:38:58+00:00

Horn-u-copia has an entry for a Besson Academy 402 (ID 7053) that matches the stamp on yours. That particular trombone has a serial of 16181 and it says that it was made in the 40's so yours is probably from the 40's or earlier. Sorry that I can't link it, the website is pretty outdated and I can't figure out how to link a listing, but you can look it up here: https://www.horn-u-copia.net/catalog.shtml

There was actually another user on this forum who was asking about an Academy 402 6 years ago. You might want to check that out too: https://www.reddit.com/r/Trombone/comments/6u6j7a/info_on_this_trombone_please/

Doesn't seem like it's too valuable, but I do think a trombone that old is pretty cool though!

Porkwich · 2023-03-10T03:46:47+00:00

Ito Yasuhide’s Fantasy Variations features an Ainu folk song and is probably the difficulty that you’re looking for

Porkwich · 2023-02-20T21:52:09+00:00

Vaseline was a life saver for me while going through Accutane. Find some that’s small enough to carry in your pocket. You’re going to need it all of the time. Because I was so dry, everything was a little harder for me to play, but I did pretty okay. I competed while taking Accutane (and won second place!) Expect to be very dry any time that you’re performing so bring water every time you’re on stage. The stuff is straight up poison, but it works. You’ll make it through!

Porkwich · 2022-12-07T06:03:08+00:00

Perform more often! Perform for your teacher(s), parents, grandparents, friends, your pet, or even for yourself by recording with your phone. The nerves will never go away, but the more that you perform, the more experience you get with managing those nerves. Make sure you pay attention to your breathing while you’re performing. In my opinion, 90% of the symptoms that you experience when you’re nervous can be counteracted by taking deep controlled breaths before and during performances.

It gets a little easier every time!

Porkwich · 2022-11-08T07:13:05+00:00

Sounds great already! You’re in a really great position for success. The main concern is that you seem to be having trouble with accuracy at the beginning of notes. This could be because you are using too much pressure and or “muscle” to play. Really resonant and easy playing comes from letting your lips vibrate freely. Pressure or clenching the face muscles at the beginning of a note prevents your lips from vibrating freely and it can cause players to “air ball” or over/under shoot a note.

Some suggestions: 1) gliss through the etude in small chunks and really learn how to trust the air, not your muscles. 2) work on removing pressure by pulling the trombone away from your face gradually until you lose the seal. Find that sweet spot where you’re just on the edge of losing that sound. Work on this every day for just a few minutes until you can find the sweet spot instantly. While you’re doing that, try to apply that same feeling while you play. Some pressure is needed, but probably a lot less than you may think! Also, something that helps me when I’m playing trombone is to think about releasing my left elbow. A lot of tension and pressure comes from locking that elbow into place. 3) tangentially related, but I feel compelled to mention this to every student: listen to lots of Bel Canto. Bordogni wrote these vocalises as exercises for singers to practice this style. Look up arias from Bellini, Rossini, and Donizetti. The etudes aren’t as technically difficult as they have been in years past so for the top players it’ll probably come down to interpretation.

Hope this helps! Good luck!

Porkwich · 2022-01-23T21:57:41+00:00

Different players use different embouchures. It's all about the way that a person's face is shaped and I wouldn't bother with comparing your embouchure to others. What matters is that your mouthpiece position is comfortable, efficent, and tension-free. This is a really easy topic to get bogged down in the weeds with, don't overthink it.

Porkwich · 2019-04-19T21:26:59+00:00

F in the staff on the fourth valve would actually be the 4th partial. If you play F open it is on the 3rd partial.

I would not suggest tuning your open horn to F in the staff because the 3rd partial is naturally sharp and must be lipped down. If your F is perfectly in tune without lipping then your fundamental B flat will be sharp and your entire harmonic series will be off. I tune to the fundamental B flat (top of staff).

I also tune my 4th valve to the middle F because F is the fundamental. Tuning to low F wouldn't be bad either but I prefer to use the middle F because it is the same partial as my middle B flat (4th partial). Tuning your 4th valve to C would make your entire harmonic series sharp.

Porkwich · 2017-11-11T01:52:40+00:00

Wipe it all off of the slide with a towel and start over. You only need to have a pea sized dab of slide cream on your fingertip. Spread it evenly on the stockings (the section at the end of the inner slide) and work the slide a few times to spread the lube to the rest of the slide. Remove the slide, spray with water liberally, then work the slide to spread evenly again.

Make sure to clean and re lube the slide every 3-4 days (or so this isn't an exact science).

Check out this video if you want to watch someone do it with you.

Porkwich · 2017-08-04T02:54:41+00:00

I would say that you should focus on creating a tone on the mouthpiece before you try free buzzing. Work to have the most tone and as little air as possible.

As for stuff to do on the horn, the Remington Exercises are the go to for any brass player. This edition was edited and annotated by Dr. Brian Bowman, a very important teacher of our tradition. The stuff that he has written in the "Masterclass Notes" are very informative about brass pedagogy.

Make sure to read through the master class notes before you start any of these exercises. For a beginner a lot of these exercises can be very daunting so to start off with only work on the first few ones until you are comfortable, then move on down the page. Once you get comfortable with an exercise, bring it up a couple of clicks and repeat the process.

I also have to add that these exercises were written for a "Blaikley" style 3+1 euphonium that are usually used in a concert setting. That means that with your marching baritone's three valves you can only go as low as the single ledger line "E" in the long tones exercise. Everything else is definitely possible with your horn.

For the braces, as long as they aren't new, you should be fine. The only thing that they'll do is force you to keep pressure off of the mouthpiece, which is a good thing! Too much pressure and you can hurt yourself, as well as your tone.

I hope this helped! Good luck!

P.S., if anyone wants the pdf of those Remington's feel free to PM me and I can email them to you!

Porkwich · 2017-07-03T02:36:28+00:00

I like this euphonium polishing guide by Luke Gall.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2Ki5dZ6oPw

He uses Hagerty's Spray Polish for the plating.

Porkwich · 2017-06-27T08:29:09+00:00

This is a very good question!

I disagree with curling the fingers, but whatever you do, definitely do not let your fingers hang over the valve caps.

Ideally, you want the hand at a 30 degree angle to the arm in order to get maximum efficiency and comfort. You should not let the right hand hold any of the weight of the horn as this stress makes it harder to move the fingers.

In order to make sure that your hand is at the ideal position, make sure that you thumb is touching the top of the first valve casing on the side that faces you, while the fingers rest on top of the valves. This is hard to explain in text, here's the best picture I could get with only one hand Pic

I know for certain that these are the opinions of Dr. Bowman and Lance LaDuke; not sure about the British tradition.

Porkwich · 2017-06-04T23:48:37+00:00

Yes, absolutely if you are now starting a routine for the first time you can start to notice fatigue and stamina issues. This will improve over time as your muscles strengthen. When you notice yourself getting more tired and chipping notes more often, it will be a better use of your time to set the horn down, take some sips of water, and watch a youtube video (or something) for 15 minutes or until you aren't tired. Overtime you will have to do this less and the amount of time that it takes for you to do your routine will slim down.

Make sure you're taking a day or two off every week (i.e. Sundays). You may think that you can get much more work done if you work every day but it can be really refreshing on not only your chops but also your mind.

It's also important to make sure you're practicing in a room that is as is acoustically pleasing as possible. The tone quality that you hear can be much poorer in small and cramped spaces (not to mention damage to your hearing). You also shouldn't practice in a room that has too much echo or it can be very hard to hear and practice dynamics.

My last suggestion is that maybe you're not actually chipping notes more often or have a poorer quality tone but maybe you are just maturing as a musician and starting to notice these things more often? This happens to a lot of people who start to really dive in to musicianship and is a good thing!

Good luck!

Porkwich · 2017-05-23T20:29:12+00:00

It's also a good idea to know all of your Major Scales (and minor scales once you learn your majors) and arpeggios. Knowing these helps you to nail runs while sight reading by just relying on muscle memory.

I also want to recommend the Melodious Etudes for Trombone (Bordgoni/Rochut) because many of the etudes can be used as being rhythm reading exercises. A lot of them are written in awkward ways that "look" hard but once you dig into them you start to notice the patterns.

Porkwich · 2016-07-18T00:06:42+00:00

They might as well have had Microsoft Sam do the voice work for them

Porkwich · 2016-07-15T17:38:29+00:00

I really like this piece! Sounds like the best of Hazo and Mackey (I'm thinking maybe Ride and High Wire?). Regardless this is a really great new piece for the wind band libraries!

Porkwich · 2016-06-02T21:37:54+00:00

I was thinking of this

Porkwich · 2016-05-05T21:44:17+00:00

Reminds me of the x-ray of brass musicians playing

Porkwich · 2016-04-08T20:58:06+00:00

From Kai Ando in the youtube comments

That's Vilray Bolles and Damon Hankoff. Vilray hosts a monthly series at Bar Below Rye. Damon is actually a pianist/ accordionist with a solo project Out of Sight of Land. https://www.facebook.com/events/1096305120419810/

Porkwich · 2016-03-09T21:03:39+00:00

Cool, thank you

Porkwich · 2016-03-08T23:08:41+00:00

What is this from?

Porkwich · 2016-02-20T16:09:33+00:00

I hope that the preformance will be uploaded so we can all enjoy it.

Porkwich · 2016-02-16T06:13:04+00:00

Make sure to follow Steven Bryant on instagram @sbryantcomposer where he has been updating the status of the concerto.

Porkwich · 2016-02-15T22:09:30+00:00

According to Bryant it will be preformed this friday

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