4
Instructions
The exercises in this book are all subject to your own development, with almost everything to be
played in every key, unless otherwise specified. Many of the exercises have been developed from
several methods for trumpet and cornet such as Clarke, Arban and Chas Colin as well as exercises
passed down from players I have known and studied with, and all have been modified to bring in the
playing approaches most relevant to improvisation and modern forms of music. The language and
rhythm used is found in improvisation and modern music, but focus primarily on playing these
exercises with good intonation, a nice sound and clear articulation as specified.
You can progress through the keys within the exercises ascending in half steps which will enable you
to stay within a similar register, or play through the keys using the cycle of fourths (so if you start in G,
the next key will be C, then F and so on). Using the cycle of fourths will make it easier to jump
around the trumpet when improvising. It also enables you to hear the harmony of the exercise more
distinctly and keeps you focussed on the musical potential for the use of the language content of the
exercise. If you choose to work on the exercises ascending in half steps, perhaps while you are
becoming familiar with it, make sure you listen very carefully to your pitch, as it is dangerously easy to
switch off your ears and just press the correct valves!
It is important to play in tune and in the development of one register, playing some diatonic (major and
minor) exercises before the more chromatic or varied harmonic exercises to make sure that we are
not running before we can walk.
Bottom F# up to top C should be played in the same manner. There are no exercises in this book
that go higher than top C, so if top C is too high, don’t play it as the lower exercises will develop your
range gradually. If you miss the top note of an exercise, do not try and start again on the missed top
note as you will certainly not be breathing the way the exercise requires. Restart from a lower point
and crescendo more as you ascend.
Breath marks are not given in this book. It is not important to keep a steady tempo in most exercises
(except for the rhythmic displacement exercises and later the Parker tunes and ‘Evidence’ where a
metronome will be useful to start with) as the focus is not on chops endurance or making it all the way
to the end in one breath. When taking a breath (as with missed top notes), make sure that when you
recommence playing you do not hard tongue a note to get going again, especially not on a downbeat.
The jazz articulation is often at the end of a bar, so start there, which means jumping one or two notes
back from where you paused to breathe. It is also important to remember that you do not need to
inhale a lot of air in one go. Try using as much air as you would inhale before speaking.
When dynamics are clearly specified, these are to help you learn to control your airstream to achieve
clearer intonation, with faster air to ascend and slower air to descend. As we cannot predict which
direction we are going in when improvising, some exercises have a lot of dynamics marked. Once
your airstream is working for you and the notes are in tune with each other, you can moderate the
dynamics so that perhaps only you will be able to hear them, but you will be able to feel the different
speeds of air and tongue positions guiding the airstream as you play. Initially the use of dynamics
and fermata where you crescendo before ascending a phrase can seem excessive, but this is to
achieve good intonation and a constant airflow with different air speeds.
There may be new muscle memory and articulation to develop within this method for you. If you are
able to play well without any tuition, you may have strong natural ability, but perhaps not a clear or
focused idea of how you do what you do on a technical level. This is fine when it works, but in the
long term you will need to self-evaluate to improve and (hopefully not too often) to diagnose problems
if they arise. In this respect, naturally gifted players need to spend time thinking about how they do
what they do, as it can be very hard to deal with technical problems that arise when you have already
reached an advanced level of instrumental or improvisational skill. Greater self-knowledge
unquestionably leads to improvement, both creatively and technically, rather than continually looking
for new and exciting methods.
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