TubeNet

If I am a tuba player and starting playing trombone. (mostly just doing lip slurs) Would that help or do anything to my chops? What about buzzing on a trumpet mouthpiece?

Thanks,

Nick Phillips

I know from personal experience that tuba and trombone can be mutually beneficial. I don't think that playing trumpet will hurt you as long as you proceed with caution.

I think playing the trombone and the trumpet are helpful to tuba chops. They can focus your emouchure and help with upper register playing, as well as workout your brain in different registers. By playing on all three regularly, one gets a kind of "Bobby McFerrin" range in their head and lips, which I find helpful on all pitch ranges of the brass family.

Definitely helps. Ive been playing Bass bone for about a year and my tuba sound has gotten much more focused, air flow improved because of having to blow through a cylindrical instrument. Only thing that happened was that I had to downsize my contrabass mouthpiece (which Im actually very happy about now). My Mike Finn 3b started feeling like I was playing into a bowl (the eating kind). But yea, its good to be able to play multiple instruments. Good Luck!

I started out on tuba and then moved up the instruments and have found it to be nothing but beneficial to my playing all the way around. I can easily go between tuba/trombone/euph, or between trumpet/trombone/euph, but it does take a few extra minutes if I've been playing trumpet for a bit and then move to my tuba.

tubagod94 wrote:If I am a tuba player and starting playing trombone. (mostly just doing lip slurs) Would that help or do anything to my chops? What about buzzing on a trumpet mouthpiece?

Thanks,

Nick Phillips

I have gone the other way, playing trombone, mainly bass, and then started playing tuba. For the trombone playing I think the tuba has helped me to be a bit more relaxed and flexible. The trombone sound is now fuller and more resonant than before tuba. However, I also started messing around with an old english tenor horn in Eb which seems to have helped a bit with the upper register on the trombone. Also, when you play different sized mouthpieces then different part of the muscles will be used with hopefully lesser risk for injuries.

For me it works fine with middlesized mouthpieces for respective instrument.

All in all I think it might be good for the chops to play on different sized mouthpieces/instruments but only if you are very observant and careful with what you are doing. That is of course the case even if you only play one instrument/mouthpiece.

Most important though, have fun!