Recently I’ve been reading a little about the old French trumpet player and pedagogue Merri Franquin. In 1912 he invented a four-valved trumpet in C. The fourth valve worked differently from the standard three in that it raised the pitch of the trumpet by a tone – like a backwards first valve. The purpose of […]
One or More, Big or Small, Should do it? A discussion by Richard Colquhoun about the differing attitudes towards choices of trumpet mouthpieces for performance and their use in pedagogy. Introduction In April 2016 I travelled to Belgium to meet with Bahb Civiletti. Bahb is one of the world’s pre-eminent baroque trumpet players and his […]
There are a number of discussions you can find in forums on the web and blogs of players who religiously follow the teachings of one brass guru or another who try to talk about the Tongue Controlled Embouchure. This is good; discussion is healthy; and at least if people are talking about an idea then that […]
What is Einsetzen/Ansetzen? An article that describes, defines and explains the use of these lip positions in modern trumpet embouchure systems by Richard Colquhoun Intro One of the highlights of spending time with Bahb Civiletti in April this year was having the chance to watch him teaching TCE to trumpet players who had not tried […]
