[Trombone-l] Help! A question for everyone.

[Earl Needham]

At 08:41 AM 1/25/2007, ewigleben1 at aol.com wrote:
><snip>
>As I get older it seems I'm getting sharper and sharper.  Not my 
>mind, of course, my playing!  Over the last two years or so I've 
>noticed I have had to pull out more and more.  And it's not just in 
>my rock band.  I've noticed it in my playing with the brass choir or 
>other symphony or even church work around town.  It's not as big a 
>problem with my bone quartet but that's because I think the other 
>three guys are adjusting to me (I play the first book).

         Interesting -- in the past ten years my pitch has been going 
lower.  I ran out of tuning slide about 5 years ago and a lot of 
so-called "first-position" notes have to played somewhere else.

>I've wondered if it is my horn.  Is that possible........a horn 
>simply "wear" out?  I have played the same Bach Strad 36 since 
>1975.  It's a small bore without a trigger for those not 
>familiar.  I bought it because back then that's what Watrous played 
>and I thought he was the greatest!

         Well -- my personal suspicion is that my pitch is going 
lower because my teeth are wearing down.  No, I'm not joking, that's 
exactly what I'm thinking.

         Have you had any dental work done in the past few years?

         Or, one other possibility I can think of -- if your 
embouchure is as strong as you say, it just may be raising the 
pitch.  Just a guess, but maybe.

         Earl

KD5XB
Clovis, New Mexico DM84jk
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cw_bugs
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