Remember to always practice like you are playing in front of an audience.
| Exercise | Tone quality | Pitch centeredness | Articulation | Lip Flexibility | Finger flexibility | Sight reading |
| Long tones | X | X | ||||
| Slurring | x | X | ||||
| Tongue arch | x | x | ||||
| Tonguing | X | |||||
| Metronome | ||||||
| Scales, etc. | X | x | ||||
| Songs | X |
Big, bold X’s indicate the primary benefit. The smaller x’s indicate secondary benefit not necessarily the only other benefit.
| Exercise | Musicality | Range |
| Slurring | x | |
| Tongue arch | X | |
| Metronome | X | |
| Scales, etc. | X | |
| Songs | X | |
| Playing with group(s) | X |
What to practice for:
- Tone quality: long tones, tongue arch
- Pitch centeredness: long tones, slurs, tongue arch
- Articulation: tonguing
- Lip flexibility: slurs
- Finger flexibility: scales
- Sight reading: scales & songs
- Musicality: metronome, scales and more, songs, playing with a group
- Range: tongue arch, slurs
Why practice:
Long tones
- Purpose: Training yourself to produce tone quality habits with pitch centeredness.
- Control of breathing, air stream, embouchure form, tongue arch, and horn angle.
- Control of volume, intonation, and vibrato for consistent tone quality.
- Build muscles and endurance.
- Play scales, arpeggios, thirds, etc. with a tuner.
- Listen for tone quality and study what changes you can make to change tone.
Slurring
- Purpose: Develop flexibility of lips to change pitch smoothly with pitch centeredness at any tempo.
- Control breathing, air stream, embouchure form, and tongue arch.
- Control pitch change smoothly with tongue arch not with tonguing articulation.
- Build muscles and endurance.
- Play scales, arpeggios, intervals, etc.
- Listen for tone quality and study what changes you can make to improve smooth centered changes in pitch.
Tongue arch
- Purpose: Control pitch change and centeredness, and range.
- Control tongue arch and coordination with air stream and embouchure changes.
- Control range increases without increasing pressure on lips.
- Build speed and accuracy to adjust to pitch change.
- Play scales, arpeggios, intervals, etc.
- Listen for tone quality and study what changes you can make to improve smooth centered changes in pitch.
Tonguing
- Purpose: Develop clean, intentional articulation of notes.
- Control tongue speed, cleanness, and evenness of notes for single, double, and triple tonguing.
- Control staccato and legato distinctions.
- Build speed and accuracy to articulate expressing a note.
- Play exercises with single, double, and triple tonguing.
- Listen for tone quality and accuracy to produce note articulation as intended.
Metronome
- Purpose: Develop tempo and rhythm awareness, as well as, measuring progress in speed of play.
- Control pitch changes whether by tongue or slur to match the pulse of the metronome.
- Control speed of play for maximum accuracy at maximum speed.
- Build tempo and rhythm awareness for speed with accuracy.
- Play scales, arpeggios, intervals, etc.
- Listen for accuracy of pitch changes to match tempo of metronome.
Scales, arpeggios, thirds, etc.
- Purpose: Develop mental and fingering agility to play music.
- Control pitch changes and finger positions within the appropriate key signature.
- Control finger positions to respond to reading music or to what you imagine in your mind.
- Build finger position memory and agility for speed and accuracy to adjust to pitch changes within a key signature.
- Play scales, arpeggios, intervals, etc. while slurring and tonguing.
- Listen for relationship between of notes and the mood that is evoked.
Songs
- Purpose: Develop musical intelligence to express emotion.
- Control tone, volume, articulation, and rhythm to express emotion.
- Control expression in sound to produce mood.
- Build repertoire of songs to play with emotion.
- Play a variety of songs that express a variety of emotion.
- Listen for changes and sounds in songs that evoke emotion.
Playing with group(s)
- Purpose: Develop skill to coordinate with other musicians.
- Control rhythm, volume, and pitch to blend with other musicians.
- Control sound to contribute to the whole.
- Build understanding of how parts of a song work together.
- Play with a group that will help you be a better musician.
- Listen for appropriate times to blend and stand out.
