TromboneChat

Hi everyone and a Happy New Year!
I have enjoyed paying about 5/8th of and inch out from the bumper. This allows me to correct intonation in first position, play my trigger C equal to my Bb, and play low F all the way in.
I use this set up on my large bore tenor and small bore King.
I would like to know what other peoples opinions are and if this is a reasonalble way to tune.
Thanks
Randy

I don't measure it precisely, but tuning away from the bumper is a good idea. For my horn, it has the most benefit for playing D5 with some remote semblance of being in tune.

I just leave the tuning slide pushed in all the way. Been doing this for a very long time.

This is what I was taught to do by Per Brevig when I started college.

harrisonreed wrote: ↑Sun Jan 05, 2025 7:05 am I just leave the tuning slide pushed in all the way. Been doing this for a very long time.

Me too, since many years. It might lead to your seventh position is where the slide falls of, but if you have a trigger trombone you use the trigger instead of seventh, or you have really long arms. I reach if I stretch. This is the only real negative aspect i can find, and especially if you have short arms.

Positives:
1. You can play in first. Base for first position then needs to be quite far of off the bumpers.
2. You can do slide vibrato in first position
3. You can adjust, and follow sharp better if you need too.

Positives/negatives to play VERY long positions with tuningslide pushed in all the way that may be different views on:
4. May effect your sound if this makes you hit/miss the goldilocks pitch centre. If you succeed to not play sharp in pitch and not sharp in sound then you might get a deeper sound compared to what you had before. This is if your playing in this aspect had this "fault". This is from my personal experience and was an unepected bonus when I did the change, but I didn't do the change because of this. I did it because of reason 1.
5. May be difficult at first since you change where all positions are a lot. It might at first cause that you play quite a bit out of tune (sharp), but it's temporary if you listen and adjust. This is your opportunity to aim a bit lower to get a deeper voice, it's because you adjust both with the slide and mouth/lips/cavity. The latter, when you aim low will also flatten intonation. It might happen this helps you find your goldilocks deeper sound. If a deeper sound is what you want. I must point it is based only from my personal experience.

4 and 5 might be something to debate.

/Tom

I've always just kind of used my thumb to measure some space off the bumper.

tbdana wrote: ↑Sun Jan 05, 2025 9:01 am I've always just kind of used my thumb to measure some space off the bumper.

I do something similar. Because of the way I hold my bass (including a Bullet Brace), I end up indexing 1st position by bumping my right thumb up against my left little finger. I've been wondering what other people do.

tbdana wrote: ↑Sun Jan 05, 2025 9:01 am I've always just kind of used my thumb to measure some space off the bumper.

While playing I think I do the same to find the space for the different first positions. I streach the thumb, and that touches just where the slide slides under where the left hand grip is. Unfortunately I do not know the name of that part, but it is the spot opposite side where the slide lock is. I streach my thumb so I can feel where this place is for first position and it can vary on different trombones how much I need to streach the thumb. This is to calibrate where my different first positions are.

/Tom

Yes, very reasonable way to tune.

From a historical perspective: trombones didn't have tuning slides until the very late 18th century in France, and the 20th century in Germany. Trombonists of the baroque era were instructed to play first position "two finger widths" out (about 1-1.5 inch). The Germans eventually added spring barrels, where you have that 1+ inch spacing built-in