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I'm there with the low notes as well. Back in the day I had a killer pedal range on the big-bell 186CC, now I'm working hard to get a good foundation from F down lower. It's just harder after missing 15 years of playing, but I'm working on it.

Is the Snedecor book a good help?

prodigal wrote: Wed May 20, 2026 10:50 am

Is the Snedecor book a good help?

I've been playing song things from it... but honestly I prefer doing Bordogni etudes down the octave (the Bordogni-Rochut Trombone book 2 octaves). More lyrical less weird jumps.

There are a few Snedecor exercises that are okay, but I don't find them particularly musical or idiomatic. The thing I do like about his exercises is that they blend mid-high range with extreme low range playing.

(Phil Snedecor actually plays trumpet in my local orchestra now:

https://ectsymphony.com/musicians/phil-snedecor/ )

Cool! I'll check the book out.

The "classical" music world is smaller than we think. Warren Deck's aunt was the church pianist at a church that I used to attend.

About pressure pulses coming back to the chops; I've had situations in which I was in a LOUD concert band and literally could not hear myself (on horn, not tuba) and the group was good enough to actually have a pitch center; if my note was in tune, it was easy, and the way to tell I was not in tune was that my chops were fighting to maintain the pitch they were playing. I found that fascinating, and an entirely different kind of feedback than hearing what I am doing.

I just play out of the three trombone Borgogni (Rochut) books down two octaves when I want to work on a double low range reset/reinforcement.

At the risk of being too specific (and something that may only help me and some others, but not everyone) I have found that tongue does little more than interfere with the really really low pitches, usually simply start those by blowing air. When actually written in music, they're very often going to be more of an effect than involving any sort of phrasing.