The trombone came into the jazz scene during the Dixieland era. Known for being able to mimic the human voice, it quickly spread into other types of jazz settings. From Big Bands to Latin Bands, the trombone is truly a staple in jazz culture.
Steps
Part 1
Part 1 of 2:
Learning the Basics
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Listen to the standards. The standards are the pieces that all jazz musicians know. Start by listening to these pieces to immerse yourself in the style of these players and the music. Once you know the standards well, feel free to start learning to play them with a Jazz Fake Book.
- Many professionals memorize the standards so that they can sit with a band at gigs
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Get the right type of equipment. Jazz is a unique type of music, so it has many unique pieces of equipment. The basic pieces of equipment are:
- Jazz mouthpieces
- Cup mutes
- Plunger mutes
- Hat mutes
- Straight mutes
- Dixie mutes
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Improve your sight-reading skills. Sight-reading is very important for jazz musicians as it allows them to quickly dissect new rhythms. Thus giving them more time to work on their technique and improvise.
- Look at the tempo (speed) and key signature.
- Look for anything that catches your eye as difficult or unusual and make a note of it.
- Play through the music and make mental notes of where you made a mistake, You can always isolate the areas you can't play after.
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Join a jazz band. Surrounding yourself with other musicians is a great way to improve. Many schools have jazz bands made up of the student body. There are also many community jazz bands around the country.
- If you can't find a jazz band near you, you can always make your own.
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Part 2
Part 2 of 2:
Improving Your Jazz
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Practice regularly. Try to practice daily for a minimum of 30 minutes. Doing this will rapidly improve your tone, range, and articulation.
- Lip slurs are a great way to develop your upper range and stamina.
- Long tones are great for improving tone and breath support.
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Learn to swing. Swinging eighth notes (quavers) is necessary for almost any jazz setting. To do this, add one extra sixteenth note (semiquaver) to the first eighth note and take one away from the second. So it would be played as a dotted eighth, sixteenth rather than two eighths.
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Learn your scales. Learning scales is necessary if you are ever going to improvise in any type of jazz. Blues scales are especially useful in a big band setting while minor scales are great for Latin.
- Most people swing their scales to improve their jazz feel and become acquainted with the scale in context.
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Learn to improvise. Improvisation is a great skill to have for any jazz players as it allows you to add a piece of you to the music. To improv, you can use a scale that fits in the key your playing in so that your music blends with the other improvisations supporting your solo. You even could change as the chords in the background change to have a solo that flows really well.
- When starting out, confidence is the most important thing when soloing.
- Make sure to listen to the players around you to keep on tempo and feed of their energy
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Find your own playing style. Jazz is about freedom and expressiveness. So, once you can mimic other players, you should break out and find your own. The players who you listen to will subconsciously influence your playing but, once you add your own aspects you can call it your own.
- Don't be afraid to mess up, once you're truly relaxed, you will be able to express yourself much better and find that special style.
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