The Brass Players Stutter

Nick Prince

Name: Nicholas Prince Main Subject: Classical Bass Trombone Research Supervisor: Pete Saunders Title of Research: The brass player’s stutter Research Question: The brass players stutter, what is it, what are the causes and how can it be alleviated? Summary of Results: This paper deals with what is known as the brass player’s stutter, a very common but under researched issue. It occurs as the player inhales a breath to play but cannot exhale and produce the note on demand. The breath is just held in, thus giving a stutter effect. Many well-known professional brass musicians have suffered with these problems at some point in their careers. The author himself is one of the trombonists who has had to deal with this issue. Research was done through a series of interviews with different professional trombonists who have dealt with this problem to get their own opinions on this unusual issue and what they did to alleviate the problems. A questionnaire was also sent to trombone students in The Netherlands to find out if younger students are aware of such issues and if it can be avoided in the future. The results will provide a greater understanding of this problem and how I and others can find a solution to this obscure technical issue. Biography: Nick Prince is a Bass Trombonist from the UK. After finishing his Bachelor degree with Roger Argente and Graham Lee at Trinity College of Music London, he moved to the Netherlands to do his master degree with Brandt Attema. His keen interest in orchestral music has led to playing with many orchestras including the RPO and Southbank Sinfonia. He also has a keen interest in brass chamber music, being a founding member of the Gianni Brass ensemble, which still performs numerous concerts per year and takes part in many education projects in the London area.

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Introduction

My masters research is looking in to the a stutter experienced by some brass players. I decided to do this as I suffer from this myself and wanted to look into why it happens and how to overcome it. The stutter is a slight hesitance after the inhalation of breath and before the exhalation. Resulting in it to be difficult to play on demand. There has not been much literature written on this to date. I think this is because it is a very personal problem and some people are not so willing to talk or write about it. This has led me to the research question.

The brass players stutter, what is it, what are the causes and how can it be alleviated?

My experiences with the stutter

My personal experience with the stutter has been very frustrating. The feeling I get when it occurs is the complete inability to play a note. After the initial inhalation of breath, I seem to be powerless to exhale and play when I want. It feels as if I have a cork in my throat. This has not always been the case. As I have progressed as a player and looked to advance my technique I found myself going into much greater detail. This is where the problems started. I think it was a mixture of the frustration that the new techniques didn't work for me and doubts that would start to creep into my head that I would never be able to play, led to the issues I have today.

For it occurs in various ways. Pressure and nerves are a contributing factor, especially in the quieter dynamics. My stutter would happen when put in a pressure situation playing completely alone. However I do not have a problem when I play under a conductor or have a given pulse. Neither do these issues happen when I play alone, in a practice room for example. I find that the best ways for me to overcome my worst moments are to simply give myself a pulse even if it is just tapping a my big toe to bring myself in. This has not completely solved my issues, however it is helping. I occasionally suffer setbacks. Especially if I am doubting my ability. My preliminary investigation resulted in me discovering that a lot of top professionals have also been dealing with this.

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