Alternating Small bore/large bore practice

[henrysa]

For a returning player like myself, is it advisable to alternate practice everyday between my small bore Getzen 3508 and my large bore King 4B? Or should I concentrate on one instrument. Obviously they both play quite differently.

[Doug Elliott]

I would suggest spending 80% of your time on one and 20% on the other, for a week. Then switch for the next week, and keep switching on a weekly basis if that works for your schedule. I think that would be the best way to get good at each of them while constantly reminding yourself about the other.

[henrysa]

Thank you, makes sense, that continuity will give me more moral support as the day to day references will be fresher in my mind.

[muschem]

As a returning player myself, I wondered this as well. Thanks for asking the question so we can all benefit from the wisdom of Doug Elliott and others on the forum who may weigh in here.

After I got past the initial hurdle of 20+ year stale chops not wanting to buzz for more than a few minutes at a time, I started including both large bore and small bore tenor into my daily practice routine. Over the last few months, I picked up an alto and a bass, and now I try to include those in my daily sessions as well. My routine usually looks something like:

1st session:
Warm-up: large bore tenor. This is what feels like home base to me, so I try to start each day here. I find that starting from something that feels “normal” helps me notice if something feels “off” that day and make corrections before moving around.

High range work: start on large bore; move to small bore, then to alto. I try to work range exercises on fresh chops following warm-up. My strategy is to move from the familiar to progressively less familiar, with some overlapping ranges.

Low range work: return to large bore tenor, then move to bass. Again, starting from familiar and moving to less familiar.

2nd session:
After a good break to let the chops rest, I return to whatever instrument and music need focus work. This is usually associated with the parts I’m covering in local groups for upcoming concerts. I also try to mix in more time on alto occasionally in this slot, even though I don’t really play it anywhere. This is because it feels least familiar to me and I find that without focus time on it, I quickly lose whatever level of comfort I had previously attained.

3rd session:
I usually only have time for 3 sessions per day, scheduled around my day job. This is my “fun” time - I play a mix of jazz standards and other tunes I find enjoyable. I usually start on small tenor, and then alternate on bass with the tunes played 8vbs. I try to play until fatigue forces me to stop in this last session, to help build endurance.

End of the day (off-instrument):
If I have time to sit and watch something on the TV, I use a Warburton P.E.T.E. to continue exercising the embouchure muscles without pressure on the chops from the instrument. Doing this at the end of the day works best for me, so that I have several hours of recovery time before the next on-instrument session. Too much PETE immediately before a practice session doesn’t work well on my come-back chops.

I don’t really know how “advisable” any of this is, but I’m slowly making progress toward where I’d like to be, so I guess it works ok… for me. Your mileage may vary, as they say.