Improve Your
Trombone Playing.

Make sure to start every day of trombone playing with a great sound. Get the airflow free flowing and make sure your embouchure is responsive. Also make sure you play in tune on all 7 trombone slide positions in both the high, medium and low range.

There are multiple warmups to choose between in this section. Find the ones that work for you. Some days you are good to go after a 5-minute trombone warmup, other days it takes longer.

Flexibility is a basic and important trombone skill. Since we play multiple notes in each slide position, we need to be able to rapidly go from low range to high range and vice versa. And we need to do this with as small embouchure changes as possible.

Smooth, fast and effortless flexibility will improve all aspects of your trombone playing. In this part of the member’s section, there are tons of exercises to choose between. Yes, practicing trombone flexibility can be fun!

Think of each scale as a language you want to master. Being able not only to speak without an accent, but also being able to use it for meaningful conversations and expressing your ideas.

This is how I believe you should consider playing scales on your trombone. Just playing a major scale from root to root is not what it is about. Being able to play with the notes and make music with them regardless if you are improvising or playing sheet music. This section has tons of exercises that will enable you to achieve this when you play trombone.

Pentatonic scales has a recognizable sound, are extremely versatile, and almost regardless of the key, they are very playable on the trombone. As an improviser it is crucial to know your pentatonic scales – and they are way more useful than you think, far beyond simple funk and blues.

This is how I believe you should consider playing scales on your trombone. Just playing a major scale from root to root is not what it is about. Being able to play with the notes and make music with them regardless if you are improvising or playing sheet music. This section has tons of exercises that will enable you to achieve this when you play trombone.

Don’t just play all triads on your horn. Know them by heart, sing them in all inversions and make sure to be able to intonate them perfectly. Can you without hesitating tell what note you are playing in a triad in a trombone trio? And do you know how to intonate a major third properly?

This section has tons of creative triad exercises for trombone and other bass clef instruments. I promise they will improve your game!

Playing trombone is all about playing music. Etudes are a great way to work on phrasing, intonation, legato and much more while playing music.

In this section you will find hundreds of pages of beautiful and challenging trombone etudes by composers such as Ferdinand David and Rimsky-Korsakov. You will also find orchestral studies. Challenge yourself with Telemann’s Fantasias for Flute edited for trombone or Bach’s cello suites in all keys.

Are you an jazz improviser? Or do you want to try it out? There are currently over 30 jazz etudes available, all written over the chords of famous jazz standards. Each etude starts off easy and gradually get more challenging.

Try playing inspiring trombone solos with play-along tracks over tunes such as Body And Soul, Summertime, Donna Lee and How Insensitive. Play them alone, with play-along tracks or with a rhythm section.

The jazz patterns in the member’s section will help you improve your trombone playing and extend your jazz vocabulary. Can you transpose a II-V-I lick to any key? And have you explored the vast possibilities hidden within the altered scale?

Learn to master arpeggios based on jazz chords and show those try-hard sax players that 8-tone licks sound WAY better on the trombone 😇

Since the trombone doesn’t have valves, having good articulation is fundamental. As trombone players, we need to master the skill of tongued legato playing as well as perfecting staccato playing.

In my opinion, doodle tonguing is the best articulation technique for jazz trombone players. It takes some time to learn and master, but is well worth it. The member’s section has loads of doodling exercises. Here are seven steps to getting started with doodle tonguing.