New Trumpet project

[horfhorf]

This post might be a little long...but please read on. I'm looking for opinions and advice about a new project I'm considering.

First, a little background. I'm a conservatory trained french horn player but have always dabbled with trumpet-like instrument and I'm currently studying jazz improvisation with trumpet. But my main gig is teach music to young children, like kindergarten, first and second graders (ages 5 to .

My school is pretty heavy on Orff-Schulwerk pedagogy. In my interpretation, young kids need to do 4 things to learn musical behaviors; sing, say, dance and play. There are many aspects to each of these four items, but I'd like to focus on the "play".

Typically, Orff-Schulwerk teachers have their kids play lots of different instruments. In term of pitched instruments, small xylophones are the pitched instruments most often played by young children. When kids get a little older, recorder and sometimes guitar or ukelele is added to the xylophones. The goal of using these instruments isn't necessarily to develop mad skills. They are tools to explore musical concepts. For example, if I'm teaching a second grade class about the melodic fragment mi re do, they can sing it, play it on a recorder, or play it on a xylophone. If recorder is too tough for a certain kid, then they can use a xylophone. The playing technique isn't important, the musical concepts are. The idea is to have many tools to allow for differentiation in instruction but also to allow every kid to successfully participate in classroom ensemble performances.

So why not use trumpets in this work? Band doesn't start at my school until 6th grade. Why wait for them to be that old before they play a brass instrument? The melodies that my students use to learn melodic concepts are very simple pentatonic songs sometimes only using 2 or 3 notes. I can imagine having a set of pocket trumpets that kids can play.

Obviously I'd have to deal with hygiene issues but that's not any different than recorders. Regular sized trumpets would be too big for many of my kids but pocket trumpets would fit. I'd have to get the right size mouthpiece not only in terms of diameter and rim width but throat size. Transposition would be an issue. Most of the music my kids play xylophones with is in C or F or G. I'd have to figure out how to handle that so when they get to middle school they are not confused about trumpet fingering (unless I could find pocket trumpets in C).

What do you think of this idea? What challenges would you anticipate? Is there something I'm not thinking of? I'm open to hear any and all ideas.
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horfhorf

[JayKosta]

I don't have experience with that age group, but I think that a 'challenge' would be teaching them the specialized 'skill' of how to make and use a proper embouchure. It might be 'too easy' to get them started with 'bad technique' what would plague them in later years.

If you want to try something 'brass-like' maybe use cheap vinyl plumbing tubing for a 'hose-a-fone' . Choose a diameter that wouldn't even need a mouthpiece. And use tape to wrap them into coils so they don't get used as a whip ...
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Most Important Note ? - the next one !
KNOW (see) what the next note is BEFORE you have to play it.
PLAY the next note 'on time' and 'in rhythm'.
Oh ya, watch the conductor - they set what is 'on time'.

[Quadstriker]

Ages 5 to 8 and teaching multiple children at once? Man I'd stick to "instruments" that are nearly impossible to play wrong to get a note, and that wouldn't matter if they do. Xylophones and Kazoos, etc.

No way on earth I'd try to get a group of kids like that to form embouchures and play brass in that type of setting. That is a waaaaay different task than "I'd like you to teach my 7 year old how to play trumpet" in a standard individual lesson setting.

[rhatheway]

I'm not an educator, but about 30 years ago I volunteered for many years at the local elementary school to teach that same age group very simple, basic concepts about music. I did that by bringing in a variety of different musical instruments (wind, percussion, string) that I would play for them, along with a variety of musical instruments they could play themselves. This division allowed them to understand and hear the different sounds that instruments made, along with getting a little bit of hands on experience themselves.

I'd suggest that at that age group, and in a mixed setting (different natural abilities, different attention spans, etc.) that demonstrating a trumpet or other wind instrument where they can hear it works better than you trying to get them to play basic notes on a pocket trumpet.

Like several others have mentioned too, the issue of their embouchure would be a critical stumbling block, but there's also the issue that you couldn't just bring in a bunch of pocket trumpets and hand them out and (1) expect them all to listen to you when you're trying to explain something to them, (2) expect them to all understand what you're trying to teach them, and (3) expect to get all the horns back without dents or in one piece.

But instead, if you play something for them, you'll probably hold their attention and can really demonstrate for them what you've been talking about. Then if you want to give them a recorder or xylophone or something like that to play with and make noise on you're probably fine, and the kids will have fun with that.

I can tell you though that it will be fun and the other teachers will appreciate your giving them a break!

My $.02 worth...
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Richard H
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Working on getting my chops back...

“Without music, life would be a mistake” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

1958 Conn Director 14A
1968 Getzen Eterna Severinsen
1977 Reynolds Medalist CR-58

[zaferis]

Yes, there is a physiological difference, coordination of small muscles, maturity of those muscles, and size (brass can't start on a 1/2 size instrument).
Just think of that small child trying to blow out candles on a birthday cake - it takes a little more time to develop these mechanisms. Then there is the aspect that not all embouchures will look the same. With violin every part of tone production is on the exterior, most of brass production is internal - you can't stand in front of 6 trumpeters and teach exactly the same thing to each of the six.

There's always gonna be that one exception, you know the guy.. "well, I stared at 3 and I'm fine.. blah, blah ,blah ".. Most, a super high percentage of people, aren't ready until that window of 9-11, 5th or 6th grade
I've seen studies comparing how far along students advance with brass instruments, comparing those that start in 4th, 5th, or 6th grade.. results were pretty consistent that by 9th grade the difference was negligable. The extra two years for the early starters does not show up as more advanced players.
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[Fubeca]

Check out Brass for Beginners. They have materials and instruments along these lines.

https://www.brassforbeginners.com/

Edit:
There has been lots of work in bringing the Suzuki Method to brass instruments. One of my old teachers is the first in my state and her young kids sound awesome. Lots of cornets and corno da caccia for the small ones, but it's obviously doable on the private instruction level.
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[Robert P]

Just echoing what others have said - it's fine to have them start learning but trumpet isn't an instrument to look to if you want to get a group making music right away.
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[tomba51]

As a retired elementary school music educator, I concur with what everyone else has said about the problem of teaching proper embouchure to a group of kids that young.

Here are some other things to consider;

-Where are you going to get funding to purchase all those instruments?

-You're going to have to teach a bunch of young kids that trumpets are very expensive and very delicate so they have to be treated with care. Some of the younger more "energetic" kids might not have a full understanding of that concept.

-A group of very young kids that do not have a proper embouchure will produce a very "interesting" sound when they try to play together. The teachers and students in other nearby classrooms might not appreciate the sounds that come from your classroom.
-
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Tom Barreca

[huntman10]

Not necessarily advocating these, but I did try one out to see if it would be practical to teach my grandsons on, but I didn't get much interest from them.

Check out their J Horn.

www.nuvoinstrumental.com

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/N610JHBBK--nuvo-jhorn-black
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huntman10
Collector/Player of Fine (and not so fine) Brass Instruments including
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Martin Custom Large Bore, Lots Olds!, Conns, etc.

[Andy Cooper]

I started in the third grade. At one time I started beginners - in the fourth grade.

Trumpet is not the instrument for students to casually "explore musical concepts". To make recognizable sounds approaching music the student would need to spend at least 20 minutes or so of practice a day for several weeks plus lessons specific to the instrument.

Now you might be able to give them some Stadium Horns to blow on. Set of 12 about $30. You need to find ones with a small enough "mouthpiece". They will probably just be able to play one note - but it will be a joyful noise.

[horfhorf]

Thanks for all the input...good food for thought. Fubeca, thanks for the link. I'll definitely check that out.

Like I said in my original post, I'm not really interested in teaching "trumpet" per se. The trumpet would just be one more tool to teach with. I teach kids from kindergarten to 2nd grade but then those kids go to a different teacher for 3rd thru 5th grade, and they don't start band until 6th grade. If they don't have a great embouchure, if the tone quality isn't great...I can accept that because they have a long break before they really start studying an instrument.

And I'm not sure I'd have the whole class of 16 kids playing pocket trumpets all at once (that might be worse than beginning recorder)...maybe 3 kids who want to try to play our short song that only uses sol and mi. That would be manageable.

Thanks again everyone.
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horfhorf

[Andy Del]

I am a music educator and have taught music programs at the elementary school level.

My first thought - you are teaching Orff. Do not try to bend it to your will / bias as a trumpet player. The time you spend on production will defeat the whole purpose of the program for kids 5-8.

If you have kids not playing ensemble instruments at age 8 through to 12 (grade 6 in your area?) then HERE is where you might propose to start a band program.

I did this in one school. We initially got year 3/4 kids onto trumpet, trombone, flute, clarinet, quint/quart bassoon. Flutes with bent headjoints and P-bones were used. Classes were taught in groups with instrumental teachers and group pedagogy used.

We would move trombone kids to metal instruments if they opted for private lessons. The rest were on 'real' instruments. (I guess the P-bones were used as so many student trombones are purely horrible and as the brass guy we did a clean up of our stock, disposing of many B&H and other peashooter nasties.)

Kids wold move out from these to other instruments as well. such. as sax, oboe, horn, euphonium and tuba. Worked really well in addition to the early year program.

cheers

Andy
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so many horns, so few good notes...