When getting ready for a significant performance, it's common to divide your preparation into two categories: musical preparation and physical preparation. Incorporate these four principles of preparation from Denis Wick Artist Victor Haskins to ensure that your preparation is effective and promotes your overall well-being for your upcoming big performance.

When it comes to trombone practice, the mute is usually the last thing players think about as they organize their day. However, as we learn in this clinic with Chris Houlding, leaving your mute out of your daily practice session is a very bad practice! Get practice tips for mute prep so that you are ready for performance success in the trombone excerpts Denis Wick artist Chris Houlding reviews in this short masterclass.

As a professional trombone and euphonium performer and college educator, I am asked about mouthpieces all of the time. A question that frequently is asked by trombone/euphonium doublers like myself is:

Can I use the same mouthpiece for both trombone and euphonium?

Given the plethora of research and reports highlighting the importance of music education in achieving success across various subjects, it is only natural for you, as a parent, to want to motivate your child to persevere in this newfound skill they are acquiring. "But I never learned an instrument in school. I have no idea how they are making sounds or how to encourage them!" I'm here to tell you you know more tan you are giving yourself credit for. Here is what you know, and the tools you have to become your child's greatest inspiration.

Whenever I give clinics, the usual questions about practicing or instrument/mouthpiece choice inevitably arise. The questions that never get asked are about the other, non-musical things that go into a successful music career – and they are numerous. This is the stuff that doesn’t get talked about much in music classes, and comprises the vast majority of what I do on a daily basis. Recently, while talking to class of collegiate trumpet players, the professor (who is also one of my former teachers and knows me pretty well) asked me to tell the students how many companies I run. Here it goes (and I’ll try to keep it brief):

There is a well known stereotype of  the gear-happy trumpet player buying too many mouthpiece, guitar players with huge guitar collections, but how many tuba collectors do you know? Daniel Ridder has been slowly building his collections of tubas from all around the world and shares them in this interview with Denis Wick artist manager, Brett Baker.

Steven Mead has forged a path as euphonium soloist, educator, mouthpiece designer, and more. He's the inspiration to many of the best euphonium soloists today. This sounds like the definition of a legacy, but Steven Mead is still creating and perfecting all his crafts. Enjoy this interview with Steven as he discusses the history of his mouthpieces and progression of his designs from the classic Steven Mead mouthpiece to our newest Ultra model.

Every single musician in the world has to practice. It’s just, something you have to do if you want to get better, and like practicing for anything else there are good and bad ways to do it. If you practice daily and don’t see results there could be a fundamental issue with your embouchure, but it could just be that the way you practice is not productive and you’re wasting time.

In part 1, we established two major things about tuning; that it is by definition a comparison, and that having a consistent quality of tone is important before tuning.  Now we can use those ideas to clarify some other areas of tuning and provide a guide to address some common problems.

Tuning is one of the few areas of music that is binary; something is in tune or it is not.  However, even though most everyone would agree with this statement, the subject of tuning and its pedagogy get surprisingly muddled especially within the world of marching band.  While there are still many ways to address tuning, keeping in mind the following concepts will help guide you to success and diagnose problems you may encounter.