No tough keys, only unfamiliar keys.

[sweets]

Think about this for a minute.

There are no tough keys on the trumpet or any other instrument for that matter. There are only unfamiliar keys that you simply haven't mastered yet due to not playing around with them enough.

It kind of hit me hard as well when I heard it for the first time. It's really true though. Keys like B Major, F#, E, etc... don't really lay very well on the trumpet because they require the use of all three valves, but more importantly they are more difficult because we generally don't play in these keys as much as we would play in the key of C, G, F, etc...

I just wanted to share this little bit of Jazz improvisation information with you as a reminder to work on keys that are more difficult for you so that all 12 keys on the trumpet will be nicely well rounded.

[VictorVega]

That´s so true.

[Dizzy321]

I agree.

But, for me at least, it seems no matter how much I work on the "unfamiliar keys", I just can't seem to get use to thinking in those notes.

[sweets]

Hey Dizzy321,

I would like to thank you for that YouTube comment, I'm glad that you're a part of the site.  

As far as tough keys go, it's like anything else, you just got to get used to them.

I talked to retired navy trumpet player, a really good player by the way. He could bust out all these great jazz licks over tunes in Bb, G, F, C, etc.. But couldn't do anywhere near the same in F#, E, C#, B, etc...

What he did was use Band in a Box. He took real book tunes and changed the keys to the more difficult ones. After awhile of doing this he really started sounding more fluent in the less played keys. This made it even easier for him to bust out great licks in the easier keys.  

I think learning licks in 12 keys is a really good way to become fluent on the trumpet in every key. The more you play in all the keys, the easier each one gets. That's why I'm such a huge advocate of learning licks in 12 keys. Not only does it give you more ideas, it also builds your overall technique on the trumpet.

[Dizzy321]

Cool. I need to just stop being lazy and actually transpose them 
So much time...haha, but I'm just going to dedicate this whole Christmas break to getting used to all unfamiliar keys and I guess I'll start transposing.
Today: transpose the Cry Me a River Lick...haha