Trombone slide positions chart

Basic slide positions

The modern system has seven chromatic slide positions on a tenor trombone in B♭. It was first described by Andre Braun circa 1795.

In 1811 Joseph Fröhlich wrote on the differences between the modern system and an old system where four diatonic slide positions were used and the trombone was usually keyed to A. To compare between the two styles the chart below may be helpful (take note for example, in the old system contemporary 1st-position was considered "drawn past" then current 1st). In the modern system, each successive position outward (approximately 3+1/4 in) will produce a note which is one semitone lower when played in the same partial. Tightening and loosening the lips will allow the player to "bend" the note up or down by a semitone without changing position, so a slightly out-of-position slide may be compensated for by ear.

Partials and intonation

As with all brass instruments, progressive tightening of the lips and increased air pressure allow the player to move to different partial in the harmonic series. In the first position (also called closed position) on a B♭ trombone, the notes in the harmonic series begin with B♭₂ (one octave higher than the pedal B♭₁), F₃ (a perfect fifth higher than the previous partial), B♭₃ (a perfect fourth higher), D₄ (a major third higher), and F₄ (a minor third higher).

F₄ marks the sixth partial, or the fifth overtone. Notes on the next partial, for example A♭₄ (a minor third higher) in first position, tend to be out of tune in regards to the twelve-tone equal temperament scale. A♭₄ in particular, which is at the seventh partial (sixth overtone) is nearly always 31 cents, or about one third of a semitone, flat of the minor seventh. On the slide trombone, such deviations from intonation are corrected for by slightly adjusting the slide or by using an alternate position. Although much of Western music has adopted the even-tempered scale, it has been the practice in Germany and Austria to play these notes in position, where they will have just intonation.

The next higher partials—B♭₄ (a major second higher), C₅ (a major second higher), D₅ (a major second higher)—do not require much adjustment for even-tempered intonation, but E♭₅ (a minor second higher) is almost exactly a quarter tone higher than it would be in twelve-tone equal temperament. E♭₅ and F₅ (a major second higher) at the next partial are very high notes; a very skilled player with a highly developed facial musculature and diaphragm can go even higher to G₅, A♭₅, B♭₅ and beyond.

The higher in the harmonic series any two successive notes are, the closer they tend to be (as evidenced by the progressively smaller intervals noted above). A byproduct of this is the relatively few motions needed to move between notes in the higher ranges of the trombone. In the lower range, significant movement of the slide is required between positions, which becomes more exaggerated on lower pitched trombones, but for higher notes the player need only use the first four positions of the slide since the partials are closer together, allowing higher notes in alternate positions. As an example, F₄ (at the bottom of the treble clef) may be played in first, fourth or sixth position on a B♭ trombone. The note E₁ (or the lowest E on a standard 88-key piano keyboard) is the lowest attainable note on a 9 ft B♭ tenor trombone, requiring a full 2.24 m of tubing. On trombones without an F attachment, there is a gap between B♭₁ (the fundamental in first position) and E₂ (the first harmonic in seventh position). Skilled players can produce "falset" notes between these, but the sound is relatively weak and not usually used in performance. The addition of an F attachment allows for intermediate notes to be played with more clarity.

Pedal tones

The B♭ pedal tone is frequently seen in commercial scoring but much less often in symphonic music, while notes below that are called for only rarely as they "become increasingly difficult to produce and insecure in quality" with A♭ or G being the bottom limit for most tenor trombonists. The trombone's tubing is largely cylindrical, which inhibits the production of the fundamental as a pedal tone pitch. Instead, trombonists use the higher harmonics of the instrument to produce pedal tones, giving them a bright and hollow tone quality. Some contemporary orchestral writing, movie or video game scoring, trombone ensemble and solo works will call for notes as low as a pedal C, B, or even double pedal B♭ on the bass trombone.

Glissando

The trombone is one of the few wind instruments that can produce a true glissando, by moving the slide without interrupting the airflow or sound production. Every pitch in a glissando must have the same harmonic number, and a tritone is the largest interval that can be performed as a glissando.

The trombone glissando can create remarkable effects, and it is used in jazz and popular music, as in the famous song "The Stripper" by David Rose and his orchestra.

'Harmonic', 'inverted', 'broken' or 'false' glissandos are those that cross one or more harmonic series, requiring a simulated or faked glissando effect.

Valve attachments

Modern trombones are often constructed with a valve attachment, an extra loop of tubing attached to the bell section and engaged by a valve operated by the left thumb by means of a lever or trigger. The valve attachment aids in increasing the lower range of the instrument, while also allowing alternate slide positions for difficult music passages. A valve can also make trills a lot easier.

The valve attachment was originally developed by German instrument maker Christian Friedrich Sattler in the late 1830s for the Tenorbaßposaune, a B♭ tenor trombone built with the wider bore and larger bell of a bass trombone that Sattler had earlier invented in 1821. Sattler's valve attachment added about 3 ft of tubing to lower the fundamental pitch from B♭ to F, controlled by a rotary valve, and is essentially unchanged in modern instruments.

Valve attachments are most commonly found on the tenor and bass trombones. However, they can appear on sizes from soprano to contrabass, in different variety of keys, depending on the size of the instrument.

In the early 2010s Torbjörn Hultmark of the Royal College of Music commissioned the first soprano trombone in B♭ with an F valve, built by Thein Brass.

Although rare on the E♭ alto trombone, a valve attachment usually lowers the instrument a perfect fourth into B♭, providing the first five or six positions from the tenor trombone slide. Some alto models also have a valve called a trill valve, providing a small loop of tubing that lowers the instrument by only a minor or major second, into D or D♭ respectively.

Tenor trombones, especially the larger bore symphonic models, commonly have a valve attachment which lowers the instrument from B♭ to F.

It provides access to the otherwise missing notes between the pedal B♭₁ in first position, and the second partial E₂ in seventh, as well as providing alternate slide positions for other notes in long (sixth and seventh) positions. Because the attachment tubing increases the length of the overall instrument by one-third, the distances between slide positions must also be one-third longer when the valve is engaged, resulting in only six positions available on the F slide, to low C₂. Thus, the F attachment cannot provide the low B♮₁, but it usually has a sufficiently long tuning slide to lower it into E as required, which will provide B♮₁ in a very long position.

The modern bass trombone usually has two valve attachments to provide all of the notes that are absent on an instrument with no valves (B♮₁ – E₂). This allows the player to produce a complete chromatic range upwards from the pedal register.

The first valve is an F attachment the same as that found on a tenor trombone and extends the range down to C₂. The second valve, engaged together with the first, lowers the instrument to D (or less commonly, E♭) and provides the low B₁. The second valve can be dependent, where it serves to lower the F attachment to D and has no effect alone. More commonly the second valve is independent, where it can be engaged separately to lower the instrument to G♭, or to D when both are engaged.

Single-valve B♭ bass trombones with an F attachment are still made but are now less common than two-valve bass trombones. The single valved B♭ bass trombones are essentially very large bore tenor trombones, and likewise are unable to provide the low B♮₁ without lowering the valve to E with a long tuning slide.

Contrabass trombones in F typically have two independent valves, tuned either to C and D♭ combining to A, or in European models tuned to D and B♭ combining to A♭. Contrabass trombones in low B♭ usually have only one valve in F, although Miraphone make a model in C with two independent valves in G and A♭, which combine to E.

Notation

Unlike most other brass instruments in an orchestral setting, the trombone is not usually considered a transposing instrument. Prior to the invention of valve systems, most brass instruments were limited to playing one overtone series at a time. Altering the pitch of the instrument required manually replacing a section of tubing called a crook, or swapping to another instrument of a different length. Their parts were transposed according to which crook or instrument pitch was desired at any given time, so that a particular note on the staff always corresponded to a particular partial on the instrument.

Trombones, on the other hand, have used slides since their inception, so they have always been fully chromatic. Since no such tradition of transposition was needed, orchestral trombone parts have always been notated at concert pitch. Reading in concert pitch also meant trombones did not require dedicated parts to double choir parts. While the tubing length of the tenor trombone (slide fully retracted) has remained a fairly constant 9 feet (′), the conceptual pitch of trombones has changed through history due to changing Pitch standards; a B♭ in modern A440 was a Baroque A.

Trombone music is typically notated in bass clef. Tenor clef is often used for high passages, but not usually in jazz charts. In orchestra scores, some composers wrote the entire first trombone part in alto clef, and the second part in tenor clef. As the alto trombone declined in popularity during the 19th century, this practice was gradually abandoned and trombone parts came to be notated in the tenor or bass clef. Some Russian and Eastern European composers wrote first and second tenor trombone parts on one alto clef staff (the German Robert Schumann was the first to do this). Scores by Igor Stravinsky, Sergei Prokofiev, and Dmitri Shostakovich commonly used this practice.

Trombone parts in concert band music are nearly exclusively notated in bass clef. In the British brass band, trombones are treated as B♭ transposing instruments, and read transposing B♭ treble clef, sounding a major ninth below written pitch (thus reading middle C₄ produces B♭₂).

An accomplished performer today is expected to read parts notated in bass, tenor, and alto clefs, and (more rarely) treble clef in C and B♭.

Trombone position

The trombone produces notes within its range by extending the main slide to different positions. In first position, the length of the bore is at its shortest; seventh position puts the slide at its furthest extension, at the edge of the inner slide's stockings. (These are sections of slightly greater diameter at the ends of the inner slide tubes.) Positions 3 and 4 may be located by referring the player's right hand to the bell of the instrument. Each player "has a different way of visualizing where the positions of the slide trombone are in relation to each other" Positions, especially in the higher register, may need to be shortened or lengthened (sharpened or flattened) to play in tune. Lower-numbered (shorter) positions are closer together than higher-numbered ones. Positions six and seven are primarily useful in the lower part of the trombone's range.

Some notes may be sounded at more than one position; for example, D4 may be sounded either in position 1 or 4. As a result, trombonists often spend time studying a part to determine how to approach a particular phrase.

Harmonics and tuning

If the harmonics are octave displaced and compressed into the span of one octave, some of them are approximated by the notes of what the West has adopted as the chromatic scale based on the fundamental tone. The Western chromatic scale has been modified into twelve equal semitones, which is slightly out of tune with many of the harmonics, especially the 7th, 11th, and 13th harmonics. In the late 1930s, composer Paul Hindemith ranked musical intervals according to their relative dissonance based on these and similar harmonic relationships.