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Thus far, I've learned three ways of performing vibrato on trumpet:
What are the pros and cons of each? A trumpet teacher I talked to was a big fan of the jaw method. Is there a preferred method?
All of the brass teachers I know (including myself) teach the jaw method.
I find it preferable to the other two methods because:
In contrast, jaw vibrato makes use of a simple brain->muscle->result link, which is easy to control and shouldn't mess with your air or embouchure too much.
The only instruments that make use of a diaphragmatic vibrato are the flute and double reeds. Proper vocal technique does NOT use a diaphragmatic vibrato. (The profession is not unanimous on this so it's an annoying point of contention, but I will briefly cite two professional voice teachers and my own.) Clarinet traditionally does not use vibrato, and saxophone typically uses jaw vibrato. The reason for each of these has to do with how tone is generated and how much resistance exists in the instrument.
Flute has essentially no resistance, making diaphragmatic vibrato the only option that will not mess with your embouchure. In contrast, the double reeds have a TON of resistance, requiring a firm and static embouchure to maintain a good tone. Saxophone, similar to the brass instruments, is pretty free blowing and utilizes an embouchure that applies tension to a vibrating element. In the saxophone's case, that's the reed; in the brass family's case, it's the lips.
Jaw vibrato in both cases is not a "pinching off" of your embouchure (in brass instruments we never vibrate sharp in pitch). When you lower the jaw, you are loosening the tension and thus allowing the pitch to sag. When teaching this, (and only after a student has developed a good and consistent tone with a relaxed throat) we start very slowly, with "square wave" oscillations at about q=60. Gradually, that is smoothed out to a sine wave and sped up at different rhythmic intervals. The result is a very precise control directly to the vibrating element that does not mess with your tone.
Diaphragmatic vibrato disturbs your support because your diaphragm is your support. From elementary school through college brass teachers repeatedly insist "More air!" because that's the foundation of good tone and volume. Vibrating with your diaphragm is literally varying the air pressure behind your lips. Additionally, the diaphragm is a huge muscle compared to the jaw, making jaw vibrato a much more efficient technique to develop.
Though I defer to NReilingh as a practicing brass instructor, as a current singer and former low brass player, I disagree that diaphragmatic vibrato is a no-no.
Every human with a set of lungs and a diaphragm will produce a small amount of natural tremelo in their airstream when sustaining a controlled exhale, such as to sing or to play. This usually manifests itself as a variation in volume, not pitch or tone. It becomes more pronounced as the lungs empty, coinciding with the muscles in your diaphragm starting to wonder how much longer they'll be tensed.
If you are exercising proper breath control instead of letting your throat do the restricting, it will reflect as a subtle vibration in the tone as you sustain a note. This is normal, and not to be discouraged. It can also be manipulated, with practice, to enhance the effect subtly without losing control or sounding like a "ha ha ha". I've been singing all my life, and played low brass for six years through school, and I can tell you the techniques for properly inducing tremelo in voice carries over to brass quite well.
I was actually taught that manipulating the jaw to "pinch off" the sound, forcing it sharp and/or flat, was the no-no. It normally coincides with other undesirable tensing of the throat muscles that will fatigue the jaw, throat and soft palate. It also is pinching off the airflow and embouchure, which will cause an undesirable change in tone. Again, these phemonena are misrrored in singing. Although in brass playing the jaw is necessarily more rigid than in singing, it is encouraged in both fields to keep the throat relaxed and open, as if you were swallowing an egg. This becomes extremely difficult when you "clamp down" to perform the minute adjustments needed to induce vibrato in the jaw.
My $.02, thanks for reading.
One of Hollywood's elite trumpeters of the '40s, '50s and early '60s taught me and his more famous students that the correct vibrato on trumpet is not to "mash the trumpet against the lips" as mentioned, but rather to take the pressure off the lips by moving the hand slightly. The idea is to lower the tone (tonality) forcing the player to play slightly sharp (without the vibrato) and get a more brilliant tone quality due the increased harmonics attained. Don't know if I explained that well, but it was the tried and true method by commercial and legit players then . . . and I'm guessing now. Think Uan Rasey, for example.
Love the question regarding vibrato.
Probably can't add a lot more than the previous posters, but I thought that it would be good to clarify that vocal vibrato comes from tremulousness in the vocal cords.
I wrote about that more here: https://www.ramseyvoice.com/how-to-sing-vibrato/
While diaphragmatic vibrato is a great way to get this kind of vibrato started, it's not technically the correct way to sing with vibrato.
The best way is to have balance in the instrument and the vocal cords will naturally begin to tremble.
Hope that makes sense!
