Stuffy Mutes No More!

Ever notice how difficult it is to slur "across the grain" when using a plunger mute? Or......hate how stuffy that cup mute can be? Here's a little tip:

Around the handle receptacle on your plunger you'll notice a collar with large "threaded" grooves where the handle was once attached. By the way, if you haven't yet, REMOVE the wooden handle! (HA!) Look down past these grooves and you'll probably notice that the bottom of this hole is covered.Very carefully, take a very sharp knife and cut out the bottom of this hole. This will leave you with about a half-inch hole in the center of your plunger mute.....enough to "open it up" and play across breaks with ease whilst maintaining that characteristic plunger sound.

With your stuffy stone-lined cup mute, find the very center on the bottom and drill a SMALL hole. (1/16" would do it). This will open up the mute nicely and allow you to play better in tune,too!

Handy-dandy stand bag!

Here's a rainy-day project for ya! Have you ever seen those industrial sized paper clips with a black clasp and 2 silver "wing" handles? Like this:

Find the biggest one you can and remove ONE of the silver handles. Find yourself a nice velvet bag......a Crown Royal Bag does nicely but may be just a tad too large. If you can find a smaller one, so much the better.Now, remove the drawstring from the bag. Get yourself a piece of coat hanger about 10 inches long and form it into a circle. (Wrapping it around a coffee can gives it a nice circular shape!). You'll feed this through the bag where the drawstring was.The bag should then have a nice, round open top! With needle-nose pliers, bend the ends of the hanger to fit into the paper clip (where the silver handle WAS).

VOILA! Clip this to your music stand to hold pencils, water bottles, love-notes, whatever! For added stabilty, put a small paper or plastic cup into the bag to hold it's shape.Keep this in your case and you'll be the envy of everyone in the group at your next rehearsal!