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razeontherock Heavyweight Member
Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 10609 Location: The land of GR and Getzen
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Posted: Sun Apr 30, 2017 9:00 pm Post subject: |
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I somehow missed this the first time around, so thank you! |
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epoustoufle Veteran Member
Joined: 07 Nov 2015 Posts: 232 Location: France
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Posted: Sun Apr 30, 2017 10:15 pm Post subject: |
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Browsing the "chop opus" and reading that corner breathing is the no. 1 cause of chop trouble, I think it ought to be said there are other reasons too. Personally I would say MY no. 1 cause for chop trouble has had nothing to do with breathing.
When you blow a stream of air there are several things that can block it:
* throat
* tongue
* teeth/lip
* lip/lip
All of these are capable of blocking your air totally - try it and see. Your diaphragm is weak in comparison and so blowing against these stronger forces is a recipe for disaster.
Somehow you need to develop a way to put a thin tube of air through the lips yet not clamp down those muscles - because they will win and create back-pressure from your head to your colon (with associated problems in those places and everywhere in between).
So, I would think the main source of chop problems is inability to get a thin tube of air through the lip. Unconsciously the body tries to create this with a tight throat or lip-lip compression or lip-teeth compression. Some lucky percentage naturally use tongue/roof-of-mouth compression - even this has to be forward in the mouth otherwise it's similar to tight throat compression.
I know all these issues well, but there are surely others.
(EDIT: I am playing a different way now with lip-tongue compression but I'm already getting off topic!)
My point, I guess is that lip mashing (mouthpiece pressure) that can come from hasty corner breathing - and mouthpiece pressure generally - is not the be-all and end-all of career limiting problems on trumpet |
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brassmusician Veteran Member
Joined: 25 Feb 2016 Posts: 273
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Posted: Sun Apr 30, 2017 11:33 pm Post subject: |
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maybe this chop disturbance idea is a reason why nose-breathing as done with Caruso exercises seems to do so much to settle and optimize my embouchure. It is not (the caruso) just a type of strengthening exercise. |
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TKSop Heavyweight Member
Joined: 23 Feb 2014 Posts: 1735 Location: UK
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Posted: Mon May 01, 2017 4:50 am Post subject: |
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epoustoufle wrote: | Browsing the "chop opus" and reading that corner breathing is the no. 1 cause of chop trouble, I think it ought to be said there are other reasons too. Personally I would say MY no. 1 cause for chop trouble has had nothing to do with breathing.
When you blow a stream of air there are several things that can block it:
* throat
* tongue
* teeth/lip
* lip/lip
All of these are capable of blocking your air totally - try it and see. Your diaphragm is weak in comparison and so blowing against these stronger forces is a recipe for disaster.
Somehow you need to develop a way to put a thin tube of air through the lips yet not clamp down those muscles - because they will win and create back-pressure from your head to your colon (with associated problems in those places and everywhere in between).
So, I would think the main source of chop problems is inability to get a thin tube of air through the lip. Unconsciously the body tries to create this with a tight throat or lip-lip compression or lip-teeth compression. Some lucky percentage naturally use tongue/roof-of-mouth compression - even this has to be forward in the mouth otherwise it's similar to tight throat compression.
I know all these issues well, but there are surely others.
(EDIT: I am playing a different way now with lip-tongue compression but I'm already getting off topic!)
My point, I guess is that lip mashing (mouthpiece pressure) that can come from hasty corner breathing - and mouthpiece pressure generally - is not the be-all and end-all of career limiting problems on trumpet |
I think (from my reading and understanding) the main point of the chop opus was that incorrect corner breathing was the cause of many problems... And that doing it correctly is the remedy.
As far as I can tell, the whole point of corner breathing is to give the player a more consistent embouchure formation (including lip/lip and lip/teeth, from your list) and the potential problems have to do with corner breathing in ways that don't give that consistent formation - and with more consistent and correct formation comes correct balance in that system....
If you're not setting correctly or consistently, you're more likely to find an imbalance creeping in and the subconscious attempts to balance this (including more pressure) are probably where the chop problems come from, and why poor corner breathing technique would be to blame, or am I interpreting something wrong here?
At any rate, there are two main reasons I resurrected this old thread:
1) The opus describing the do's and don'ts of corner breathing seems a very valuable resource for anyone else starting to look into corner breathing or wanting to assess possible flaws in their technique, or confirm the absence of flaws.
2) To confirm with one of Doc's students that there isn't something obvious I'm missing by reading it plainly.
As this is the Reinhardt board and this is one of his teachings, both reasons seem equally valid to me...
Let's try and relate whether our personal understanding of how things work to Doc's ideas, if we're lucky his students can either confirm or correct our statements and we'll learn something either way, otherwise we might as well not be in this subforum?
(PS. The diaphragm is an involuntary muscle - and even if it weren't, trying to overcome imbalances in chops/aperture by just forcing more air doesn't sound very Reinhardt to me). |
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tim_wolf Veteran Member
Joined: 28 Feb 2006 Posts: 379 Location: Lancaster, PA
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Posted: Mon May 01, 2017 7:41 am Post subject: |
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It would be very helpful to me (and hopefully others) if someone (Chris, Rich?) would post a video showing both the incorrect way and the correct way. I personally learn better visually. |
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