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Development from high F to super G


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BBB1976
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 13, 2019 1:16 pm    Post subject: Development from high F to super G Reply with quote

Hi everyone

I have a good high F, but want to develop and learn how to break up to super G (a tone step)
I play lead in big bands, and would make life easier and more enjoyable playing the tunes!
What methods/exercises have you all used to do this? I've tried most things, but can't seem to break up further. Any ideas?

Best
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jkarnes0661
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 13, 2019 2:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The single most helpful thing I have done for range development is playing soft. Basically any exercises can be used, just continue the exercise's pattern in the higher register. Developing the ability to play p to mp volume up to high G helped me to train the embouchure muscles to form a small aperture, develop a more efficient chop set, and helped reprogram my mental image of what's needed to play in the upper register (less muscle, more finesse).

Alan Vizzutti's "High Notes" (http://www.vizzutti.com/Merch.html#books) was an excellent read and has some nice exercises for range work.

-Jon
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BBB1976
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 13, 2019 2:43 pm    Post subject: Development from high F to super G Reply with quote

Thanks Jon

Good advice! Yes a great idea to play up there softly. I guess you have to blow correctly doing it that way, speeding up the air. Will definitely try that and hopefully get a feel for the notes.

Cheers
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Brad361
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 13, 2019 3:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

And as soon as you get there, or maybe even before, stop calling it “super G.”
(Sorry, couldn’t resist!😉😉).

Brad
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kalijah
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 13, 2019 5:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
I guess you have to blow correctly doing it that way, speeding up the air.


Writing "stuff trumpet players say" will not help your range.
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BBB1976
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 13, 2019 11:02 pm    Post subject: Development from high F to super G Reply with quote

Well, I am a trumpet player and personally discovered my range using faster air, the tongue etc....getting an open sound. I would only like to get practical advice please. Sadly, the previous 2 posts are not helpful to me. Darryl Jones post is flippant and facetious.
It's about the music, and trying to improve ones playing. Yes sure, that playing with people, doing gigs and practicing more will help me, but I have hit a wall. Jon's post was very helpful..... Let's focus please!

Best.
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kalijah
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 4:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Ok. then regarding faster air:

How "fast" is it? (In some units such as meters/sec. etc.) WHERE is it faster? How did you measure it?

And Jon wrote nothing about "faster" air. YOU brought it up.

Quote:
It's about the music, and trying to improve ones playing.


Then you should understand that "fast air" is a liability. And the embouchure function is key to range. Tounge arch is ONLY an ancilary action related to emboouchure effort of CERTAIN embouchure muscles. Arch alone does NOTHING to determine pitch.
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BBB1976
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 8:25 am    Post subject: Development from high F to super G Reply with quote

Hi Darryl

Thanks for your interesting response.
Well, all the top players in London talk about the air, from my experience.
I think the air speed is not a liability as this is how I get a good sound in the upper register.
Upper register is something I personally have to work at and doesn't come naturally to me.
Therefore, the air speed has helped me a lot. Furthermore, the embouchure function is not key to range. Sure, you have to have strength in the chops which is important, however I think embouchure is over emphasised a lot. The chops just vibrate, and work up there from the air speed, and not the other way around! I disagree that tongue arch does nothing to determine pitch. It does! Lastly, a well organized progressive routine does sort this all out, and as you say re: embouchure it does become strong, which is inevitable. However, I feel your programming of the approach to the trumpet is inaccurate. But, best of luck to you.
There is a trumpeter on here John Mohan..am sure you know. He talks a lot of sense, even tho I've never studied the CG system. It's all the same idea! And am sure he wouldn't disagree with what I say. Anyway, balance is key like most things.

Sincerely.
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kalijah
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 9:21 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Therefore, the air speed has helped me a lot.


Define air speed as you understand it.

How do you control it?

And again, how did you measure it?

Where in the system did you measure it?

Is the air speed the same everywhere in the system at any point in time?

Quote:
The chops just vibrate, and work up there from the air speed, and not the other way around!


Perhaps "visualizing" air speed actual helps you engage in actions that directly control the vibrating aperture. (Making it "firmer" and thus ascending the pitch)

In any case, the aperture state controls pitch. You will not find one scholarly study that shows otherwise. If you know of one please present it.

If you change the tongue position without a concurrent embouchure action then NOTHING changes, especially not the pitch. THIS is easily demonstrated to oneself.

Tongue arch is related and concurrent to the "roll-out" action of the bottom lip. Its that simple.
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John Mohan
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:05 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks of the honorable mention, BBB1976!

I think I can help the you and hopefully avoid being a partial cause of this thread being assimilated by the Eternal Argument that seems to suck up many otherwise worthy threads around here, usually brought on by the writing of the two words "air" and "speed" with no words separating them (I think Kalijah has some sort of automatic search function that alerts him to the presence of those two words when they appear anywhere on the Trumpet Herald).

I had a similar issue for many years. I could play a full-power F# above High C anytime, anywhere, even at the end of the third show of the day when I was on tour with the Circus (we closed the show with "Born to Be Wild" - a little pro-animal dig I managed to sneak into the show that the Producer/Owner never quite caught onto).

But the G, when I could get it at all was squirrelly at best. What finally got me over the hump was I stopped trying to "play higher" (meaning squeezing my lips together more and trying to arch my tongue even more than I already was), and just blew harder - a whole lot harder. And all of a sudden, the F# would click up to a full power G. I realized that my problem was that while I was already doing the right thing with my embouchure and tongue arch, I just wasn't capable of blowing hard enough (creating enough air pressure) to get the full power F# to click up to the full power G. Once I found how I could do it (by playing the F# and then blowing even harder), I still could only pull it off when I was fresh, because within a few minutes of playing I didn't have quite enough muscle power in my blowing muscles to create the required pressure to get that nice, full-sounding G.

So the solution for me was, I went back to the Part 1 and Part 2 exercises in Claude Gordon's Systematic Approach to Daily Practice for Trumpet book and practiced them every day. In the Part 1 exercises you play arpeggios down into the pedal range holding the last note of each arpeggio as long as you have air and then longer, trying to crescendo the note as you run out of air to really exercise the blowing muscles. The wonderful thing about this is you really work those muscles of expiration, but because you are down in the pedal register you are not creating excess pressure in your head (as happens when we hold a high note for a period of time and our faces turn red). And you are also not overtaxing the embouchure muscles this way. We don't really need much lip strength at all to play high notes IF we are using tongue arch correctly and blowing hard enough (creating the required air pressure).

In the part 2 exercises throughout Systematic Approach one does arpeggio exercises that progress up to the highest notes the player can currently play, but the last notes of each exercise are only held long enough to make a slight crescendo on the note (about 4 or 5 beats). These Part 2 exercises are more about finding the "feel" or "knack" of the upper register than they are about building strength (though they do build strength and therefore endurance as well).

I hate to mention the nouns that will appear in the next sentence because I fear they represent other Kalijah trigger words, but here goes... If we consider a nozzle on the end of a garden hose, we all know that as we tighten the nozzle, reducing the size of its opening it causes the water stream to become more compact and fly farther and farther across the yard (note that I have assiduously avoided discussing what the nozzle does to the speed of the water).

But: we all know that at a certain point, closing off that nozzle further causes the opposite to happen - the water stream gets choked off, and soon stops completely. This is what happens if we try to play higher when we’ve reached the top of our range, and have arched our tongue all the way up and forward in the mouth (click on the cued up video below to see this illustrated), have tightened our embouchure muscles as well, and are already blowing as hard as we can. If we try to play higher, we can't. We're already blowing as hard as we can and if we arch our tongues more and/or tighten our lips more we just cut off the air. What is needed is more power (air pressure). Until we develop the strength to blow harder, we cannot play higher.

Buy the book Systematic Approach, study the instructions and start doing the Part One and Part Two exercises. If you want to be sure you are doing them correctly contact me and we can get together for a Skype lesson or two and I'll send you down (or rather, up) the correct path. They work every time when the player practices them correctly and sticks with it long enough for the desired development to occur.

Here's that video of fully up and forward tongue arch happening (starting on a very low note going to a very high note):

https://youtu.be/MWcOwgWsPHA?t=106

Best wishes,

John Mohan
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John Mohan
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 10:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Here's the short version of the above:

Given that you are able to play up to a good F, I am sure your embouchure and tongue arch are working just fine. But when you try to play higher they are writing checks your air power can't cash. Build up the needed blowing strength and find the feel for the highest notes by properly practicing the Part One and Part Two exercises in Claude Gordon's book Systematic Approach to Daily Practice for Trumpet. I can help you with the "properly" part if you wish.

Cheers,

John
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Brad361
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 12:45 pm    Post subject: Re: Development from high F to super G Reply with quote

BBB1976 wrote:
Well, I am a trumpet player and personally discovered my range using faster air, the tongue etc....getting an open sound. I would only like to get practical advice please. Sadly, the previous 2 posts are not helpful to me. Darryl Jones post is flippant and facetious.
It's about the music, and trying to improve ones playing. Yes sure, that playing with people, doing gigs and practicing more will help me, but I have hit a wall. Jon's post was very helpful..... Let's focus please!

Best.


Okokokok, it was meant in jest. Mea culpa.

Brad
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BBB1976
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 12:59 pm    Post subject: Development from high F to super G Reply with quote

No worries Brad.

John Mohan's responses are excellent and interesting.
I always like to listen to what experienced players say.
I'm definitely going to try his suggestions.
What's the difference between Maggio and CG? Anyone tried both? Thoughts?

Best from a rainy London.
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kalijah
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 2:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The problem with John's musings is that they do not hold true for many players, and in general. I can play notes up to above double C with far less than my maximum pressure. There is also the matter of efficiency. Sound produced is a product of air power and efficiency. One can improve efficiency by improving the embouchure function.

Most players learn to gradually increase range by playing these higest notes softly at first. Certainly at less than their maximum pressure.

The reason that higher pitches are less efficient is because the aperture resistance is MUCH greater in this range and the resistance from the instruments is much less due to progressively less acoustic impedance for each ascending harmonic.

So yes. Generally more pressure is required to play when the system is less efficient. But this doesn't limit pitch. It limits loudness of tone. But efficiency can be improved with correct practice.

I am also a very experienced player and much more knowledgeable in physics and mechanics than John Mohan.
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Richard III
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 3:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Funny I was just thinking about the John vs. Darryl joust that has taken place so many times. You all know it. John says tongue arch etc. and Darryl says aperture only and stuff. Anyway, I play with mouthpieces all the time. With a tight mouthpiece it makes it hard to get the arch involved, with an open mouthpiece it is much easier. For me. Set ups dictate sometimes what works. I'll let you take a look at what each of them play and draw your own conclusions.
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delano
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PostPosted: Wed Aug 14, 2019 11:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

kalijah wrote:
(...) I can play notes up to above double C with far less than my maximum pressure. There is also the matter of efficiency. Sound produced is a product of air power and efficiency. One can improve efficiency by improving the embouchure function.

Most players learn to gradually increase range by playing these higest notes softly at first. Certainly at less than their maximum pressure.

The reason that higher pitches are less efficient is because the aperture resistance is MUCH greater in this range and the resistance from the instruments is much less due to progressively less acoustic impedance for each ascending harmonic.

So yes. Generally more pressure is required to play when the system is less efficient. But this doesn't limit pitch. It limits loudness of tone. But efficiency can be improved with correct practice. (...)


Very well said!
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jakepainter
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 15, 2019 9:56 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Hi BBB1976

I've studied both the Claude Gordon and Caruso methods from great teachers and I found both extremely beneficial for upper register in different ways.

I actually did some Claude Gordon lessons back in 2002 with TH's very own John Mohan and it was great for me especially in initially finding the higher notes and making them speak.

I also had some fantastic lessons with Noel Langley (if you are London based i am guessing you will know of him) Noel introduced me to the Caruso method and I felt it really helped solidify my upper register, i.e be able to properly play a double G, in tune, loud and strong. And also I found Caruso great for endurance. I used to play a lot of Salsa gigs, and Caruso for sure saved me!

I actually use a bit of both methods in my daily routine, im a great believer in experimenting and finding what works for you, but I would very much recommend looking up Noel or or getting a lesson from John.

Two very different approaches but for me it has worked well.

Another thing that really helped me as a lead player is to find some flute music, and practise it on trumpet, any medium level flute piece will go up to that range and its really useful to try and play melodies in a non big band style musically.

Hope that helps.

Jake
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kalijah
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 15, 2019 11:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
I hate to mention the nouns that will appear in the next sentence because I fear they represent other Kalijah trigger words, but here goes


Really John? You are such a model of civility.

Quote:
... If we consider a nozzle on the end of a garden hose, we all know that as we tighten the nozzle, reducing the size of its opening it causes the water stream to become more compact and fly farther and farther across the yard (note that I have assiduously avoided discussing what the nozzle does to the speed of the water).


Beware John's junk science explanations. Especially ones that have been soundly debunked.
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acritzer
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 15, 2019 2:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Richard III wrote:
Funny I was just thinking about the John vs. Darryl joust that has taken place so many times. You all know it. John says tongue arch etc. and Darryl says aperture only and stuff. Anyway, I play with mouthpieces all the time. With a tight mouthpiece it makes it hard to get the arch involved, with an open mouthpiece it is much easier. For me. Set ups dictate sometimes what works. I'll let you take a look at what each of them play and draw your own conclusions.


Without getting into the weeds on "scientific" terms and rigid idealogies, I'd like to second the above statement. Certain people, with certain setups are bound to respond differently to different approaches, regardless of literal definitions.
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kalijah
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 15, 2019 3:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
John says tongue arch etc. and Darryl says aperture only and stuff.


Not exactly. I think you miss the gist of the argument. I personally think tongue movement forward is part of the actions required for most players to ascend,(depending on equipment and set-up.) I would even recommend it in reasonable amounts if a player needs to do it for their approach and setup.

As I have stated many times; if it helps, do it. End of story.

Why bring fake technical explanations to defend it? WHY?

And we have heard them all. These are the typical ones:

It creates faster air. And air speed controls pitch.

It compresses the air. And air compression determines pitch.

It creates resistance which increases air pressure.

It controls oral resonance, which controls pitch.

And the most far-fetched and ignorant one of all:

It concentrates the air like a hose nozzle and causes only a small area of the lips to vibrate (This one is easily dismissed for a number of reasons)

Over the years John Mohan has changed his "technical" explanation defending the arch because he can't defend his claims and "explanations" in the face of known science. And he will not give the lip aperture and the muscles that directly control it credit for the being the determining factor of pitch. He can't because he is firmly entrenched in his, as you say "rigid ideology" of the Claude Gordon dogma.

Quote:
With a tight mouthpiece it makes it hard to get the arch involved, with an open mouthpiece it is much easier.


Larger and more open mouthpieces have less acoustical and mechanical leverage and require more effort from the embouchure muscles to achieve ascending pitches. For a conventional embouchure this requires more corner effort and roll-out effort. Resulting in a more pronounced arch to ascend.

Also, those who use a more "rolled-in" setup will use less arch action in general.
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