Barely any progress one year into Embouchure Change

[Jrin777]

Hello everybody,

It's close to exactly one year now since I have made my embouchure change. Throughout high school and undergrad, my setup required me to apply excessive mouthpiece pressure to the point where my inner lips were jammed into my front teeth, before I even formed my embouchure. I had a decent sound, but I always struggled with a consistent range as well as consistent endurance. Many of my teachers in undergrad assumed I didn't practice, when I would spend hours in a practice room, only to feel pain and discomfort after every session.

Last year, after being out of undergrad for a year, I was taking gigs and getting out into the real world, until my range gradually decreased, to the point where I couldn't ever hit any notes above high C and I could only play for about 20 minutes before my range was limited to a G on top of the staff. I took a hard look at my playing and figured it was time to fix all of these issues I had with mouthpiece pressure.

Since then I've sought out the help of three different teachers in my area, who each gave me a wealth of materials to help me. I learned to play with much less pressure than before, and I finally felt muscle soreness in the corners of my mouth rather than sharp pain on my top lip after practicing. Four months after starting the change, I brought my range up to a G on top of the staff, and my sound quality/endurance improved a bit. Now, a year into it, my rage has remained at that G on the staff, I can last about 20-30 minutes on gigs, and my sound/intonation is fairly inconsistent.

I've felt trapped in this same spot for 8 months now; it feels like I can't build any strength in my embouchure, and I've tried making so many corrections (opening my jaw more, changing my tongue position, messing with the angle of the horn, and most recently, playing to the side of my cupid's bow shaped lip). I think at this point I have given up on making performance a full time job for me, but I would still like to perform in the future as a source of income, and would like to tr and fix these problems before going back to school. I know nobody can diagnose/fix my problems without seeing or hearing me play, but I'm wondering if anybody has experienced a roadblock like mine, and if they have overcame it. Thank you in advance for any help and sorry for writing a novel.

[Mike Sailors]

Yes I had similar experience.

You can figure it out if you want it bad enough, and find the right person to show you what to do.
_________________
www.mikesailors.com

[Christian K. Peters]

Hello,
Welcome to the TH. I spent most of my undergrad years playing and really not working on technique stuff. By the time I got done with groups and work, I just did not have much time left. I was always sore and tired also. By my third year, I had figured that I would not be a performer, so I went into teaching. That was a good move, as I now had time to work on stuff I should have done and got to play with community groups. I also had some wonderful older fellows to play under who had a wealth of knowledge ans experience. I learned how to really play after I got out of school. I agree with Mike. Sometimes you have to find the right combination of experience and direction. Sooner or later, you will have to choose the path that will satisfy you over the next thirty years.
_________________
Christian K. Peters
Schilke Loyalist since 1976

[Andy Cooper]

I used to assume that every trumpet players lips bleed. I would go to the drugstore and have them mix up a tincture to use as skin toughener on my lips. So yes - when I say I can feel your pain - I can.

A few questions:
1. What mouthpiece(s) have you tried?
2. Does switching mouthpieces seem to solve the problem for a couple of weeks then things revert to pain as usual?
3. Have you ever played trombone, euphonium, or tuba? If so - was the high register and endurance better?

[JVL]

hello
i'd take a 5-7 days break at least, doing only fluttering during these days.
then, after these days, keep on fluttering for warming up, and do short attacks lip buzzing with the fingers at the contact point of your mpc.
flutter
do the same with the mpc
practice softly Clarke stuff, mid-low range, legato, staccato, rest between sequences at least twice as you played.
pay attention to your mpc setting, embouchure, breathing, and aperture.
rebuild your foundations.

And take lessons with Bobby Shew
best

[JetJaguar]

Try the Coady routine in my signature. It takes 15-20 minutes. When I began them in earnest, I noticed improvement in a week, and after two weeks, I had grown from looking for a mouthpiece to rescue me, to feeling strong on any mouthpiece. And read everything in them carefully.
_________________
1938 Martin Handcraft Imperial #2 bore, 38 bell
Bach 7C mouthpiece

I'm looking for a Connstellation 5C-N or 5B-N mouthpiece
www.jazzscales.org
The Coady Strengthening Exercises: http://coady.coolwarm.com

[JayKosta]

[Lionel]

There are two kinds of beginners,
1. Raw beginners who've never played trumpet before. And,
2. Those making substantially different embouchure changes.

I'm in #2 category due to loss of an incisor. Fortunately things are getting much better. I've had some "Valleys" though. Times when nothing improves. Just this past August I was in a really bad one. But that's just part of the process. I worked myself out and this was a most necessary element of my path to improvement.

Suggestions:

Range is critical! Even a raw beginner should learn to play soft high C's. At the beginning we have a choice: form a flabby, weak, lower register setting OR develop an upper register capable setting.

Because our directors generally don't know any better they push us to develop a fat sound in the beginning BUT THIS IS WRONG! Usually we learn to drop our jaw and play on loose, flabby chops. This is the norn.

Solution?
Don't over-emphasize tone production. At least at first. Surely we have enough lower register trumpets in this world. Instead emphasize 2 and 3 octave arpeggios. That and embouchure and air development. Maynard has his Youtube video where he emphasizes "Stance" and air support. Just search "Maynard 1977, Canadian stage band festival.

He doesnt talk embouchure but he never did.

Questions? P/M me anytime.
_________________
"Check me if I'm wrong Sandy but if I kill all the golfers they're gonna lock me up & throw away the key"!

Carl Spackler (aka Bill Murray, 1980).

[Vin DiBona]

There is some good advice, but some not to good advice, too.
Did any of these so-called teachers ever give you exercises on how to breathe and move air? Doesn't sound like it to me.

Too much pressure is virtually always because of lack of air flow. It is air that makes the sound and when your lips are jammed against the mouthpiece, your sound is garbage, your range is lousy, and you have no endurance.

Being from the Chicago area, I have been fortunate to have been taught since a high school kid that air flow creates everything. My instructor in music school was a Cichowicz student and a long time friend was also a Cichowicz student. Both of them gave me great insight into how to breathe and move your air.

I suggest you find someone who can teach you the great player/pedagogue, Vince Cichowicz's Long Tone Studies. http://studio259productions.com/

Strive to make a beautiful sound - always! If you teach yourself to make a lousy sound, you will be sure to have a lousy sound. That result comes from not moving air and improper breathing.
Good sound comes from moving air. When you play an exercise, make it musical. Sing it in your head the way you want it to sound.

Here are some lesson notes from Bud Herseth as taken by Tim Kent.
http://ojtrumpet.net/herseth/herseth_notes.html

Read them and see what you can gather from this magnificent player about moving your air properly.

Again, it probably is not your embouchure (unless it is truly terrible) but a complete failure to use proper breathing and support.

Good luck to you. You can fix this.

R. Tomasek

[JayKosta]

[JVL]

respiratory muscles must be properly involved for a good "air support" that will avoid too much mpc pressure against the lips.
air pivoting is also needed to avoid it, as does aperture control

[Denny Schreffler]

Mike Sailors has already expressed interest in your situation -- contact him for Skype lessons. I don't know if he has left NYC or if he is commuting to his UT gig in Austin. If he's still in NYC, live lessons would be better for someone as close as Nyack.

Long hours of practicing the wrong way -- not the wrong material, necessarily -- is guaranteed to make things worse.

With what seems like the fundamental training that you've had, eight months with the right teacher should have you an octave above the G-at-the-top-of-the-staff where you're at, and able to hold up for four or five hours a night unless the cupid's bow that you mention presents a formidable anatomical problem.

Trying to mix a few lessons with different teachers with an internet-fed DIY approach is more likely to give you excuses for not making it as a pro than solving your playing problems.

-Denny

[Vin DiBona]

The concept is simple.
When you do not use a complete, full air flow, one uses pressure to make the sound. That only works for so long and range, tone, and endurance disappear.
I suggest anyone who wants to understand this simple concept to find Luis Loubriel's book on Vince Cichowicz, " Back to Basics for Trumpeters, The Teaching of Vincent Cichowicz".
R. Tomasek

[Lionel]

I'm seeing some less than applicable advice here. However it isn't my nature to say "hey "so & so" that's not such a good piece of advice".

I get it that air support and breath control are basic and necessary for sound and range production. And for years I've recommended that a trumpet student ought to study breathing. Particularly as defined in Maynard's video. His stance too is excellent viewing. Getting the whole body into the production of sound. However these ideas are iften if not usually espoused by those whose embouchures already work pretty well.

Yet in this fellow's case he obviously had some kind of embouchure deficiency. We know this because he decided to take a year to learn another chop setting.

Where do you want to start and go with this? Should we define "embouchure problems" as including persons who can't play a high C? Yet there are some kids who can hardly blow a G top of the staff. And on the other extreme I self diagnosed my own embouchure as being deficient in embouchure even though most of my peers were envious of my range. In fact I had a pretty damned good G/High C before radically changing my chops. I'm still somewhere in the middle of that process.

So no. Air support isn't the only factor. It may not even be a primary one in some cases. After all we were born with the ability to breathe. You once actually had to learn how to buzz your lips.
_________________
"Check me if I'm wrong Sandy but if I kill all the golfers they're gonna lock me up & throw away the key"!

Carl Spackler (aka Bill Murray, 1980).

[kalijah]

Air flow is not a substitute for good embouchure habits.

The skill and craft of producing a musical tone is purely an embouchure function. The player then applies the air pressure, by exhalation effort, for the volume of tone required.

Air flow will occur depending on the total resistance of the system.

Anyone who plays efficiently knows that it does not require "full air flow" or "lots of air" to play. To do so would be to play inefficiently, especially for soft tones.

Excessive mouthpiece force is a problem related to embouchure habits. The remedy is correct practice that will encourage correct habits.

Contact me, I can help you.

[Lionel]

[Heim]

If you post a video of you slurring up open notes starting on low C you might get some help.

[Heim]

There isn't much that you can do with an embouchure until the air hits the lips.

[Heim]

If someone practices a lot consistently and they aren't improving it should be obvious that they are doing something incorrectly.

[mike ansberry]

I feel your pain. I just deleted a long paragraph telling about my embouchure struggles. Let's just say that I studied with a lot of top shelf, very fine players WHO NEVER DISCUSSED EMBOUCHURE.

In February I thought I'd give Balanced Embouchure a try. I did the BE exercises but played gigs with the old embouchure. The roll out exercises were no problem. But I could not get the roll in embouchure to vibrate. But I kept after it. In August I started getting a sort of buzz going. By September I was doing the roll in exercises fairly well. My high range started to open up and my endurance increased. Over the next few weeks my usable range increased to a usable Eb and I could play a strenuous 45 minute set with no endurance problems at all. At the gig yesterday I was improvising and ran a lick up to high G. Playing in the high range feels different. It used to take a lot of effort to play in the high range. Now it is easy. It is a totally different feel. I am hopeful that my embouchure problems are over. Only time will tell.

There is no one solution to embouchure that works for every trumpet player. You have to find what works for you. You might want to give Balanced Embouchure a try.
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Music is a fire in your belly, fighting to get out. You'd better put a horn in the way before someone gets hurt.