Air concepts and terminology

[JVL]

Hello everybody !

seen all the topics about the matter, i think we should summarize once for all the things.
First of all, excuse my poor english and the unprecise terms used for i've got more knowledge on physiology, physical preparation, nutrition, than physics.
My goal is to try to summarize for more concrete understanding and application some terminologies and concepts. I then suggest a frame i invite you to give your idea or correct, mostly Kalijah that seems the most specialist among all of us on this matter.
I quote down there one of his posts that according to me gives a lot of good points.


Let's first say that we'll talk mostly about air, knowing that :
- it's not the only factor : embouchure, coordination etc. matter highly, but will not be primarily discussed here
- a lead mpc (shallow cup, tight throat & bb) will allow more air pressure between the lips and the cup, but less air flow than a "legit" mpc (deep cup, large throat & bb), so does a "tight" horn vs an "open" one.

We can also note from 0 (minimal intensity or importance) to 10 (maximal intenisity or importance) all the factors. All being relative.

air volume = air in the lungs
air flow = air passing throu the lips aperture
air pressure = caused by expiratory muscles

pp, low-mid register = low air pressure, low air flow, slow lip vibration frequencies, low air velocity

pp, high register = more air pressure, air flow ?, fast lip vib freq

ff, low-mid reg = more air pressure, more air flow, slow lip vib freq, more air velocity ?

ff, high reg = highest air pressure, important air flow but not max, fast lip vib freq, important air velocity.

Kalijah, maybe you can please note from 0 to 10 the different parameters so we all can see how they adapt according to you, in function of registers and dynamics.

i hope this will be a constructive post, and will not degenerate in the eternal sterile debates.

All the best

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from Kalijah




The speed of the air approaching the aperture DOES NOT MATTER. And does not CAUSE anything.

There are three things:

1. The state of the lip aperture determines pitch.

2. The air pressure before the aperture controls the loudness of sound.

3. Air flow will result, depending on the resistance of the WHOLE system. But you need not know what that is. OR care. (Nor do you kneed to know, or care, what the "speed" of the air is. ANYWHERE.)

That is all, and it is THAT simple.

The air pressure, speed, flow ANYWHERE is NOT what determines the pitch, nor controls it in ANY way.

IF you could place your tongue in ANY position. Or even be absent a tongue, as long as you achieve a playable embouchure you can play the note that the embouchure is set for.

The tongue NATURALY moves forward for intense corner and bottom lip roll-out action due to the natural and physiological functions. Which is food processing, mastication, etc. THAT is why many players find benefit to ALLOWING the tongue to move naturally forward as one ascends. It is all but impossible not to for most lip postures as to ascend.

For players who use strong roll-out and corner action for aperture control,(A majority of players), the tongue action is increasingly required to ascend to very high pitches.

For embouchures that use pronounced roll-in actions, such as Walt-Johnson's high-gear, and John Lynch's altissimo style. A pronounced forward tongue arch is NOT required, even a detriment, for high notes.

Again, the tongue and lip functions are not arbitrary and are designed for specific purposes. Playing a brass instrument is certainly NOT one of them. That is something that humans have mobilized for a creative use. (And a small fraction of humans at that, and most of those poorly without tremendous amounts of practice). It is truly an arrogant and ignorant presumption to think that THE PURPOSE of the lips and tongue, teeth and breath, is to play a modern brass instrument.

If moving the tongue helps when you play the trumpet, THEN DO IT! That is ALL you need to know!

Please stop trying to "explain" pitch with "myths" and layman's junk science about air "speed" etc. that you haven't even measured, and air "explanations" that flies in the face of the KNOWN science of fluid dynamics. (Again, Bernoulli, Poiseuille, etc). That which you haven't even bothered to understand.

Please stop.

(I suppose if we had a video of Bernoulli or Poiseuille playing a double C some of you might be interested in what they had to say. Sad.)
_________________
Darryl Jones

Callicchio 1s2
Benge 3x+ (Burbank)
Yamaha YHF631 Flugelhorn
MP: stock Marcinkiewicz 9 or 10

[HERMOKIWI]

There's dialogue in the musical "Wicked" that goes like this: "Where I come from we believe all sorts of things that aren't true. We call it history." Essentially, if a story is told enough times it can become "true" to a lot of people even if that was never the intent of the story or even if the information is erroneous. Under those circumstances people will often defend the "truth" of the story with unwavering conviction until the end of time. That's the whole objective of propaganda.

A lady is getting ready to bake a ham. She cuts off the ends and puts the ham in a pan. Her daughter is watching and asks, "Mom, why did you cut off the ends?" Her mother replies, "That's the way my mother taught me." The girl then goes to her grandmother, reports what she saw and what her mother told her and asks, "Why did you cut off the ends when you baked a ham?' The grandmother replies, "That's the way my mother taught me." The girl then goes to her great grandmother, reports what she saw and what her mother and grandmother said and asks, "Why did you cut off the ends when you baked a ham?" The great grandmother replies, "I had to cut off the ends because my pan was too small."

A lot of trumpet "knowledge" follows that format. We believe things because we've read or have been told those things by people we respect or by enough people for us to conclude that they have to be true because so many people have said so for so long. We don't require real proof. We just go along.

There are things we do as players and characteristics of our horns that create a genuine benefit in our playing. However, the reason for the benefit might not be what we think the reason is. It could be a reason totally different from what we think it is.

Our "reason" may just be something we've heard for years that we can't really authenticate scientifically, so we want to either ignore the science or override the science with our own "feelings," "experience" or other personal bias. The "personal" approach and the "scientific" approach often conflict significantly. We may even have a tendency to feel threatened by one or the other approach depending on the approach we most value.

Thus, the seemingly never ending debates we see so often here on TH, especially debates about topics such as "fast air," "compressing the air," "air flow," and "pitch control."

The complications of playing the trumpet have more to do with the complexity of the combination of components involved in the system than it does with the basic science. How sounds are made on the trumpet is pretty simple. The complexity is in the quality and range of sounds combined with the fact that there does not seem to be one single universally accepted authority on the mechanics.

The solution is very elusive.

All I will say is this: The more thinking I do when playing the worse off I am. I get the best results when things just happen and I don't have to think about how they happened.
_________________
HERMOKIWI

[cgaiii]

[Richard III]

Aperture size is relative in my style. I can play with a smaller aperture to achieve higher range. Or I can open that aperture and play with more tongue arch to achieve that range. Or I can use a combination of those. Some of this is altered by the mouthpiece and its architecture whether it be cup shape or bore size.
_________________
Richard

King 1130 Flugabone
King 12C mouthpiece

[kalijah]

[HERMOKIWI]

[JVL]

I just intended to make things as clear as possible and useful for everyone, to avoid the same threads, topics and argues that followed recently

If we all can find a consensus on the words to use to describe what's really happening, it'll be constructive and helpful. Rather than multiplicate the same posts and put oil on fire every time. If some of you like this better, keep on doing, i'm not interested in this.

all the best

[BBB1976]

Good grief!

Just reading this I'm confused!!

[kalijah]

I will try to address the OPs points. May take a few posts over some time:

[JVL]

This was what i meant

[kalijah]

Good. So, "tighter" equipment means generally more impedance and therefore more resistance. This does not create more pressure. But it yields less flow.

Remember: pressure is generated ONLY by the lung state plus the exhalation effort.

There are not additional "compression" mechanisms. I know there are some YouTube videos discussing multiple "compressions". ("The three compressions" )

These are not in the least accurate mechanics other than the first "compression" (pressurization), which is lung air pressure.

[Rod Haney]

I think that a good start might be to figure out what tongue arch really does and work from there. Does arch increase air speed ( not my belief) or cause movement in the jaw which helps direct air to the upper register pivot points ( which I do believe).
In hi school I was very close to the best player in a small state and also ran the half mile quite a bit below 2 minutes and thought I might make the olympics, I had all the wind and internal compression anyone could hope for, but even at my best I couldn’t go above hi f. Many years pass and I can’t walk a fast half, but I have more range?? I read everything on web and heard a lot of theories but until I started working on training my emb. to hit the pivots and using the lower jaw to do so did I get the gain. A lesson with Bobby Shew confirmed this as well as ways to build strength for the ff. So maybe the tongue arch does help jaw move but it can also be accomplished without the tongues help which makes articulation a little better. So if you need tongue arch to move the jaw up and out for the hi notes ok, but I would like to understand if the theory is correct. I can see how it could restrict flow, does when I use it, it it can assist in jaw movement, it doesn’t speed air or direct it in a better place on lips that I can see??

Not saying I’m right but my experimentation bears it out

Rod