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| How did you learn to play high notes? |
| Teacher(s) taught me |
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6% |
[ 4 ] |
| Mostly teacher(s), some experimentation/info gathering on your own |
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7% |
[ 5 ] |
| Mostly experimentation/info gathering on your own, some help from teacher(s) |
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33% |
[ 21 ] |
| Experimentation/info gathering on your own |
|
46% |
[ 29 ] |
| Advice/lessons from high notes specialist |
|
1% |
[ 1 ] |
| Other (specify in comments) |
|
4% |
[ 3 ] |
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| Total Votes : 63 |
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| Author |
Message |
mike ansberry
Heavyweight Member
Joined: 03 Jun 2003
Posts: 1607
Location: Clarksville, Tn
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 Posted: Sat Jan 27, 2024 8:01 am Post subject: |
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I played for decades on an embouchure that looked correct to my teachers, but I was using entirely too much muscle effort. That prevented me from having good endurance and range. I studied with some very good teachers, but never found my way. Then I found Rusty Russell's 19/30s. That lead me to working on an embouchure that did not require so much muscle effort. That helped me some. Then I found BE. It became sort of a continuation of what I got from Rusty. I have found an embouchure that requires WAY less effort to play. It also seems to free my brain to listen more as I play. I am not even close to being a big band lead player, but I can play lead all night in a rock band up to E above high C. Now I am starting to knock out solid F#s and Gs in practice.
_________________
Music is a fire in your belly, fighting to get out. You'd better put a horn in the way before someone gets hurt. |
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Seymor B Fudd
Heavyweight Member
Joined: 17 Oct 2015
Posts: 1474
Location: Sweden
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| Posted: Mon Jan 29, 2024 4:39 am Post subject: |
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Mike!
Amen to that. No teacher until I was well over 70. But able to play lead (swing era scores) as well as front row on a fairly high level - however my seemingly good embouchure collapsed after 40 years... The newfound teacher (he found me..)questioned my use of the entire face when playing. Slowly put on the right track. My previous relative successes might be attributed to being young,vigorous, forceful plus at least a little streak of talent. But when the foundation is weak, sooner or later the superstructure will collapse.
And then I found the BE! Which after hard and dedicated work, immensely &patiently helped by Jeff S has resultated in a rather effortless high register - not good enough for modern big bands though - and a nice and comfortable all-round playing.
And since long a very good endurance. By now 81.
_________________
Cornets: mp 143D3/ DW Ultra 1,5 C
Getzen 300 series
Yamaha YCRD2330II
Yamaha YCR6330II
Getzen Eterna Eb
Trumpets:
Yamaha 6335 RC Schilke 14B
King Super 20 Symphony DB (1970)
Selmer Eb/D trumpet (1974) |
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wiemelen
Veteran Member
Joined: 08 Aug 2007
Posts: 455
Location: Belgium
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| Posted: Sun Apr 07, 2024 12:44 am Post subject: |
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| steve0930 wrote: | Jaw04's post has good pedigree
| Quote: | | To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often |
Winston Churchill
cheers Steve |
From my personal experience, both Jaw04 and Steve/Churchill got it right.
Don't ask my how, but I could play a decent C above staff before I could play a decent C below staff. For some reason from the 1st time I put a mouthpiece against my lips I thought I needed to apply lots of pressure. Took my teacher lots of time to change my embouchure.
Throughout my teens, I could play high by using pressure, but only till about the C and it was pretty fatiguing. No high C at the end of a concert.
Then some years later my windband got a new director. A pro trumpet player who also was a college professor. I'm still greatful to him for teaching me 2 things:
1) You play a wind instrument, don't suck on it, blow air through it. Wind wind wind is the keyword.
2) Get rid of that instrument you play on (a Courtois at the time). Don't adjust your playing to your equipment, but find the equipment that fits you.
He provided me with some instruments to test and I settled on a 2nd hand
Yamaha 6335H which I played for many years to come. Also over time I tried out other mouthpieces. Played Stork for a while, then GR for many years and now Lotus for some years.
Looking back, I still wonder how I could have played that instrument combined with a Bach 1.5 C for so long. Even today, I can't play a Bach 1.5C for more than 15 minutes. Guess it's not a good match for my embouchure and way of playing.
After those equipment changes, I noticed that indeed I could play more easily and had lots more endurance when playing with more air and much less pressure. I also noticed that a mouthpiece with a bigger bore and/or bigger taper suit me better.
Now recently I've also been looking into TCE (tongue controlled embouchure). It's a fine technique and I actually can play even higher with that technique. But on the downside, I can't play F or FF using it and also switching from non TCE to TCE from a certain point ( above staff) is difficult for me. But I think I will keep fumbling with it a bit more. Maybe one day I can get it to work for me decently.
_________________
Trumpet : Yamaha YTR-9335CHS + Yamaha YTR-6335H
Trumpet mouthpieces : Lotus 2L (main) + Lotus 2L2
Flugelhorn : Kanstul 1525 with Curry 1,5FL
Cornet : Conn 80a (1919) with Curry 1,5 BBC + Curry 1,5 VC + GR L66,9 #6 |
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