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Air escaping my embouchure



 
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callum_blows
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2018 1:39 am    Post subject: Air escaping my embouchure Reply with quote

So I’ve always struggled with endurance which made it very difficult to practice everything I need to for my university ensembles and other performance based subjects. I’m going into my 4th year at university now and decided to try and fix this over my summer break. I’ve started playing with very little pressure and using more air instead. It’s really helped with my endurance but I have noticed that a lot of air is escaping my embouchure. It’s almost impossible to stop and I feel like I’m doing everything i can to keep my corners tight but there’s still so much air escaping and going in all directions. Any suggestions would be great because it’s extremely frustrating.
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1jazzyalex
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2018 1:44 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Do you have crooked or fang-y teeth? I've played flute in the past and it's funny, I'd have a main jet of air blowing across the hole in the mouthpiece, and a little side-jet thanks to my right canine tooth which is kind of fang-y.
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callum_blows
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2018 1:53 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

My teeth are quite crooked and weird I had braces when I was younger to fix my underbite but my teeth are still quite crooked and small
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Richard III
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2018 6:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

http://www.johndanieltrumpet.com/
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Rod Haney
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2018 7:45 am    Post subject: Re: Air escaping my embouchure Reply with quote

callum_blows wrote:
So I’ve always struggled with endurance which made it very difficult to practice everything I need to for my university ensembles and other performance based subjects. I’m going into my 4th year at university now and decided to try and fix this over my summer break. I’ve started playing with very little pressure and using more air instead. It’s really helped with my endurance but I have noticed that a lot of air is escaping my embouchure. It’s almost impossible to stop and I feel like I’m doing everything i can to keep my corners tight but there’s still so much air escaping and going in all directions. Any suggestions would be great because it’s extremely frustrating.


When you play, where do you feel the corners you are describing? Toward the outer portion of your lips or much closer to your mouthpiece, feeling closer to your teeth? Do you make an effort to smile or frown?

I ask because I had both an endurance issue and air leakage above 2nd line a at any real volume. I have come to realize that for me the corners aren’t in the lips but surrounding the mouthpiece toward the eyeteeth and I started to find a lot of things improved. It helped me to quit trying to move the lips under the mouthpiece, and let me understand how tongue level and airspeed and the muscles surrounding the mp do everything and the area under the map should just vibrate. I’m just seeing improvement and surely dont have all this down, but learning and feeling that the red flesh does nothing but vibrate (when done right 😆) was key for me. Both endurance and most of all leakage is improving steadily now that I’m practicing right. Hope this helps your issue as it did mine.
Rod
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1jazzyalex
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2018 6:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I've seen this written about elsewhere; that your "corners" are where your eyeteeth are, not the actual corners of your lips.
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dstdenis
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 15, 2018 8:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

When I hear "always struggle with endurance," "air leaking," and "difficult to practice everything," I wonder if maybe you tend to push yourself really hard without enough rest and recovery. That would tend to keep you on the edge of exhaustion, and that would account for these symptoms.

Try changing some things around so you feel fresher and stronger. Maybe rest more frequently and for longer intervals while practicing. Maybe shorter practice sessions. Maybe rest longer between practice sessions.
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callum_blows
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2018 3:15 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wow, I’ve been practicing today and I cannot believe how much rods advice has helped. It seems like this was my exact problem. I started doing some carmine caruse excercises and noticed that the air was leaking closer to the mouthpiece than the actual corners. I’m seeing so much improvement already in one day, thank you so much 🙏🏻 It’s actually also taken a bit of the air out of my sound already which is a problem I’ve had for over 2 years

Dstdenis, I do over practice and it’s actually something my teachers always tell me to stop doing( I guess I just lose track of time)

With rods advice I’ve been doing 10 minutes on 5 minutes off though because the muscles in my face seem to fatigue and then air starts to escape but after a 5 minute break I can play again without any air leakage(unless I’m playing high notes which I’m not too worried about for now)

Thanks so much for everyone’s advice. I really think this will help a lot
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dstdenis
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2018 4:09 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

callum_blows wrote:
Dstdenis, I do over practice and it’s actually something my teachers always tell me to stop doing( I guess I just lose track of time)

I know what you mean. I have to keep an analog clock with a sweep-second hand in my practice room so I can force myself to stop playing for awhile. ("Ok, now I'll rest for 60 seconds...") Otherwise I'd keep playing until I was too pooped to continue, before finishing what I'd planned. I also use it to break up my practice into sections so I can force myself to STOP! playing one section, rest, then start the next one.

Anyway, glad to hear you're doing better. Good luck.
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Andy Del
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2018 1:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

callum_blows wrote:


Dstdenis, I do over practice and it’s actually something my teachers always tell me to stop doing( I guess I just lose track of time)

With rods advice I’ve been doing 10 minutes on 5 minutes off though because the muscles in my face seem to fatigue and then air starts to escape but after a 5 minute break I can play again without any air leakage(unless I’m playing high notes which I’m not too worried about for now)

Thanks so much for everyone’s advice. I really think this will help a lot


That is good news. Once you have started to get more comfortable with playing / rest in your practice, you should probably start to investigate 'thoughtful practice'.

Clearly, despite advice you were not thinking through what you were doing, and got less than optimal results. Thoughtful practice involves not only how long you practice and rest for, but also what you work on, the order, why you work on particular things, and what your goal is for that session.

Sounds complex, but it is really simple. Talk to your trumpet teacher about it.

cheers

Andy
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roynj
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2018 3:01 pm    Post subject: Re: Air escaping my embouchure Reply with quote

callum_blows wrote:
So I’ve always struggled with endurance which made it very difficult to practice everything I need to for my university ensembles and other performance based subjects. I’m going into my 4th year at university now and decided to try and fix this over my summer break. I’ve started playing with very little pressure and using more air instead. It’s really helped with my endurance but I have noticed that a lot of air is escaping my embouchure. It’s almost impossible to stop and I feel like I’m doing everything i can to keep my corners tight but there’s still so much air escaping and going in all directions. Any suggestions would be great because it’s extremely frustrating.


I would suggest even more rest periods when you practice. For example, when play an etude, try resting right after for the same amount of time (so for a 30 second etude, rest right afterword for 30 seconds). Playing for 10 minutes full out, and then resting 5 minutes, while somewhat of an improvement, is not really enough rest for your chops in my opinion. Experiment and see what is right for you. This is a common problem -- lack of adequate rest in the practice session. There's the old adage, rest as much as you play. Good luck.
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Rod Haney
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PostPosted: Fri Feb 16, 2018 3:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

callum_blows wrote:
Wow, I’ve been practicing today and I cannot believe how much rods advice has helped. It seems like this was my exact problem. I started doing some carmine caruse excercises and noticed that the air was leaking closer to the mouthpiece than the actual corners. I’m seeing so much improvement already in one day, thank you so much 🙏🏻 It’s actually also taken a bit of the air out of my sound already which is a problem I’ve had for over 2 years

Dstdenis, I do over practice and it’s actually something my teachers always tell me to stop doing( I guess I just lose track of time)

With rods advice I’ve been doing 10 minutes on 5 minutes off though because the muscles in my face seem to fatigue and then air starts to escape but after a 5 minute break I can play again without any air leakage(unless I’m playing high notes which I’m not too worried about for now)

Thanks so much for everyone’s advice. I really think this will help a lot


Thanks, just an educated guess. Glad it helps. If you feel benefit from this you should look at 2 things that helped me to find it. I was using Mystery to Mastery ( look on utube ) and picking up quite a few ways to "feel" some things that were described to me 47 years ago in shhool, and in the last few years when I started playing again , in greater detail on the Internet. The key to really getting the feel for the corners and how the breath, tongue and corners work together was a post in fundamentals called 19/30 exercises. Doing this exercise showed me what it felt like to just let the lip under the mouthpiece vibrate without an effort to control it. The concept of free vibration had eluded me until I found this exercise and blindly did it without questioning any part of it. This was over a month ago and I haven't gained much in range but the notes I have are big and strong. For me once I tried to quit controlling the lip and started using the tongue and air to play I felt like I was finally ready to progress as a player. I still have to drill my tongue and air to respond correctly and I get a feeling that the tongue and air are training and strengthening my corners. I'm starting to get some systematic coordination that I think is what people call the knack. I really feel like the only thing limiting range is how hard I work at coordinating and building. Once the 19/30's sunk in the mystery to mastery started building on it. Also Lex recommended a Schlossberg workout in an earlier post that's doing wonders for endurance.

My experience is that many good working players never find this out and it seems to be to be well worth finding.
Rod
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Shark01
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 22, 2018 10:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I started a comeback with a 3C. After a couple of years, and multiple dental procedures, I too developed this air escape issue. I went back to the 5A I used in HS 40+ years ago, and the problem went away.
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