Actual versus perceived pressure

[Chris Brown]

Hi all

In the paper www.trumpetguild.org/pdf/9805barb.pdf

The lowest recorded level for a player hitting top C is 30 Newton’s. (3 Kilos force)
My trumpets weight is about 2 Kilos (4.4 Lbs) Last night I lay on the couch and let my trumpet rest vertically on my lips. After steadying the trumpet in this vertical position the force acting between my lips and the mouthpiece is about 20 Newton’s (2 Kilos) That’s about two thirds of the lowest recorded level in the attached paper.
I must say that when I play my lips don’t register as intense a feeling of pressure as they do when resting the full weight of my trumpet on them.
Maybe that’s why my range is G just above the staff at present.
I would suggest that experienced players with ranges to top C and above would not experience the same degree of intensity that I do at present, as their embouchure is so well developed after many years of practice.

Chris Brown.
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Yamaha 6335 Mk II Pro trumpet
King 650 Flugel Horn
Yamaha 2330 MkII Cornet
Holton T161 C trumpet

[thesplitmeister]

As usual the answer really is a mix of several different things.
Partly its down to strengthening your chops through years of playing, and then that strength can resist pressure for longer periods or can resist pressure for higher notes. This is something people don't like to talk about becuase we all want to believe that we play with NO pressure and admitting the previous fact would burst our bubble.
Part of it is gaining efficiency of airspeed for high notes and endurance through the many years of practice.
And finally partly its through slowly reducing the pressure we use through the previously mentioned many years of practice.
So... its not all about pressure, its the whole package im afraid

[tanseycg]

I (like many players) have always heard, "you're putting too much pressure..." and am always afraid I am doing so...After reading your post, I immediately weighed my horn (1.1kilos) and laid on the floor to feel how much pressure that felt like and I was quite surprise...it felt like there was more pressure by doing this than playing normally...It has put to rest some of my fears of too much pressure....not that I am going to cram the horn in my face.
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[tpetplyr]

Your horn may way 2 kilos (call it 20 Newtons for easy math). But to get PRESSURE don't forget to divide by the area of contact ==> the mouthpiece rim. This calculation has been done many times before and I don't want to do the research to repeat it. But, I'm sure we can all agree that the area of a mouthpiece rim is significantly less than .1m^2. And an area of .1m^2 would give a pressure from 20 Newtons force to be 200 Newtons/m^2.

And that is why your horn feels so much heavier than the actual pressure you exert. Because it is.

Stuart
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[pelirrojo173]

My teacher is very fond of saying that he loves pressure It just needs to be pressure going into the horn, not into your chops...

[Chris Brown]

Hi Stuart,

From the paper (3rd paragraph) “The research centred on the FORCE they applied to the mouthpiece, which trumpet players usually refer to as MOUTHPIECE PRESSURE”
I thought by saying ‘Intense feeling of pressure’ I may open a Pandora’s Box.
So for yourself and other readers, replace the word pressure with the word force in my original thread topic.
As a qualified Mechanical engineer I know how to determine pressure given force and relevant area values.
My gut feeling would be that an experienced player wouldn’t feel the same intensity as I do when resting the trumpet on the lips as described.
I know this is subjective as it would be difficult to compare individual feelings of intensity.
What I do know is that in my case when I play to my present range limit (G above the staff) I experience a feeling of using much more force than with 2nd space C. In fact I don’t get the feeling of using force when playing 2nd space C. That certainly wasn’t the case a year ago.

Chris Brown.
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'Its never too late to try somthing new'

Yamaha 6335 Mk II Pro trumpet
King 650 Flugel Horn
Yamaha 2330 MkII Cornet
Holton T161 C trumpet

[swthiel]

The last time we went 'round about this, I went back to one of Barbenel's original publications in the peer-reviewed literature. [J. C. Barbenel, P. Kenny and J. B. Davies, "Mouthpiece forces produced while playing the trumpet," Journal of Biomechanics, 21(5) 1988, 417-419.] The force measurements were indeed on the order of 30N. If I recall correctly, Barbenel concluded that managing or tolerating this force was an important element of upper register playing, and that players are not good judges of how much force they are using.

In the case of your experiment, when you rested the horn on your lips, did you also form your embouchure? My current speculation is that one of the roles of the embouchure is to distribute the mouthpiece force over a wider area -- sort of like a buttress. That's just speculation, though, I have no measurements to back that up!
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Steve Thiel

[kalijah]

When we talk of mouthpiece pressure we are usually referring to the force. But the popular verbage is not "mouthpiece force" it is mouthpiece "pressure".

If you lay on your back and rest the weight of the horn on your lips you now have a constant force.

When playing normally we vary the pressure immediately to meet the demand. The peaks of mouthpiece force are during the higher/louder segments and we immediately reduce it upon the note stopping or on a lower / softer note.

That is why it SEEMS there is more force when you rest the full weight of the horn on your face.

Darryl


www.myspace.com/darryljtrumpet

[Chris Brown]

Steve said;

In the case of your experiment, when you rested the horn on your lips, did you also form your embouchure? My current speculation is that one of the roles of the embouchure is to distribute the mouthpiece force over a wider area -- sort of like a buttress. That's just speculation, though, I have no measurements to back that up!

Well Steve I repeated my experiment. However before I started it I weighed my trumpet again using a spring balance @ 1.6 Kilos (dam those bathroom scales)
Which would mean that my lips are supporting about 16 Newton’s.
I lay on my back and played a C below the staff. Then I gradually released my support of the trumpet allowing my lips to support its weight. My lips compressed as before and I lost the note.

Daryl said;

When we talk of mouthpiece pressure we are usually referring to the force. But the popular verbage is not "mouthpiece force" it os mouthpiece pressure".

I agree with you and the paper.

If you lay on your back and rest the weight of the horn on your lips you are now have a constant force.

I agree

When playing normally we vary the pressure immediately to meet the demand. The peaks of mouthpiece force are during the higher/louder segments and we immediately reduce it upon the note stopping or on a lower / softer note.

I agree

That is why it SEEMS there is more force when you rest the full weight of the horn on your face.

Yes good summation.

Chris Brown.
_________________
'Its never too late to try somthing new'

Yamaha 6335 Mk II Pro trumpet
King 650 Flugel Horn
Yamaha 2330 MkII Cornet
Holton T161 C trumpet

[TrpPro]

Gauging the "forces" applied to my lips while playing by comparing to the pressure that is applied to them by the weight of the trumpet, it is clear to me that I seldom exceed the weight of the trumpet, at any volume, to the third and fourth ledger lines. Above G over high C and especially at double C at moderate volumes the pressure exceeds slightly the weight of the trumpet. I play a Yamaha 8335LA.