Tone check please

[Lectron]

well.....even the better player can have some edge to the sound pedaling @ FF,
but there is a difference between a li'll edge and vulgar

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10201221664973683" target="_blank" target="_blank

[Tuboss2]

well.....even the better player can have some edge to the sound pedaling @ FF,
but there is a difference between a li'll edge and vulgar

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10201221664973683" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank

So that an example of vulgar or....

[Lectron]

Good job BTW

[Tuboss2]

I was not trying to troll. No point in doing that. I'm here to receive help.

I do have a question, how can I have a singing high register(notes in the staff-above the staff).

[k001k47]

Dynamic level?

[Tuboss2]

I'm sorry, but is that supposed to mean anything?

[Tuboss2]

https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCc-t0JCe ... ltNmeQ1bTg
Non mobile: https://youtube.com/channel/UCc-t0JCebn ... ltNmeQ1bTg
I think I sound pretty dam* good here. Decided to try a new approach...hopefully its better then the vid in the OP. different song too. You know the questions I usually asks after every vid I upload.

[Lectron]

It is better, but many of the tones changes character during it's length.
You often hit the note outside center and. I assume you are still
playing on your 187?

That is a good instrument and should not sound like a wet fart

I am not able to give many piece of advice without seeing what you do,
but singing the notes in correct pitch, buzzing with and without mouthpiece
and long notes would improve quite a bit......as it do with everyone

Pick a tune for yourselves to practice on...Christmas is coming up soon
Adeste fideles/Come all ya faithful is a nice tune

[Tuboss2]

Yeah. I was thinking that my accuracy wasn't as good as I thought it should be. Do I readdressed it and came up with this:
https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCc-t0JCe ... riBbu6U7gs
And I do warm up with long tones everyday for 10 min.

[Roger Lewis]

You can post things here all day long and get all kinds of responses - BUT - none of us can SEE what you are doing, only make educated guesses as to what we THINK is going on. Personally I think you have an issue with your attack that needs to be addressed, but that's just from hearing recordings. My recommendation is that you get with a really good teacher if you want to get better and let them assist you in developing your sound and technique. My feeling is that you have some fundamental issues with sound production that need to be addressed and perhaps need to be altered to achieve the sound and style that you are trying to attain.

I would examine your attack very closely, your embouchure, your breathing and I think that mouthpiece may be just wrong for you. The Miraphone 187 is one of my favorite horns and usually has a sweet, singing sound. Most of what I listened to had a lot of "garbage" in it at the start of the note (hence my recommendation that you take a long hard look with a professional at what you are doing in your attack) and there are many inconsistencies from note to note and even within one note.

I applaud your determination but firmly believe that you will only make improvement strides with some "in person" assistance from a talented teacher.

I'm just being honest here and not trying to drag you down, but you really need assistance from someone who can examine all the different aspects of what you are doing. It reminds me of that famous quote: "A person who defends himself in court has a fool for a lawyer". Studying with yourself, without knowing what you need to correct, leads to a very long process for getting improvements to occur in your playing.

Worse comes to worst, take an online lesson with Sumner Erickson. He's a fabulous player and even I would like a couple of lessons with him.

This is not meant to discourage you, but to get you to seek professional assistance. That way you can get the most bang for the buck and make better strides in improving.

Just my $0.02.

Roger

[Tuboss2]

https://m.youtube.com/channel/UCc-t0JCe ... lfWAJ0p9RY
Non mobile: https://youtube.com/channel/UCc-t0JCebn ... lfWAJ0p9RY

Here it is guys. A look at my face while I'm playing so y'all can see what I'm doing.
I am playing the same 2 songs as I did in the first post.

And the usual questions....
Improvement?
Dynamic?
Things to work on?

[Roger Lewis]

Okay. Now for my famous question - which lip is doing the work? Is the upper on vibrating against the lower lip or is the lower lip vibrating against the upper lip? When you buzz without the mouthpiece, is the air going up or down? If the air is going upwards, then you DO need someone to help you correct this, IMHO.

Roger

[Untersatz]

Is it possible that his embouchure has suffered some partial damage form all the
"sousaphone wars" style of blasting? I agree with Roger 100% that the attack
is not clean at all & it is causing many of the notes to sound distorted & not speak clearly.
I also agree that taking some lessons from a qualified instructor might be the only way to
get past this & get your tone production headed in the right direction.

[Tuboss2]

The air stream is going straight. In mouthpiece terms the air stream is going straight through the hole of the hole of the mouthpiece. No upward action in it.
And the top lip is found most of the work. Is that bad thing?
And at above post: would taking a day or two off solve any damage done even though I don't feel anything.

[Lectron]

Hmmmmm...._You seem to have all the right answers, but that does not seem to solve the problem with your sound.

Try to listen to understand, not so much listen to reply

[Z-Tuba Dude]

I think that this is a problem with all of the "Tuba Wars" videos on YouTube: It gives young people a horribly distorted idea of what a tuba should sound like.

Without wanting to open that whole can of worms again, a very influential teacher from my youth, once told me "You sound how you want to sound!". By that, he meant that we subconsciously will make the horn sound the way our mind "pictures" that it should sound.

If young people think that the blatty sound they hear produced by sousaphones on YouTube, is the way tubas should sound, then a whole generation of tubists are lost!

My advice is to start listening to better role models of quality tuba sounds. (John Fletcher is a great place to start!)

[Tuboss2]

You guys are right. It's not the ideal sound. It's unpleasant to ears(well most of them) and sounds terrible. It's fun and all to play like that. And I'm most likely going to a black school(HBCU). Where that type of playing is expected for ya. Those guys their selves know that it sounds bad and all, but play like that because its what gets people hyped and all that. I've had lots of Friday tell me to go to black schools like PV and all because I have that loud fat edgy sound that those tubas(and all hbcu) tuba players play with.

I just want to be able to have that rich symphonic sound whenever I want to. I'm aware I gotta develop and all. Lots of practice.

My directors say I sound good when I want to. I just sound bad once I start playing with that infamous HBCU sound. So the trick here I guess is just don't play like that for them...since they see to hate the hell out of it. Even then I natural play loud.

These recordings I've sent to y'all. I honestly think it's just bad sound recording all, the attacks is something I'm going to address. But how it sounds is not much of a problem because when I'm playing I sound really good,(and I have a good perspective of sound). On the recordings it comes out like s---. Could be my iPhone honestly.

[Roger Lewis]

The way I play (and teach) the top lip should be doing the work so that is a good thing. Blowing at the hole in the bottom of the mouthpiece may be one of the contributing factors in your sound. To direct the air straight ahead, requires you to push the lower jaw forward, which takes the jaw out of the (usual) natural position. It also eliminaes most of the color of sound that the mouthpiece can add in.

If you have the traditional overbite, meaning that when you close your jaw in a natural position your upper teeth are in front of your lower teeth, then I recommend trying the get the air stream to go more in a downward direction. This bounces the air and the vibrations off the side of the mouthpiece and should let the mouthpiece add some color to the sound.

Again this is only speculation as I can't hear you play in person, but try shaking things up a bit and see what happens. You may be surprised at the results.

Roger

[Roger Lewis]

As to attack, here is a post of mine from a different thread that may help you straighten things out:

We are going to work with elements of your attack. I always tell my students that when you are working on attack issues and evaluating the attack "syllable" that you whisper when doing so. You do not want to activate the vocal chords as it can become a subconscious issue that turns into a habit that is truly hard to reverse (been there, done that).

The sound you hear is coming from non-energized air (what I call stable air) in the oral cavity and you are actually starting the pressurized air from someplace further back in the mouth or throat. You may actually be "coughing" the attack with the tongue going through the motions, but not actually working as the "valve" or doing anything for the air stream. All this stable air needs to be pushed out of the way to get the energized air from the lungs to the embouchure. It passes through the lips without creating "work" or getting the lips to vibrate so it sounds like a brief hissing noise that is then amplified by the tuba. I believe this is what you are hearing.

The solution is to get the pressurized air up to the front of the oral cavity, behind the tongue where it belongs. Here is how you do that.

Whisper the syllable "hut" (as in Jabba the ...) and HOLD THE "T". The air is now under pressure behind the tongue and you can feel it there. Now go from the held "T" into your whispered attack syllable. I personally prefer TOE myself but you can use whatever suits your playing style.

Practice this away from the horn, slowly: HUT.....TOE, HUT...TOE, etc., always whispering, and then slowly start shortening the time between the HUT and the TOE until the two syllables become one single, simple motion. This will get you used to the feel of the pressurized air being right behind the tongue and have you going right into your attack. Now try it on the mouthpiece for a little while keeping it as one motion now incorporating the buzz into the activity. Then try it on the horn and see if there is a difference.

It should not take very long to get this to work and to see the results from the change.

What you also want to do is to try to figure out where you have been starting the air from to see if there is a possible closing of the throat going on as well. We want to try to eliminate that behavior at the same time we improve the efficiency of the attack so you are going to need to do some self evaluation to figure out what you HAVE been doing so that it does not complicate this small change. When I work on embouchure issues in my own playing, I usually work in a completely dark room, so that there are no distractions and I can pay close attention to what is going on in that part of our instrument that we cannot see.

Best of luck to you.

Roger

[Lectron]

Here's a very crappy recording.
You can still hear it's good sound.
We all know the limitations of an iphone