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I have been counseling a fellow on an informal basis and have had limited success correcting his problem of a pinched, nasal sound. Then I remembered a particularly good discussion from earlier this year or maybe late last year - but now I can't find it. I believe Roger Lewis pitched in at one point, as well as Elephant and maybe Neptune, but in searching through their posts I must have missed it. Anyone else remember this thread? Can you help me track it down?

Was it this one?.....
"The physics dictate that you need to have soft tissue vibrating against other soft tissue. The easiest way to for the correct embrouchure (in my playing) is to do this exercise:

Sit in a chair and focus your vision on a fixed point across the room so that your vision line is parrellel to the floor (assuming that the floor is close to flat). Now, hold your hand out at arm's length with your palm facing towards you and place it approximately 6 inches below your "sight" line. Now, WITHOUT MOVING YOUR HEAD - blow air at your hand. Move your embrochure around until the air is hitting the palm of your hand. Getting the air to the hand by moving your head defeats the value of this exercise so make sure you use the lips to get the air going in the proper direction. Once you have the air hitting the palm of your hand directly, feel how you have your lips set. The way they are at that moment should be the perfect setting for low register playing. Now if you buzz the air to the same point on your hand you will find that it is a slow vibration buzz = low register.

For mid register move the hand 6 more inches down and repeat the process of getting the air to your palm without moving your head. Buzz again and you will find that you have a solid mid register vibration.

For high register playing place the palm of your hand on your chest facing upward and again, without moving your head, blow air at your hand. Once the air is hitting the hand then buzz so that the air from the buzz is hitting the hand as well and you will find that you have a high vibration buzz, perfect for high register playing.

All points in between will garner faster or slower vibration based on the location of the hand and hence the direction of the air stream.

Remember this exercize is to show how the lips need to be formed and the importance that air direction has in helping to set this up.

One of my adult students worked on this and found that another concrete visual aid made it a little easier for him to grasp. Hold a mouthpiece up so that, if you are facing West, the mouthpiece is facing North to South. Point to the area on the outside of the mouthpiece just below the throat of the mouthpiece, at the bottom of the cup, and this is where you will blow air for low register (when the mouthpiece is on your embrouchhure, of course). Point at the side of the bowl of the mouthpiece and this is where you blow air for mid register. Point at the section at the top of the bowl, just under the rim and this is where you blow air for high register.

It's that simple. Remember - babies and monkeys can buzz their lips - what we're doing is NOT rocket science and it isn't hard!

Just my observations."

Roger

Excellent advice, Roger, and something I plan to try in my teaching, but I'm not sure this is the one I was thinking of. Anyone else remember?

Then let's start from scratch.

In my experience I have found that a severe nasal quality of sound is usually attributable to one of two things (occasionally both).... jaw too closed or buzzing the wrong lip. I usually find that it is the buzzing of the lower lip instead of the upper one to be the culprit. To test this you really need a visualizer so that you can track the player’s air stream direction. If, when buzzing through the visualizer, the air stream is going up, then the lower lip is the one that is buzzing or doing the work.

Try it yourself and see if you can replicate the students sound and it will give you a clearer idea of all the factors involved in getting this kind of sound. I also often find other things in conjunction with the buzzing of the lower lip further complicating things such as: back of the tongue too high; jaw too closed; weak air stream and too much strength being applied to the muscles of the embouchure. I'm sure there are others but these are the ones I have personal experience with.

If the player has a fairly normal jaw set-up where the upper teeth are ahead of the lower teeth (over bite vs under bite) then the natural tendency of the air stream should be downwards. If the student has an under bite, then it might be more natural for them to play with up-stream air and other habits need to be installed to make this better. However, I have little experience with under bite embouchures so I will not have good solutions for you on this.

If you find (and I think you will) that the air stream is going upwards rather than down, then you have isolated the problem. Now the challenge is to get the player to try to blow air at the bottom side of the mouthpiece and then try buzzing with the air going towards the bottom side of the mouthpiece. You may want to move the mouthpiece up on the embouchure to trap the lower lip and in turn forcing the upper lip to do the work. When the player gets it right you should hear a remarkable change in the sound.

Another exercise that the player can practice is to hold your left hand out in front of you, about 6 inches below the mouth, and without moving the head but by focusing the air stream, have them blow air at their hand. Next, have them buzz the air at the hand – make sure they can feel it and that they are not moving their head around to hit the “target” but focusing the lips to do so. Then alternate between buzzing the air at the hand without the mouthpiece, then with the mouthpiece, then again without the mouthpiece, etc., etc. Or use the visualizer.

This should help and the change will take about 30 days to be incorporated into the players “physical vocabulary”. I have had one student who pretty well mastered the change over night, so it’s not hard but it really helps to understand what you are trying to accomplish and the physical things that need to happen to get the change to settle in.

I hope this helps.

Peace.
Roger

Some things we all need to remember - the horn makes no sound of its own. It's empty, hollow and does nothing until you do something to it. When we have a sound issue, it is time to get away from the horn and back to the mouthpiece where we can manipulate the fundamental process to get the best sound out of the human body – where the sound truly lives.

Working with the mouthpiece and a visualizer should uncover the issues with the sound fairly quickly if you listen carefully. You need to pay attention to the very small things that you hear as these will be amplified along with everything else by the tuba and be present in the sound, possibly detracting from what you are trying to do.

Yes, individual physiology does have an impact on a person's sound, but these can be worked through. Mr. Jacobs was disappointed to see that I still had my tonsils, but said "Oh well, we'll deal with that." and we went on from there. The size of the tongue will also impede air flow and resonance, but can be worked around.

The oral cavity is a resonating chamber. The bigger it is, the more resonance is added to the sound by the addition of this extra resonance that isn’t in the horn. The lungs become a resonating chamber as well and contribute to the color and resonance in the sound coming out the bell of the horn.

Anything that impedes the resonance that can be produced by the body will also have an effect on what comes out of the bell.

I hope this helps.

Peace.
Roger

Roger's teaching method is identical to that of my college tuba teacher (he was a trombonist). I did then and still do, have a pinched sound. It is directly attributable to the fact that I have absolutely no muscular control over my bottom lip (nerve damage). In order to help correct this, I have been trying mouthpieces (I now have 7!) of varying rim/bowl/bore/lip. The one I used in college (at that time it was called a Schilke 66, but that is now a 62), seemed to work a bit better for me, but no longer. I really am out of ideas. Any comments?

jmerring wrote:I really am out of ideas. Any comments?

Take what you hear here with a grain of salt. What Roger Lewis says, as well as some other established posters, is GREAT stuff... however, it is no replacement for one on one consultation.

I say contact Dave Wilken. Wilken is an embouchure specialist/guru. He is very good with embouchure diagnosis, problems with the musculature/nerves, and a great all around musician. Wilken is a professor at UNC-Asheville. Wilken and Doug Elliot (yes, that one) are VERY educated and can provide help to almost anyone with embouchure difficulties or inefficiency.

Great stuff, Roger. My own approach tends to follow the vertical "innerspace" path (hot potato on the tongue, "toh" syllables, etc.) more than the airflow direction path. My method doesn't always seem to get it done. I'll use both from now on, thanks again!

FWIW, another tool I kind of insist on is for the student to record his/her practice and play it back right away and often, to compare with his/her ideal concept.

That said, when you have a physical disability that limits feedback from your own body - jeez, that is a tough road. I doubt whether I'd have the guts to take that one on.

I'm going to throw my 2 cents in on this one - not because I disagree with ANY of what Roger said, but several years ago I encountered a student who gave me another perspective on this.

When the student auditioned for entry into the school, I wasn't there (we hold auditions in Chicago and only a small group get to go), so when the student started playing in his first lesson I was in shock for a good 10 minutes, trying to imagine why the audition committee had admitted him. I had never heard such a nasal sound! We spent most of the lesson, and the next several weeks, just trying to open things up (pretty much trying everything Roger has already mentioned). I had him walking around with a breathing tube, using the bag, buzzing, blowing, and no matter what, every lesson it was the same thing. Finally, I had to tell the student that he was making no progress in developing his tone and that I was greatly concerned that he would be asked to leave the school after his first jury (believe me, this hurt me too!).

I will never forget what happened next. He said something like "gee, Mr. Solomonson, I've tried everything you suggested and I practice all of those exercises every day, so I don't see why you think I haven't improved!"

It hit me like a ton of bricks. It wasn't WHAT the student had said as much as HOW he said it! His voice was incredibly nasal too! I asked him if he'd ever done any singing (which is what I should have asked him the day we met...) and of course he had not. I called one of my colleagues from the vocal area and asked if he could give him a mini-lesson and give me his opinion, and after a few minutes he came back with "he's got uvular nasality". The vocalist recommended that he take voice lessons for the rest of the semester, and I concurred.

I wish I could say that the student diligently took his voice lessons, did some singing, and was successful - but he wasn't. He balked at taking voice lessons - thought it was a waste of time - and sure enough, he was gone at the end of the year.
HOWEVER, not too long after that, another student auditioned with an incredibly nasal tone. This time I was prepared, and since he had good technique I counseled him on taking voice lessons right at the beginning of the semester to compliment his tuba lessons, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Of course I could have saved a bunch of bandwidth by simply pointing out what a wonderful singer Mr. Bell was... or referred to "Song and Wind" - but I thought the story would pack some weight, too. In something akin to what Roger said, "If you can't sing it, the horn can't sing it for you."

terry solomonson

Yup. I do a lot of singing and vocal directing myself so I grok that. Thanks for the story and the validation.