Does buzzing on your mouthpiece ruin your embouchure

[vd8m9]

Does it? I was told that not making any buzz is how you get the best tone.

[Timmm]

Buzzing on your mouthpiece away from the horn?

[tylerferris1213]

No. Quite to the opposite, actually. Being able to play a song on your mouthpiece BEFORE you put the mouthpiece in the tuba will help greatly. Be sure to practice with a tuner. It is 100% possible to play any piece of literature on just the mouthpiece.

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

1.) The end result is not your "embouchure." The end result is beautiful, powerful music.
2.) Playing the mouthpiece away from the instrument is one of the best things you can do.
3.) If by "buzzing" you mean "double buzzing," refer to number 1.
That is all.

[ppalan]

It has been argued (by more than one person) that "gigantic-bore mouthpipe tubes" have "ruined" some professional players' embouchures. (yet to be determined)

How large a mouthpipe tube is "the earth's atmosphere"?

Buzzing into a tuba mouthpiece (with almost no back pressure) isn't a particularly similar experience to buzzing a tuba mouthpiece inserted in a tuba (or with some artificial back pressure...player's finger/BERP/tape/etc.)

bloke "Do it, or don't do it. You ain't me."

+1
I keep a Kellyberg mouthpiece with BERP attached in my car to buzz a little on the way to a gig. I used to use just a mouthpiece but it felt like trying to blow up a backyard swimming pool by mouth. If I used the "finger on the shank" method, I wound up with spit dripping all over.
Pete

[eupher61]

Only if you buzz on the wrong end. Or use the mouthpiece to get the wrong kind of buzz.

[swillafew]

Vincent Cichowicz was teaching a master class at Bowling Green State University. Several students got up to play, some better, some worse. Each student played a selection, and Mr. C had them remove the mouthpiece and play it mouthpiece alone. The quality of buzzing was corresponded to the quality of play. Shaky playing: poor buzzing. Solid playing: strong buzzing. When returning the mouthpiece to the horn, no matter the ability, each person played noticeably better on the next try. As you can imagine, very little needed to be said about what was going on there. Edward Kleinhammer's "Art of Trombone Playing" devotes a chapter to this kind of practice. http://www.amazon.com/The-Trombone-Play ... 0874870585" target="_blank" target="_blank It's a good read.

[iiipopes]

I think it is a good idea to use buzzing in conjunction with a warmup, or if there is a technical issue with a passage, to try to sing it, then buzz it, then rehearse the fingers without air or buzz, and then put everything together. I would not do extended buzzing as a substitute for a practice session, if for no other reason than the point bloke makes: it just isn't the same, and we always need to be practicing and rehearsing "as if" we are performing.

[Greenbenches]

I put a trumpet mouthpiece into the back of the tuba mouthpiece and it gives a similar resistance to my tuba. The shanks normally fit well in the taper.

[bighonkintuba]

Buzzing with a drone pitch is even better.

That's part of my daily routine, along with recorded major/minor scales (including thirds).

[MackBrass]

The mouthpiece is actually the instrument and the tuba is just an amplifier of what comes out of the mpc. I have always used buzzing along with playing and not to long ago when Rich Serpa and I were playing he suggested using a piece of flexible tubing on the end of the mpc for buzzing. This works very well and I went on to cut three different lengths of the tubing, 4 inches, 12 and one long enough to get the open harmonics in C. Keep in mind when doing this to make sure your not using much pressure on the mpc.

I go by the saying if you cant buzz it you cant play it. This will also force you to develop your ears instead of just pushing down buttons to get the pitch in the ballpark.

Good luck.

[Donn]

Or use the mouthpiece to get the wrong kind of buzz.

Yeah. My theory anyway, is, whereas

• there are many wrong ways to play the tuba
• maybe more than one right way also, but they have in common that they sound good - on the tuba
• buzzing without the tuba, you forego that reality check
• therefore, someone who is not really producing a good sound, might be ill advised to buzz-practice and possibly reinforce bad technique

[eupher61]

I once got stopped by a cop while driving on the highway and buzzing on a mouthpiece. He thought I was getting buzzed, as opposed to buzzing.
Question: how many of those who have been affected by FD were lifetime proponents of buzzing? Or, from another angle, how many longtime buzz proponents have been affected by FD?
My first guess at version 1 is 0... Although one came to it somewhat later in his career, and has recovered somewhat. V.2 leads me to answer 0 also. I could be wrong on either, but I'd like to know. No names please.

[b.williams]

I once got stopped by a cop while driving on the highway and buzzing on a mouthpiece. He thought I was getting buzzed, as opposed to buzzing.
Question: how many of those who have been affected by FD were lifetime proponents of buzzing? Or, from another angle, how many longtime buzz proponents have been affected by FD?
My first guess at version 1 is 0... Although one came to it somewhat later in his career, and has recovered somewhat. V.2 leads me to answer 0 also. I could be wrong on either, but I'd like to know. No names please.

What is FD?

[tusabtuba]

Jeez NO!! Arnold Jacobs often said, "Be a mouthpiece virtuoso." He strongly advocated playing often on the mouthpiece, and working out passages on it.

[Michael Bush]

Jeez NO!! Arnold Jacobs often said, "Be a mouthpiece virtuoso." He strongly advocated playing often on the mouthpiece, and working out passages on it.

Exactly. It certainly didn't ruin *his* embouchure, did it?

[Zaphod Beeblebrox]

Disclaimer: I have never been diagnosed with FD.
Still, some time ago I had about a two-month spot in which I couldn't play. Some days were better than others, but other days I couldn't play a single note. I was really, really concerned that I might have had FD. And then I began playing on my mouthpiece every day, singing vocally, and then putting the mouthpiece into the leadpipe. My symptoms largely abated, and I've been back to normal ever since. I now play the mouthpiece alone alllllll the time. It was weird. I am not saying that this method works for everyone, but it did work for me.

[chronolith]

I studied with Mr. Cichowicz at Northwestern years back. Buzzing was a daily procedure.

I got away from mouthpiece buzzing partially out of laziness but also because for a long time I felt that it was not necessary. For a perfect player, buzzing the mouthpiece is truly meaningless. Turns out I am not perfect though and for a long time I could not figure out what was going wrong.

I spend time buzzing before playing now because I found that with the horn I was not fully engaging my embouchure. I wasn't involving the lower lip very much and I was relying on only enough air needed to get through things. Bad and lazy habits creep in this way. I admit my fault. Buzzing on a mouthpiece does not let you get away with this.

For that reason I also do not advocate stopping up the mouthpiece to buzz, at least at first. The low resistance that the mouthpiece gives forces you to get in there with your embouchure and use all of it that is necessary. It forces you to engage the lower and upper lips evenly. It forces you to use good volumes of air and to practice smart and budgeted breathing. It pronounces the differences in the mechanism for register changes and makes you commit all necessary resources for low register notes to speak and flow. Finally it forces you to listen to yourself and adjust the tuning naturally with just the embouchure and the air.

So in the end, it is not truly necessary if things are all well. For the imperfect player like me though, it is diagnostic in nature. It is the pre-flight check. It gets me into tuba-player mode more quickly than stumbling through Rochut and hoping I am noticing what needs to be worked on. I credit Roger Lewis' spit valve drill also because it accomplishes much of the same thing. Look it up if you are curious.

It's natural to dislike the lack of compression and feedback that you experience with a mouthpiece. I think we get used to the tuba doing some of the work for us though I think it is a bad habit. It's also easy to wander away from just buzzing the mouthpiece simply because it sounds stupid to us. Don't be distracted by this.

Maybe, if you are a seasoned professional with daily extensive practice and performance, you could get away without mouthpiece time. For someone like me though with limited time outside the day job, a little buzzing time will ensure a more efficient and enjoyable experience with horn time.

[eupher61]

Question: how many of those who have been affected by FD were lifetime proponents of buzzing? Or, from another angle, how many longtime buzz proponents have been affected by FD?
My first guess at version 1 is 0... Although one came to it somewhat later in his career, and has recovered somewhat. V.2 leads me to answer 0 also. I could be wrong on either, but I'd like to know. No names please.

As focal dystonia is a neurological issue, I don't see how buzzing on a mouthpiece alone could be a trigger.

"Trigger" is your word, not mine. You make my point in a roundabout way.
My point is exactly the opposite. Brain plasticity... etc.

[swillafew]

Great post above from Chronolith.