Upstream or Downstream?

[imperialbari]

This is impossible to give good answers to without having heard and seen you playing. So I will reply from general experience.

My ideal embouchore is centered (like in straight under the nose) with much more upper lip than lower lip. With a horn rim, which I use for horn, trumpet, cornet, and flugelhorn on threaded mouthpieces), I use the inset style of embouchure. That is: the narrow rim sits in the red of the lower lip. This approach is not possible with larger mouthpieces with wider rims, but I try to get as close as I can.

I also find that ones embouchure shall feel natural to one self. As a teacher, though, I have corrected, when especially one trumpet student slid his embouchure to the right, because he was too lazy to hold the trumpet in the correct position.

I will not encourage a change of embouchure for you. But if you want to give the downstreams embouchure a test, then this test has to be fair.

I would consider a radical shift of embouchure like restarting after a long break with no playing. Nobody should expect to play perfectly right after such break. How much time is needed is individual for each player. But you have to give that test a fair period to work (or fail).

You also have to consider that your airstream has to adapt to the new embouchure. Positions of lower jaw and of tongue have to adapt to the new approach to the mouthpiece.

Klaus

[timothy42b]

Are you an upstream player throughout your range?

Or a downstream player that changes to upstream for part of it?

Upstream isn't inferior. There are lots of successful upstream players. Changing back and forth is likely to confuse you though, at least that's what trombonists think.

You should probably figure out what you really are, and stick with it. You may need to consult a pro on this one. One of the forum members (Doug Elliot) is a specialist in this area.

[Donn]

Agreeing with the previous replies - this is the last thing anyone could give a generic rule for. There are indeed people who believe that more or less everyone should play the same particular way, but when we start talking about upstream or downstream embouchures, we implicitly recognize that we're different, so that standard prescribed way to play is out the window.

[Lectron]

Can you buzz how you play?
Sounds like a stupid question but many will have to rely on the horns resistance/resonance to start the buzz making lipping/intonation more tricky.
I find using the same parallel (straight through) embouchure for buzz/MPC/tuba, except for extremes low/high.

Also remember that what you hear from your buzz/scull-resonance/under-bell is completely different to what you project.

[timothy42b]

As a teacher, though, I have corrected, when especially one trumpet student slid his embouchure to the right, because he was too lazy to hold the trumpet in the correct position.

Klaus

Might want to check out Chris Botti, a trumpet player with an extreme off center setting who seems to do okay with it.

Nobody's tooth structure is 100% symmetrical and I think most of us play a bit right or left of center.

I'm not sure lazy is the best description.

[Michael Bush]

There are teachers in the lineage of Bill Bell who teach a gradual "pivot" from a downstream set in the high register to an upstream set down low.

[timothy42b]

There are teachers in the lineage of Bill Bell who teach a gradual "pivot" from a downstream set in the high register to an upstream set down low.

Thanks, I didn't know that.

Does it work?

[windshieldbug]

There are teachers in the lineage of Bill Bell who teach a gradual "pivot" from a downstream set in the high register to an upstream set down low.

Thanks, I didn't know that.

Does it work?

Did for me.

[Eflatdoubler]

No two players are the same and there are great examples of both upstream and downstream players and those that play more center. Although a majority of players fall into the downstream category, don't force yourself into this if you aren't meant to be in it. Otherwise there still might be some nuns out there who can rap you on the knuckles with a ruler and force you to be right handed even if you are supposed to be left handed and I suppose the same can be true with embouchures.
Doug Elliott is a great resource in this department, both in identifying what type of player you may be and also for his understanding of the pivot system.

[imperialbari]

That trumpet student had a well functioning centered embouchure, but out of laziness didn’t want to keep a productive body posture. Laziness is the right word.

Denis Wick in the first edition of his book warned about starting students too early on the slide trombone, because their attempts to reachs for the longer positions tended to offset their embouchures to the right.

Offset embouchures are right for a very few players.

Embouchures going offset for the wrong reasons should be avoided.

Klaus

[imperialbari]

There are teachers in the lineage of Bill Bell who teach a gradual "pivot" from a downstream set in the high register to an upstream set down low.

The effective results of this approach comes close to the one of some top teachers, which want the angle between face and mouthpiece kept steady for faster mobility between ranges. They teach the directional movements to be done by tongue positioning and by placement of the lower jaw.

I cannot speak for upstream players, but I tend to doubt that any player really applies as well upstream as downstream depending on the range played.

Playing the very lowest range isn’t achieved by changing from downstream to upstream or vice versa. The lowest range is achieved by playing straight through the mouthpiece.

I have seen tuba players looking like they blew their airstream closer to their noses on low notes, but then they also bent their heads forwards, so that the airstream really went straight through the mouthpiece. In my opinion an inefficient approach, as they could have kept their normal head positions and have lowered their jaws without protruding them as extremely as they did.

Klaus

[happyroman]

Arnold Jacobs allowed a lot of variability in how his students embouchures "looked" and had them focus on generating a great sound throughout all registers. If you can create a great sound, your embouchure will be functioning in a manner that works best for your personal physiology. We all have different shaped mouths, teeth, lips, and tongues, so what works well for one player will be problematic for another. Also, Mr. Jacobs believed that a younger player must go through the normal stages of development and should not try to make their embouchure look like that of a mature professional. The professional has developed their embouchure through years of practice and the student has simply not had enough time to develop the musculature in a similar manner.

But the main point that Mr. Jacobs would make is that the muscles of the lips are extremely complex, and we will never know what we are doing when we play. We cannot create a great sound by trying to control the muscles. However, if we focus on the end product, a great sound, the muscles will develop and will perform the necessary functions required for us to sound great.

Mr. Jacobs did describe what we should do in very general terms. Primarily, Jacobs wanted his students to have a long embouchure (i.e., a long lateral area of lip surface that vibrates). Based on the diameter of the mouthpiece you play, the longest embouchure is possible when the mouthpiece is placed so that the opening between the lips is approximately half way from the top to the bottom of the cup (as seen when looking directly into the cup). He referred to this as playing near the "equator", as opposed to playing close to one of the "poles." Some people think of this as having a 50-50 ratio of upper to lower lip inside the rim.

This does not mean that the mouthpiece should not shift positions when we play. There is the famous story where his teacher at Curtis showed him how he was able to play the high G in Benvenuto Cellini by shifting his embouchure down toward the bottom of the cup (effectively shortening the embouchure so it could vibrate faster). Jacobs made a similar shift and found that he not only could play the high G, but the G an octave above it.

The bottom line is that you should allow the mouthpiece and lips to do what they want to do on order to sound great. Start in the middle register and develop excellence there, and then transfer that excellence to the extremes.

One note to be aware of. Mr. Jacobs felt that how you play on the mouthpiece alone, when you are generating a good sounding buzz, is YOUR correct embouchure. He felt that if what you are doing on the tuba, in terms of mouthpiece placement, is different than what you are doing on the mouthpiece alone, then what you are doing on the tuba is wrong.

Mr. Jacobs assigned several specific etudes to his students that he believed were beneficial in the development of a well functioning embouchure. He liked Arban #98-102 on pp. 179-180 of the trumpet book as well as the etude in 6/8 in the Hal Leonard book (in D major). This etude is a Kopprasch study and is in E major in that book. He also assigned another arpeggio study from Arban, page 55, No. 68 in the trumpet book. These exercises were to be played on the mouthpiece as well as on the tube, going back and forth between the two in short segments. In general, any arpeggio study in the middle register is excellent for development of a functional embouchure. Finally, the half note exercises in the Arban Studies on the Slur section (page 40 in the trumpet book) are excellent for embouchure and tone development. In particular, No. 11 and 12 on page 40 are great for this.

[timothy42b]

I have seen tuba players looking like they blew their airstream closer to their noses on low notes, but then they also bent their heads forwards, so that the airstream really went straight through the mouthpiece. In my opinion an inefficient approach, as they could have kept their normal head positions and have lowered their jaws without protruding them as extremely as they did.

Klaus

I've seen similar. Here's my take on that, I don't claim to be an expert.

Most of us play downstream or upstream throughout our entire range.

We make small adjustments as we traverse different areas of range. These are horn angle and maybe the mouthpiece moving relative to the teeth but not the lips, and can be so small in skilled players they are hard to detect, or they can be large (I'm thinking of a video one of the forum members posted.)

Trumpet and trombone players can adjust the instrument with their left hand, and if you look closely you'll see that happening. Tuba and French horn players are more locked into instrument position, and you'll see their head moving.

[timothy42b]

If Jacobs really wanted everybody to place the mouthpiece 50/50, then he was wrong.

Of course with a large mouthpiece and a short upper lip the nose may get in the way of a higher placement.

[Donn]

I would agree, though I'm an authority in any degree. But while reading these accounts of how different players manage with respect to placement, it seems to me there may be a trend: whichever way you roll, the eccentric placement applies more to the upper range, and the lower range tends to, as Klaus put it, blow straight through. I.e., 50/50. Maybe he thought of that as a sort of base position.

[timothy42b]

If Jacobs really wanted everybody to place the mouthpiece 50/50, then he was wrong.

That's not what was said.

[quote)He referred to this as playing near the "equator", as opposed to playing close to one of the "poles." Some people think of this as having a 50-50 ratio of upper to lower lip inside the rim.[/quote]

Maybe you had to know the context. It's hard for me to believe as experienced a teacher as Jacob would really recommend one size fits all. Still...

[timothy42b]

it seems to me there may be a trend: whichever way you roll, the eccentric placement applies more to the upper range, and the lower range tends to, as Klaus put it, blow straight through. I.e., 50/50. Maybe he thought of that as a sort of base position.

If you're on an instrument where efficient high range is important, then I wouldn't think of that placement as eccentric, but normal. You can pull a high range setting down, but the reverse is rarely true.

Jacobs and his teacher were apparently able to move between two different settings: the efficient high one and the one they used in less demanding music, presumably with advantages of its own. Lesser mortals like me can't do that without getting the chops confused. Either we learn to pull the high one down, or we specialize in low parts and largely avoid high range. As a trombone player I opt for the first, but maybe if I played more tuba I'd have gone the other direction.

[Donn]

eccentric adjective ... 2 (of a thing) not placed centrally or not having its axis or other part placed centrally.

[Donn]

It's hard to interpret it any other way.

[GC]

removed