Embouchure Efficiency

[TinyTubist97]

I know what many of the symptoms of an inefficient embouchure are, but I'm having trouble trying to figure out how to get more efficiency. It would help me if I knew the differences between an inefficient and an efficient embouchure and the physical characteristics causing inefficiency. Also, does anyone know where I could get some recordings of Arnold Jacobs on a mouthpiece or buzzing rim?

[we3kings]

You might want to look through Roger Rocco's blog for some insights with fixing your problem.

http://www.rogerrocco.com/


If I remember correctly, the Legacy of an Artist has a 5 sec clip of Arnold Jacobs buzzing on a mouthpiece during a monologue. You can going through the Arnold Jacobs Almost Live video clips on http://www.windsongpress.com and you might find something there. It's been a while since I've gone through them.

[fairweathertuba]

Youtube is your friend! We are lucky that there are many hundreds of clips on youtube of professional orchestras doing their thing. Look through several videos and watch the brass players, how they position the mouthpiece to the lips, how they form the embouchure, how they breathe.

I have noticed that many of the brass players (don't look at horn players too much as they are more inconsistent) are doing pretty much the same thing. Mouthpiece position a little more to the upper lip, corners of the lips firm and either forming a slight frown or fairly neutral in position, hardly ever will you see the corners going up very much. The jaw will drop very slightly for the lower register and will come up just a little for the higher registers.

There are of course slight variations but for the most part there are quite a few similarities, enough to give one a rough guide in starting and to help you avoid detrimental habits like smiling too much while playing or stretching the lips too thin or pushing the MP too hard against the face.

A good practice regimen of warming up with long tones, starting out softly with crescendo and decrescendo on each tends to help me get a good efficient embouchure buzz going.

[Donn]

Look through several videos and watch the brass players, how they position the mouthpiece to the lips, how they form the embouchure, how they breathe.

And then do it the way that works for you, since your face is not the same as everyone else's. I mean, not to encourage bad habits or anything, but I'd be far better off today if I hadn't early on believed that copying the guy in the photographs was the way to get better on the tuba.

It sounds like the O.P. is approaching this in a fairly analytical way, though, which is good.

[fairweathertuba]

Look through several videos and watch the brass players, how they position the mouthpiece to the lips, how they form the embouchure, how they breathe.

And then do it the way that works for you, since your face is not the same as everyone else's. I mean, not to encourage bad habits or anything, but I'd be far better off today if I hadn't early on believed that copying the guy in the photographs was the way to get better on the tuba.

It sounds like the O.P. is approaching this in a fairly analytical way, though, which is good.

I agree, as I think I did mention that watching what professionals do could be a rough guide, a place to get started. One should not try to copy exactly what another person is doing as the muscles and bone structure are a little different from person to person.

[Ken Herrick]

I know what many of the symptoms of an inefficient embouchure are, but I'm having trouble trying to figure out how to get more efficiency. It would help me if I knew the differences between an inefficient and an efficient embouchure and the physical characteristics causing inefficiency. Also, does anyone know where I could get some recordings of Arnold Jacobs on a mouthpiece or buzzing rim?

Dear Tiny,

I have just read through the replies to this post and your earlier one enquiring about what tuba you should have. I don't normally get too involved in this sort of discussions here as ten minutes actually seeing and hearing you play would be a much better way to find solutions to your dilemmas than hours of reading and replying to such posts. Often there is some good advice offered along with, all too commonly, a lot of nonsense.

Let me start with one bit of a reply which was rather useless. A respondent said your teacher "had taken from Arnold Jacobs." Frankly that doesn't mean a thing. A LOT of people have "taken" from Jake and often that means they attended a masterclass or had one or two lessons just so they could say they had "taken" from him. I personally know some people who went to several lessons with Jake but, who really "took" very little from him - they just did not learn what was on offer.

Getting the various books and cds and studying things on Utube and the fine material Brian F has available on his Windsong Press web site and Roger Rocco's site and all are fine .....to a point. HOWEVER, it is quite possible that if that is the way you approach learning to make good music by playing tuba you will fall into that great bottomless pit Jake called paralysis by analysis.

Summer is fast approaching and that can be THE time of year to make real progress as without the time devoted to other school studies more time can be devoted to practice. People say "practice makes perfect" but that ain't necessarily so. Only PERFECT PRACTICE makes perfect! The way to get practicing perfectly is to find a place where you can concentrate on playing under the guidance of a truly fine teacher. There are several programs of a couple weeks or more with such teachers held over the summer period - some are listed here under auditions and upcoming events.

Attending one of those intense study camps would probably be about the best thing you could ever do to get you playing improving. Don't worry about having the RIGHT tuba right now. Get the right instruction and get doing the right practice.

I will caution you that 3L is not much of a vital capacity for a tubist. (Yes, I realise you are still growing.) Yes, that is all Jake had late in his career but, by his own admission, he cheated a lot!
Along with your tuba studies, we should think MUSIC studies, learning piano and SINGING would be very beneficial. The fact that Jake studied singing extensively played a big part in his development as a musician who happened to play tuba.

Good luck.

Ken

[eupher61]

Song and wind. Have you heard yourself play? Do you record yourself regularly? Do you listen to what you play?

Have you seen yourself play? Have you looked in a mirror while you're playing? Do you have a lot of movement in your face which might be affecting otherwise good tone production?

Have you ever seen your lips? Do you have a mouthpiece visualizer?

All those are ways to identify efficiency. The ultimate decider, though, is the first: Song and Wind. Does it sound good? There are people who play tuba, and many other instruments, who, according to all the "rules" should be horrible. It ain't necessarily so.

[fairweathertuba]

Imitate great sounds made by great players. As your imitations become more convincing, very likely you'll be changing the right things. The physiological differences between "OK" and "amazing" really aren't that evident.

Didn't Harold Hill teach this method?

OK, I can understand where you are coming from, but I do believe that most of the time people need more direct instruction; at least they need direct instruction until they are more of an advanced player. If you tell a 7th grader to simply blow it down like Alan Baer, you might not get the results you are looking for. Besides that, you wouldn't actually need a tuba teacher, the band director could just say "Blow it down like Alan Baer" and be done with it.

[Donn]

OK, I can understand where you are coming from, but I do believe that most of the time people need more direct instruction; at least they need direct instruction until they are more of an advanced player.

It's the other way around. Advanced players benefit from direct instruction, but beginners need indirect instruction. You don't need some 7th grade band instructor to tell you how to make fart noises in the mouthpiece, you need to be around good players and not learning how to play like a 7th grader from other 7th graders. This is of course only my untutored opinion, but if beginners really couldn't do well without direct instruction, there wouldn't be so many phenomenally good self taught musicians.

[jonesbrass]

I agree that you need to listen to as many pros as you can, (IMHO live is better than recorded) and figure out who/what you like and want to sound like. As far as embouchure efficiency is concerned, it goes hand in hand with your air. To me, the real secret is relaxation. If you aren't relaxed, face, lips, chest, etc., you are not efficient.

[Roger Lewis]

Here’s my take on embouchure efficiency. It is simple to improve once you know how to evaluate it, though there is an experimental aspect to it.

First determine your baseline (pun intended) efficiency by buzzing on the mouthpiece (and don’t put your finger over the stem of the mouthpiece when doing it). There are two sounds that come out of the mouthpiece: the buzzing sound and the whooshing sound of the air passing through the mouthpiece stem.

If you have more of the whooshing sound than the buzzing sound then you are “bleeding energy”. The energy of the movement of the air stream is what causes the lips to vibrate (among other things) but it is the fuel of the embouchure. If that energy is going through the mouthpiece without creating “work” or the buzz, then it is wasted air and will require you to breathe more often to accommodate for this loss of fuel.

Now if you hear too much buzz without the whooshing sound then your embouchure is over efficient and this will lead to a tight, pinched, whiney kind of sound that is not really pleasant to listen to.

You want to have a balance between the two sounds. In my own experience, I have my buzz at about 60% of the buzz sound and 40% of the whooshing sound. This seems to be the right balance FOR ME. It gives me a good sound with good strength of tone and allows me to play relatively long phrases in the low register without a lot of effort.

Here’s where the experimental aspect comes into play. You have to experiment with the mouthpiece while you are buzzing. If you have too much of the whooshing noise in the sound that you hear, start moving the lips around inside the mouthpiece.

In my experience there are three kinds of lip tissue in the embouchure. You have the soft inner tissue which you will want to have exposed for playing in the low register; the weathered outer tissue that gets chapped all winter long which you will want to be using in the high register; and then there is the transitional tissue between those which is what I use for middle register playing. I change the lip tissue surface by slightly curling the lips inward and outward while playing to have the best vibrating surface in the mouthpiece for the range that I am playing in.

If you are puckering into the cup of the mouthpiece, start by curling one lip back out a bit, then the other and just keep moving them around until you get a firm, clear sound (still with some of the whooshing noise in it), out of the mouthpiece. Do this on ONLY ONE NOTE. Once you have a good solid, resonant sound out of the mouthpiece on that one note – play that one note a thousand times so that you will learn how to recreate it. I recommend starting with a “middle note”, something around the Bb in the staff.

Next pick a low note and work the same way until you get the clarity and resonance on that note (you will usually have to pucker a bit more into the mouthpiece for the low range) – then play that note a thousand times. Then pick a high note and do the same thing, and then play it a thousand times.

Now that you have created the sound you want in each register, start to slowly buzz sirens in the mouthpiece, keeping that same resonant, efficient sound through the whole range and this will help you bridge any gaps in the buzz sound.

Use plenty of air in all registers, especially the high register. Most young players back off on their air as they go higher and this is the kiss of death in the high register. In my own playing I actually use as much air in the high register as I do in the extreme low register; it is just that the air speed is different. When your car goes up a hill, you have to push down on the gas pedal more. When you go down a hill you let off on the gas.

Again – this is MY experience and how I approached it in my own playing. If you have any questions, let me know.

All the best to you all.
Roger

[Tigerreydelaselva]

hello, last year i started to change my embouchure, with my F tuba, (i play BBb sousaphone in the army), in the middle and part of the high register on F tuba i have no problem, but in the low register it cost a lot with my new embouchure, the same happens on the BBb, or directly i can't produce sound ,but it makes me the slurring excercises easier on middle register and to the high Eb or F, before i put the mouthpiece on the down lip, i played for years with this way, but now i'm trying to play with the mouthpiece upper, next to the nose, (walter hilgers uses this embouchure) that also makes me the double and triple tonguing easier for me, but i need more practice on low register, what would you reccommend for me?. I can only reach the CCb under the staff

[Roger Lewis]

First I would read this - it's about high range playing but explains a bit about the embouchure.

viewtopic.php?p=29184#p29184" target="_blank" target="_blank

I would guess that you need to pucker your lips into the mouthpiece a bit to expose the soft inner tissue of the lip as the vibrating part of the embouchure. To get low frequencies you need to have less firmness in the lip tissue. The inner tissue of the lips is quite soft and will make the slower vibrations that you need to produce easier.

Your standard embouchure is like a snare drum head, where the stick will bounce quite fast. What you want your embouchure to be like is the bass drum head, where the stick has to bounce more slowly. Stick your lower lip INTO the mouthpiece and pucker out the upper lip as well, slow down your air and you should see an immediate ease of playing in the low register.

Just based on my observations.

Roger