Embouchures - I'll show you mine etc...

[Peach]

Inspired by the recent chat about embouchure, I took a quick video of my own.
Results surprised me as it looks like my bottom lip moves up almost under my top lip as I play much above the staff.

Hopefully some other guys here will post videos/pictures of their own embouchures at work for discussion.

I'd like to hear from anyone who can tell me anything (useful!) about my own...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0P6q28mNCA" target="_blank" target="_blank
(by the way, HOW DO YOU EMBED A DARNED VIDEO on this site these days?? What I used to do doesn't seem to work anymore!) - if someone can embed my video please do (but only here if you don't mind...).

[pierso20]

Inspired by the recent chat about embouchure, I took a quick video of my own.
Results surprised me as it looks like my bottom lip moves up almost under my top lip as I play much above the staff.

Hopefully some other guys here will post videos/pictures of their own embouchures at work for discussion.

I'd like to hear from anyone who can tell me anything (useful!) about my own...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0P6q28mNCA" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank
(by the way, HOW DO YOU EMBED A DARNED VIDEO on this site these days?? What I used to do doesn't seem to work anymore!) - if someone can embed my video please do (but only here if you don't mind...).

I didn't watch carefully enough to really give you anything useful except to say that this is a VERY useful thread should folks also make attempt.

[Peach]

Blah
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I didn't watch carefully enough to really give you anything useful except to say that this is a VERY useful thread should folks also make attempt.

Thanks Brooke. Looking forward to your video!
Honestly it took only 10 minutes to take the video (iPad in this case) and get it on YouTube.
I'd like to see as many embouchures as possible - maybe we can all educate ourselves somewhat.

Ian. Thanks for the help. I'm sure that's exactly what I've done in the past and what I tried today with YouTube embedding. I'll try some other time.

Brian F, I found this slide online. I hope you don't mind it's use here.
Thanks, Mal

[brianf]

These embouchere photos are by Philip Farkas' Art of Brass Playing written in 1960. Some are not pretty although these are some of the finest brass players of the day. All this proves is that you do not need a picture perfect embouchure to sound good!

[Jay Bertolet]

These embouchere photos are by Philip Farkas' Art of Brass Playing written in 1960. Some are not pretty although these are some of the finest brass players of the day. All this proves is that you do not need a picture perfect embouchure to sound good!

An excellent point, kind of. I think many folks miss the point of looking at their embouchure, at least in part, because they expect not to find a "picture perfect" embouchure which they imagine they should be playing with. The photos from the Farkas book prove that you don't need a picture perfect embouchure to sound good. But what defines a picture perfect embouchure? I would argue that every one of these gentlemen has a picture perfect embouchure. The facts bear this out. All played at an extremely high level, all were able to play pretty much anything that was put in front of them, and all sustained extremely long careers, a testament to the efficiency of their embouchure technique.

There are more variables to embouchure than I can list here, and that's just what I understand at this point. For me, a lot of the process of evaluating embouchure technique has boiled down to spotting problems rather than defining what is "perfect". I look at a student's embouchure and see if I can find any flaws in their production technique. These are usually accompanied by the sounds in their playing that match the problem. Past that, I start looking at sustainability in their technique. Is there undo stress in any aspect of the technique such that their embouchure is likely to break down over time?

As an example, let's take Peach's brief recording. Understanding that it is a very short example so many aspects are not able to be evaluated because they simply aren't presented, plus there are lots of missing elements that I would use to evaluate what is there (live quality sound, body position, horn position, head movement, etc.), I would say that your embouchure technique is fine. I don't see anything out of place until the very end of the recording. I suspect you went up to that very high note at the end maybe as a little bit of a joke but it did reveal how much you stretch your embouchure out when going higher and higher in the range. To what I understand, that technique will always produce bad sound and will become harder to manage as you age. Playing in the upper range requires vibrating embouchure just as much as any other range of the tuba. Pulling some of your embouchure out of the mouthpiece when going into a specific range can only hurt you, in my opinion.

Again, please understand that this is only a very limited analysis based on limited data and offered only as an example of how to go about evaluating your embouchure technique. No doubt there are many things that Peach has worked on with his teacher(s) that play into the entirety of his technique. All those factors come into play which is why the process of honest evaluation is so difficult to effectively accomplish. Normally I would give embouchure advice only after at least a couple of full lessons and even then, being very cautious to take all factors into account.