Does buzzing on your mouthpiece ruin your embouchure

[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.

[timothy42b]

The trumpet mouthpiece is a longer percentage of the horn, but I think the resistance to air flow is due to the restriction at the throat rather than viscous drag along the length of the shank.

I just looked up the Bach dimensions. Trumpet mouthpieces have a throat from .141 inches to .161 inches while tuba mouthpieces have a throat from .328 to .354 inches.

I once tried to measure the pressure differentials with a homemade manometer built of some aquarium tubing filled with water. I used a plumbing tee fitting between mouthpiece and a trombone. It was not easy playing with the tube in the corner of my mouth. But anyway, pressure drop from my mouth to the end of the mouthpiece was 12 inches of water, from mouthpiece to atmospheric 1 inch of water. So 12/13 of the resistance of the horn is in the lips and mouthpiece. I had no way of determining how much was due to lip aperture and how much to mouthpiece throat without drilling a mouthpiece, and I didn't have an old one handy.

[chronolith]

It's fine to try and quantify the differences between tuba and trumpet buzz and play, but beside the point.

My observations come from my tuba playing alone. I was merely trying to draw the thread since Vincent Cichowicz was mentioned earlier.

This is not a particularly good post.

[chronolith]

I never did ask. I was keeping my tuba sideline a secret back then fearing that I was going to get smacked for it. Mr. Cichowicz did think that the benefits of mouthpiece buzzing seemed to apply valuably and universally to all in the brass family though.

[timothy42b]

It's probably both, Tim, but (realize that) the tuba mouthpiece stuck in the tuba offers far more resistance than not stuck in a tuba, so the throat size is only a portion of the equation.

I haven't tried that but I believe you.

It doesn't seem that way to me on trombone, but then the trombone mouthpiece is much smaller and may have a higher percentage of the total resistance.

One thing, I'm being very specific in talking about resistance to moving a volume of air. There is also impedance to the sound wave, and i suspect that gets confused.

Back on topic, I personally don't do any mouthpiece buzzing but I do a fair amount of free buzzing and "walking in."

[tusabtuba]

About the worst advice, old wives' tale, nonsense available. There is some web talk of this nonsense from the horn players. However, without buzz there cannot be sound. There MUST be vibration to make a sound. How does a violin make a sound? Vibration of the string amplified by the violin's body. Same for brass instruments, the vibration of the lips are amplified by the instrument. Arnold Jacobs said, "It's music or its not by the time it get to the throat of the mouthpiece." How do you suppose that happens? The vibration of the lips.