Klarinet Archive - Posting 000829.txt from 1996/02

From: niethamer@-----.BITNET
Subj: Re: tonguing and jaw movement (was QUESTIONS!!)
Date: Wed, 28 Feb 1996 13:36:39 -0500

> >numero 2- reciently, this student teacher told me that my chin moves when i
> >tounge. Is there any way of correcting this?

On Tue, 27 Feb 1996, Terri Kimiko Oda wrote:
>
> I had this problem too! My teacher told me to practice in front of a
> mirror more. This helps for lots of things, but it makes unwanted
> movement obvious. If you've got a nice big mirror somewhere, it's just
> great. Just do some scales with a nice tonguing pattern and watch and try
> to keep your mouth still... I didn't always have a mirror available,
> however, so I did another self-developped exercise. I played a nice,
> simple, open G and tongued it while keeping one of my hands on my jaw,
> chin, or wherever to feel the movement. This last is what really helped,
> I think. Correcting it wasn't that hard, as long as I thought about it
> all the time for a little while.
>
> Just think about your chin *whatever* you do, until keeping your chin
> motionless is completely normal. :)

This is one of those circular things - you want your jaw not to move, but
on the other hand, you don't want your jaw to become tight and rigid, so
that you lose flexibility.

Practicing in front of the mirror is good advice, and start slowly, one
note at a time, tonguing slowly on that note (easy quarters and then
eighth notes) until you can keep the air
stream going and move *only* your tongue without making your jaw rigid.
Open G is a good easy starting note. Then do the same for other notes.
When this seems easy, you can do one or two notes daily, doing each
octave of that note to 1.) practice the technique in various registers
(because articulation response varies in each register) and 2.) practice
the technique on notes which use different length of the tube (open G is
easier to articulate than the lowest G). After that works easily, then
you can do scales, etc, and you are ready to mostly commit your
articulation to the subconscious level again, with ocaisional mirror checks.

Instead of *keeping* you jaw from moving (implies force of effort on your
part) think of *allowing* it to remain steady, and noticing the
steadyness - no effort, just observation on your part. Good luck!

David Niethamer