 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Liquorice
Date: 2003-01-16 10:04
For all the clarinet pedagogues out there:
I'm having problems with one of my students "biting" too much on the mouthpiece. I'm trying to find a way for him to guage the correct pressure that he needs to place on the reed. Would it be correct to say that one should still be able to move the mouthpiece in and out of the mouth a little with the right thumb? And if one can't move the mouthpiece, one is biting too much? Is there a better way of explaining this?
Thanks,
Liquorice
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Author: John O'Janpa
Date: 2003-01-16 14:04
You could have him try double lip embouchure for a while, for demonstration purposes. Tell him that the proper amount of bite pressure should be about the same when he goes back to single lip.
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Author: William
Date: 2003-01-16 14:54
I agree with the two-lip embouchure approach to correcting the excessive bite. But being able to move the mpc in and out with the thumb serves, IMHO, no analytical nor productive purpose. That part of the embouchure concept needs stability that is not neccessarily related to the "bite" but more to steady hand position and oral muscular control of excess motion and air seal. Gently moving the mouthpiece from side to side in an aid in correcting too little embouchure support, but moving it in and out or using that as a criteria for evaluating embouchure correctness is not the way to go. Stability is needed, not sloppiness. BTW, there should always be a feeling of upward pressure by the thumb to help stabilize the position of the mpc in the embouchure. Perhaps that is what you were thinking.
Beginners can be challenging, perplexing and downright demoralizing from the teachers perspective, but they are always the most impressionable, will show the most progress and will provide the most rewarding teaching experiance of any student you will every have at any level. I would personally chose to teach an eager to learn and intensly curious beginner with lots of questions and an open mind, as opposed to a highly talented, world class and experianced student clarinetist, perhaps like Larry Combs, who would probably come to my lessons thinking He knows it all. Give me the highly motivatable beginning student any day and truely, "make my day" as a teacher. Get my point??? Good luck.
(be relentlessly--but gently--persistant and constantly supportive with lots more positve comments than criticisms)
Young people need more role models and less critics.
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Author: Mike
Date: 2003-01-16 17:27
He's got to be biting for a reason. My experience is that people bite when they have 1) undeveloped embouchures or 2) are working too hard. Maybe change reed strength and/or mouthpiece combinations.
I had a problem biting for a long time because I was playing on hard reeds on a closed mouthpiece and working way harder than I needed to. Playing on slightly softer reeds eliminated the problem.
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Author: Kat
Date: 2003-01-16 21:14
I always use double lip embouchure for my students who have had problems biting. They can amaze themselves when they hear the sound that comes out! When they (invariably) complain about the (upper lip) pain, I tell them to work harder to "relax" their lower lip so they can go back to "normal!" Well, not really...but I have them play at least 5 minutes a day (out of a 30-45 minute practice regimen) with double lip so they can work on developing a better sense of bottom lip pressure
Katrina
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Author: nzdonald
Date: 2003-01-16 21:26
kia ora
i agree with William re stability... there should be just enough upward pressured with the right thumb to keep the clarinet steady while playing an open G... often (talking here about mainly younger students) problems with tone and articulation can be greatly improved just by ensuring that the clarinet is held "firmly", as unlikely as this sounds! (Leon Russianoff wrote the same thing in his books)
i also agree with comments re double lip (i played double lip up until after i got to Mozart concerto level, and can still go back to it with little difficulty), i have found this to be very useful for helping some students with embochure- in particular when they have a tendancy to push the lips away from the teeth.
but this posting was about "biting"- a problem i personally encountered until i was at graduate school. What helped me was a total change in concept away from "holding the clarinet in my mouth". Rather- i was taught that the embochure was a structure into which you placed the clarinet (similar to the way a flute player will make their embochure then place the instrument against it). With this concept the upward pressure on the reed should be the result of the leverage of the clarinet being pulled closer to the body- NOT the lower jaw pushing up against the reed.
there is an article by my old teacher Dr David Etheridge, i think in a US magazine called "The Instrumentalist" that illustrates this concept... i believe that it is the embochure concept taught at Eastman by Stanley Hasty (though i never studied with Mr Hasty so could not be sure). I have found the "structure" concept to be the most significant thing i have learnt about tone production, and most of the problems i encounter in performances are a result of unconciously moving away from this (through fatigue/lack of time for scales and tone exercises etc). If taught well at a younger age, a correct embochure will be more habitual and less a concious effort.
keep playing the good tunes
donal
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