 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: claaaaaarinet!!!!
Date: 2004-09-27 04:37
My primary struggle over the past few years has been with articulation speed. Although my articulation technique is sound, my tongue speed is just a notch or so too slow. Try as I might, I have not been able to raise this apparent ceiling. Excerpts like "The Bartered Bride", Mendelssohn Scherzo, Ravel Piano Concerto (Eb part, 1st mvnt), and "The Barber of Seville" drive me nuts. My tongue speed is not drastically too slow, only a couple of clicks on the metronome. I get by fine most of the time, but I need a little extra speed, especially in auditions.
Has anyone out there hit a ceiling like this for a time and then eventually moved beyond it? If so, how did you do it? I am beginning to suspect that I have reached my natural single tongue speed limit and that I will simply have to find ways to work around it (learn to double tongue, add slurs, resign myself to slower tempos, etc), but I would love to hear success stories to give me hope to the contrary.
Sorry this reads like a Dear Ann.
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Author: Dee
Date: 2004-09-27 11:52
Sometimes the problem is not in the tonguing but in coordingating the finger timing with the tongue timing. This will sound and feel like a slow tongue when it is not.
Try tonguing an open G as fast as you can for a measure or two and see how fast that is. Most people find their tongue to be faster than they realize. If you find that to be the case, track down the "Clarinet Compendium" by Daniel Bonade and use his exercise to coordinate the tongue and fingers. The problem is often that the subconscious believes the tongue to be slow, even when it is not, and slows down the fingers. Then the faster you tongue, the worse the problem gets. The fingers must LEAD the tongue not follow it. If the test on the open G is fast, then when tonguing focus on finger speed and just let the tongue do its thing.
Another problem that some people have is a slight amount of jaw motion that even some very good players don't notice that they have. This really slows down your tonguing. Only the tongue should move. To test this, tongue the open G as fast as you can with your left hand touching the jaw. If this is the problem, you will need to overcome it.
It's also possible that you may have both problems.
Check on these (and let us know) before tackling double tonguing or resigning yourself to other accommodations.
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2004-09-27 13:21
I'll wager the opposite - you probably can't tongue open G at the speeds that you want to get for those excerpts.
What Dee wrote is true, but I don't think that you are at that stage yet.
Try Avrahm Galper's "Tone Technique and Staccato" book published by Mel Bay. Also the Stark Staccato Studies is very good, but I like Abe's book better. As well, get a program that can
Have you addressed the tongue speed issue with your Clarinet Professor recently?
There is a program to adjust your CD speed if you are trying to play along w/CD's for those pieces. Write me off board
blummy@comcast$.net (remove the $) and I can tell you what it is.
Post Edited (2004-09-27 23:03)
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Author: Dee
Date: 2004-09-27 17:53
As Dave implied, but didn't state, the toungue is a muscle that needs training, like every other muscle. If you only practice once or twice a week, you will not be able to build up the tongue speed. Just like any other physical training regime, it needs to be done nearly every day.
However, the one or two measure test should give some indication. Just like in running, most of us, even if somewhat out of shape, can run 50 feet quite quickly even though we would run out of steam long before we hit 50 yards. So most of us can do a few measures faster than a long passage. Once I started paying attention to this, I noticed that stamina was the problem rather than speed. I could hit those first two measures but then "died" after that and could not keep up to tempo.
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2004-09-27 20:50
Increasing your tonguing speed is a slow process, and The Battered Bride is a famous challenge for everyone.
What's the fastest metronome setting at which you can pump out smooth, even sixteenths? 126? 136? 144? If you can sustain 144 for a full measure, you're doing pretty well. On the other hand, if you can't sustain 126 practically forever, there's something wrong.
Not everyone can be Robert Spring, who single-tongues off the end of the metronome -- sixteenths at well over 200 -- but I think everyone can improve.
The main way to increase speed is to minimize your tongue movement. If you anchor tongue, or haven't gotten all the way to "tip-to-tip" tonguing, that's the first thing to work on.
Here's my favorite "Bob Lowrey" exercise:
Play a secure note (say, D below the staff), starting it mezzo forte with the breath. Then, move the tip of your tongue up and slightly forward as if saying the syllable LA, but do not let your tongue touch the reed. You want to just barely miss. Move the syllable forward gradually, so that you touch the reed only for an instant, producing the smallest possible "tic" in the sound.
Work on this until you can do it consistently and evenly. Then move to scales, beginning slowly and working the speed up gradually. The feeling should be that of your tongue brushing - almost bouncing - across the reed, but never stopping. The breath and the sound never stop.
Once you get this extremely light action under control, it's easy to make it more forceful, or make the notes shorter. Equally important, you teach yourself to play with a continuous tone, which is interrupted by the tongue, without interrupting the effort of moving the air stream. This avoids the problems that come when you think of the tongue as what starts the tone, rather than stopping it.
Give this a try, and work on the Kell Staccato Studies. (It wouldn't hurt to listen to Kell's recordings. He had an infinite variety of staccato, all perfectly clean and amazingly fast.)
Best regards.
Ken Shaw
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Author: William
Date: 2004-09-27 21:00
It is good to be optomistic and believe that you can increase your tongue speed via a methodical regimen of regular practice, but having "been there" just about all my life, I am here to tell you that there most definately is a personal speed limit when it comes to articulative speed. You will eventually discover that through your practice, a process that may take many years to complete. My tongue will not single past 16ths at 112 bpm, which is fast enough for most music that I need to play, but for those rare "supertongue" moments, I have learned to effectively double and triple tongue--and most of my colleges and audience do not realize the difference. For now, and a few years, keep the faith. Believe that you will become faster--and maybe it will happen. But practically everyone has a limit. Once you reach it and if it is not "fast" enough, you will have to learn other techniques to stay up to speed.
Buy Robert Springs "DRAGON TONGUE" CD for a great example of multiple tonguing skills at their absolute best. But please know, there are clarinetists--and other instrumentalists--that can single that fast. It's just what kind of a tongue muscle you were born with. Good luck.
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2004-09-27 23:08
16th's at 112 is VERY slow. Double tonguing would be certainly needed to do most any audition if you were so limited.
Single tongue speed should be a minimum 144 and preferably at 160 to get a gig and keep it. High School players should be able to do 120 if not 126-132 before graduating.
That's not even supertonguing - it's basic technique!!
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Author: claaaaaarinet!!!!
Date: 2004-09-27 23:17
Thanks, everyone, for weighing in on this! You all have very interesting things to say.
I don't think endurance is my main problem since I consistently practice 2-4 hours a day and have done so for the last ten years or so. I don't anchor tongue (although I used to) and I follow Kell's golden rule of "tip of the tongue to the tip of the reed". I can articulate four beats of sixteenth notes at about 120bpm, but this speed has not increased noticably over the last year in spite of the fact that it has been the main focus of my attention.
William, where did you learn to double tongue and at what point in your career?
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Author: claaaaaarinet!!!!
Date: 2004-09-28 01:17
I finished my master's degree in clarinet about two and a half years ago. Since then I have been freelancing and taking some auditions. I feel like I'm in good shape to win a job, but that my tongue speed is one of the things that might be holding me back. It is mainly longer passages of uninterrupted articulation, such as Bartered Bride, that are a struggle for me. No amount of practice seems to yield a speed increase. Mendelssohn and Rossini have to sound effortless and light, an impression that is hard to convey when you barely articulate fast enough. And then there is always the dreaded question, "Can we hear that a little faster?"
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2004-09-28 02:00
You are never too old for Lessons if there is still work to be accomplished.
That's a primary reason for Doctoral Students is that they still have some work to be done (aside from the practical reasons).
You should probably get more lessons and from somebody who specializes in fixing the fundamentals and get your multiple tonguing down.
Contact somebody you like (who you know can help you) and have a 3 hour lesson with them - fly to it if you have to.
Also to make sure that your reeds are vibrant enough not to slow you down.
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Author: DAVE
Date: 2004-09-28 05:27
If being able to tongue 16ths at 160 were a requirement to get a gig and keep it, then most every clarinet player would be out of a job. While quick spurts at this tempo are easy, sustained 16ths are almost impossible. Ever notice how on recordings of the Nielsen the fast tongued part is never played exactly at quarter note=72 as the score indicates? If single tongue speed should be a minimum of 144, as advised above, then that section of the Niesen should be quite easy and playable at tempo.
BTW, I heard Drucker a while back play the Bartered Bride with some slurs; he was fantastic!
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Author: William
Date: 2004-09-28 14:58
DB--Yes, I agree. 16ths at 112 bpm is quite slow, but I have learned to live with it. I can do "short sprints" a bit faster, but sustained.....that's difficult unless I am in optimum shape.
Claaaaa......, When in highschool, I played soprano bugle in a (pretty good) drum and bugle corps where I learned to double a triple tongue. And, after learning that Charles Niedich and John Bruce-Yeh occassionally use multiple tonguing skills (JBY on his recording of the Nielson Concerto), I decided, about ten years ago, to transfer my "bugle techique" to my clarinet. Certainly, not the recommended (do it yourself) course of instruction, but it has worked for me. I use my self-aquired multiple tonguing skills in a regional professional symphony orchestra and multiple other wind ensemble and jazz groups that I play with. (try tonguing the Clarinet Polka at "up tempo" sometime--kinda fun, ya hey)
Also, Claaaaaaaa......, With only a masters degree, you should consider pursueing a doctorate. Why?? Because that is what you will need if you even want to get your foot in the door of college level teaching just in case that (often rocky) road of auditions leads to nowhere with no wins. And I have often thought that an interesting topic for a doctoral dissertation might be to investigate the relationship--if any--of athletic ability and technical success on a musical instrument with the objective of developing a perceiver test for the beginning student to determine their future success on any given instrument. My (unproven) theory is that as people are born with certain physical apptitudes that are key to success in certain sport activities (ex. heigth for basketball), their may be some predicatable correlation between athletic quickness and technical ability on the clarinet, for example. Do people who have quicker reflex actions also have quicker fingers and tonguing actions? Could a baseball professional with "cat-like" batting and fielding skills also tongue 16th notes at 166 bpm (or better). Would that mean that Ricardo Moreles should reconsider his career choice and pick up a baseball glove where the $$s are better??
I know that there are many negatives that could result from such a "perceiver" test and that such a pre-screening might not be in the best interests of music education in general, but I have often wondered in such a relatinship between the world of athletics and the super-fast technical skills needed for virtuosic musical performance indeed exists. Or if it is just another dumb idea of mine. Only a thorough investigation, such as a doctoral level thesis, may provide a definative answer--and perhaps, an interesting (if not useful) one.
(OK--too much morning talk already, back to the long tones)
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2004-09-28 17:52
------------------------------
My (unproven) theory is that as
people are born with certain physical apptitudes that are key to success
in certain sport activities (ex. heigth for basketball), their may be some
predicatable correlation between athletic quickness and technical ability
on the clarinet, for example. Do people who have quicker reflex actions
also have quicker fingers and tonguing actions? Could a baseball
professional with "cat-like" batting and fielding skills also tongue 16th
notes at 166 bpm (or better). Would that mean that Ricardo Moreles should
reconsider his career choice and pick up a baseball glove where the $$s are
better??
--------------------------------------
Your unproven theory is wrong
The brain for music uses a large portion of it to control many, many small muscles.
In Sports there is a relatively small part of the brain controling large muscles.
Hence typical Sports figures.........
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2004-09-28 19:14
That quote came from a Doctor who lectured at an ICA conference - Dr. Frank Wilson author of the book "Tone Deaf and all Thumbs"
Cool book - Gary Vancott probably sells it, if not he should.
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Author: DAVE
Date: 2004-09-29 00:13
"Beethoven's 4th Symphony
Finale Mvt.
Standard Audition Rep. and is tongued"
Yes, but a long way away from 160.
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Author: jim S.
Date: 2004-09-29 15:42
Jimmy McPartland said Benny Goodman was a very good handball player. "He was a good athlete. He could beat all of us." Any connection between the two skills? Maybe just fierce competitiveness and the intensity he gave to any endeavor he was interested in.
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Author: sbbishop
Date: 2004-09-29 19:03
Maybe a person who can speak Spanish and roll the r's can tongue better?
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2004-09-29 20:08
Italians I would imagine would be able to tongue naturally more quickly. I know they can sure solfege quickly!
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Author: Aussie Nick
Date: 2004-09-30 01:06
I am half italian and also feel my tonuging lets me down. I have been working on it for a long time (although I admit not consistantly enough) and I still can't play Mendelssohn Scherzo faster than 80, and there's a section in Galanta Dances I stuggle with...it is supposed to be something like 144-152 I believe...but I can't get it past 126-132. Oh well, I'll keep working at it, but it hasn;t stopped me doing well in auditions.
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Author: Bill G
Date: 2004-09-30 01:45
When I was in high school, over 60 years ago, I subbed with a circus band. The gallops were two fast for me to single tongue, and I had already failed at trying to double tongue. I used the technique of brushing the tip of my mouthjpiece and the reed both up and down. I came to call it "duddle tonguing. It still comes in handy. Has anybody else tried it? Bill G.
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Author: DavidBlumberg
Date: 2004-09-30 04:08
You need to be able (able!) to play the Mendelssohn Scherzo at up to 92 "just in case".
You never know what idiot conductor will be in a rush that day.........
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Author: William
Date: 2004-09-30 15:13
"I came to call it "duddle tonguing. It still comes in handy. Has anybody else tried it? Bill G."
Yes, I have. And so has John Bruce-Yeh, associate Principal with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. He told me that he "never had any success with the taka, taka method" and developed this "over the tip" double tongue technique because it was "cleaner in the upper register". He also told me that this "duddle" method was what he used in his recording of the Nielson Clarinet Concerto.
BTW--I had this conversation with him after a clinic session he gave for the Mid-West Band & Orchestra Clinic in Chicago, IL. He spoke for about 45 mins starting at 8am and then, assembled his clarinets and performed--without warm-up and from memory--the complete Stravinski "Three Pieces". He did squeek three times, but other than that, his technique was flawless and his sound was supurb. Later that evening, he performed the Morton Gould, "Divertimento" with a visiting high school wind ensemble, all three movements (also from memory) and with flawless technique (and no squeeks). A truely virtuosic performance that received a standing ovation.
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