 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: moeboy
Date: 2006-05-16 02:21
This might at first seem like a very dumb question, and you might say it has been answered here a thousand times already, but my situation is a little different. I recently asked my teacher if he could give me anything to help me improve my tonguing, i know all the notes of the clarinet, and shaping, and everything like that, but my tonging was terrible, i wasn't happy with it. I asked him and as i was asking i added that i do not tongue with my toungue. I really don't know how i learned to do it, i used my lip and just held my tongue in place, all the while keeping a very decent embachure. He never noticed. So it's not like i ever knew how to tongue how you are supposed to, i need to relearn, and as quickly as possible, though i know it will take time and loads of practice. I was just wondering if anyone had that special technique to tongue very fast, and still sound beautiful. It is annoying to know how to play, and very well ( not to sound jerkish or anything) and then to go to nothing at all square one. I recently purchased Dave Speigelthal's bass, and i told him about it and he never heard of it. It would be nice to tongue again, and not sound like a first grader on the clarinet. (long question, thanks for reading all of it)
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Author: Ryan25
Date: 2006-05-16 03:59
Moeboy,
I had a very similar problem. I somehow learned to get by articulating by hitting the roof of my mouth with my tounge and stoping my air. When I got to Grad school, My teacher worked me to death on it and I made the switch to tounging on the reed. Making the switch showed me right away that my old style of playing was holding me back quite a bit and caused a lot of other problems in my playing.
It's been 3 years of hard work learning to tounge on the reed and now I can play almost anything. My tounge is not perfect and I still work on it a lot with etudes etc but it is already better than I ever thought it would be. I think the main thing is to give into it completely and work very hard at it. Within a couple of months it should feel a lot more comfortable.
My teacher (David Breeden. Former principal of San Francisco Symphony) started me out on open G with slow tempo. Half notes, quarter, etc and we went from there. It's important that you do not move your whole tounge. Only the tip needs to move to make contact with the reed. It's important that you do not loose your arched tounge position by moving your whole tounge....this affects your air and ultimately affects tounging. For me, learning to tounge in the lower register was much easier than the clarion or altissimo. Some key things to notice (at least for me):
Make sure you have a steady emboucher with a flat pointed chin(still a small problem for me) with solid air support..... the key for me to tounging on the reed was that the air does 90 percent of the work . Watch very closely that you do not start to develop a "sympathetic" movement in your jaw or lips as you learn to extend the tip of your tounge to the reed. Your mouth might fight this new way of playing for a while. The hardest thing to learn and trust for me was that with good air support, you barely have to touch the reed to get clean, crisp articulation....this will also lead you to developing a good rapid statcatto. I spent the first year working on this hitting the reed very hard and with too much tounge surface hitting the reed. I think these are some good general ideas to keep in mind. I promise playing is much easier once you learn to do this and it is deffinetly worth the work and sounding "bad" for a while. Saying the letter D and placing the tounge just below the tip would be a good place to start. I believe Robert Marcellus refered to it as "talking to the reed".
There are many great players and teachers on this board so I'm sure advice will be given that will be of more help than mine has been. I just felt like saying something since this was the bulk of work I did while pursuing my masters degree. Good luck and work hard.
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Author: Tobin
Date: 2006-05-16 12:29
Hello Moeboy,
First I agree with a lot of good directions from Ryan. Let me also commiserate by saying I was an anchor tonguer in my youth, and it wasn't a good thing.
Here are three related exercises that I recommend to students:
(Starting with good tongue position as alluded to above, the back of the tongue high, curving down and back up to the reed and tonguing with just the tip of the tongue)
1.) Begin any note in the chalumeau without tonguing and hold it for two beats (slow tempo), then touch the reed with the tip of the tongue WITHOUT stopping the sound or air. (produces a muted, fuzzy tone)
2.) Repeat step one: 2 beats untongued note, 2 beats muted/fuzzy note, and then release the reed = 2 beats of clear focused note.
3.) Repeat step two, changine one thing: Instead of touching the reed with the tip of the tongue lightly enough to keep it vibrating, touch it firmly enough to stop the sound without stopping the air.
These exercises will teach your tongue (1) where the reed is, and (2) the basic sensitivity the tongue needs to play with, as well as (3) how to keep the sound focues with proper tongue position while tonguing.
The three steps together isolate the tonguing motion, and are a good starting off point at the beginning of your change.
I look forward to reading the continued advice from others
good luck,
James
Gnothi Seauton
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Author: vin
Date: 2006-05-16 16:35
MoeBoy- I had the exact same problem in high school. I hid it very well and when I got to conservatory, it knew it was time to fix it. I spent my first two months doing open G and scales until my tongue bled (like the exercises Ryan and James talk about). I sounded like a bad seventh grader but I persevered for months and ended up tonguing better than everyone else eventually. Once you can tongue SLOWLY (i.e. one note every two beats at quarter equals 50, then one at 50, then two at 50,etc.), then you can think about getting it fast.
And, one more thing, I find that most students who think of it as "accenting" with your tongue use too hard a tongue. Remember, it's having the air set and taking the tongue off the reed that starts the sound!
Post Edited (2006-05-16 16:37)
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