 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-18 03:04
I am trying to understand how we blow into the clarinet. Many articles are complicated and long on the subject. Here is my take on this. We inhale while flexing muscles and expanding in the stomach area. This flexing out and down allows the diaphragm to do its' work during inhalation. ie .unfettering the lungs if you will. ..The stomach flexing has nothing to do with air flow. You can flex your stomach and exhale, inhale or remain neutral with no air flow. The flexing somehow sets up an appropriately firm conduit for air flow. There is tension from the stomach up to the oral cavity. It is flexed and not relaxed. After this conduit is in place we can then move air by blowing. Blowing is a separate function. I'm not sure how we achieve this....perhaps it is the intercostal muscles. In any case we don't have to teach people how to blow. We figure out how to blow as children. Perhaps the oral cavity is an extension of this conduit. If the cheeks are puffed and oral muscles have no flex the conduit's work is ruined. The clarinet embouchure entails enough flexing of muscles to extend the conduit right to the mouthpiece. Any comments on my rehashing of this subject? My apologies if I have stated the obvious in my short 238 words.
Freelance woodwind performer
Post Edited (2007-09-18 05:09)
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2007-09-18 10:23
Not quite sure exactly what you are asking about, but...
I think breathing is one of those natural things that we'd all do perfectly if no one said anything about it. I clearly remember an adult telling me not to puff out my stomach- I was either 4 or 5. He said that the air goes in the lungs, not the stomach, so the chest should get bigger, naturally. I remember actually practicing breathing from the chest and sucking in the tummy. It was really hard!
I try to focus more on the sound and the feel of the air than on the muscles themselves.
Post Edited (2007-09-18 10:26)
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2007-09-18 11:32
Natural yes, but there is methodology to increase the steadiness of the air column as it relates to blowing into a clarinet to achieve resonance, volume and sustained phrases. All your diaphragm does is draw the air into the lungs. As you state, it is the intercostals that will create the push outward.
Focusing on the results, such as the sound you are getting, is the best use of your mind's attention but it does help to know the fundamentals of what's going on just in case the main path you are on is lacking some basics. I for one spent many years getting a less than resonant sound simply because I had an inconsistant, unsupported, unfocused air column.
..............Paul Aviles
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2007-09-18 14:07
And how can I know if I am using my intercostals correctly?
I was once told by a teacher that the way I expel air is unusual and that it is simiar to a Yoga excercise. Apparently, using the abs is not a good way to push the air out??
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2007-09-18 14:41
Dear Sky,
I keep my stomach out as I blow out, as do many really fine players, though there are fine players who don't. The general feeling one goes for is the same sort of push you would exert in an attempt...........to relieve constipation. I really can't describe it any better - sorry. The goal here is to achieve a full, rich sound that can only come from a very steady, focused stream of air, whatever school of thought you come from to arrive at that end.
.............Paul Aviles
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Author: rtmyth
Date: 2007-09-18 14:46
Gigliotti had much to say about this during his workshop at TBA many years ago. Perhaps he may have also written about it. Anyone know?
richard smith
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Author: kilo
Date: 2007-09-18 15:12
"The general feeling one goes for is the same sort of push you would exert in an attempt...........to relieve constipation."
The surgeon who repaired my inguinal hernia said that reed playing puts quite a stress on the diaphragm and forbid me from playing for six weeks after the operation.
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2007-09-18 15:21
Thanks Paul. I have been trying for the 'belly out' method and the main problem I have is that I can't maintain air for a long period without bringing in the abs. Unless I am trying too hard for it. I sometimes wonder if I'm actually doing it but, because I am on the thin side, it just looks like I'm not.
Although my 'ab workout' method has gotten me through grad school I am still interested in trying different things- even if the result is that I am just more content with what I had been doing already.
Post Edited (2007-09-18 15:26)
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Author: sdr
Date: 2007-09-18 15:48
Books by Keith Stein and David Pino both give excellent and detailed descriptions of breath support mechanics. It's always seemed to me a bit like squeezing a toothpaste tube -- if you squeeze from the bottom of the tube you have best control because the force can only go in one direction. If you squeeze in the middle of the tube the pressure goes both ways, with less control of what comes out the open end. Supporting your breath from the pelvis by firming pelvic and abdominal muscles (with belly in or out) means the only egress for your wind is out through the mouth, so you have more control of what goes through the horn.
-sdr
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-18 17:29
"apparently using the abs is not a good way to push air out" This is a very interesting comment. After my 238 word post I expected more direct reference to my post. Going by the responses I would have deduced my initial post was succinctly, Any thoughts on air support? I was looking for comments on my post. I would have preferred everyone disagreeing with me rather than just ignoring my post. Since I started this thread let me try to redirect things. Was my original post convoluted and difficult to understand? Is any part of the post more accurate than another part. Why do you disagree? I fully understand the written word can easily be interpreted in many ways. This response in not meant to be disrespectful of others on the board. I just wanted to get some direct feedback regarding a specific concept of mine.
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2007-09-18 18:08
I ignored the parts of the initial post that didn't quite line up with my definitions of things. Flexion means contraction. If you contract any muscle in the abdominal area other than the diaphragm, you will get a smaller cavity. Also, the abdominals as I see them, will help you do sit-ups, but it is the muscles between the ribs that cause the balancing refered to in Ken's post.
And lastly, though I may have already crossed the line of good taste several posts ago, I thought I may throw out a comment by a prominent conservatory instructor who said (and not that tongue-in-cheek), "Your best rehearsal will be the one in which you 5hit on yourself."
I don't fully agree with that, but it gets to the point of breath support.
...............Paul Aviles
Post Edited (2007-09-18 18:08)
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2007-09-18 18:18
The original post was indeed confusing. It sounded like you wanted hypotheses and conclusions based on anecdotal opinion regarding a topic probably better addressed by simply asking a specialist in a biological/anatomical field how it works.
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2007-09-18 23:47
From Arnoldstang- >"apparently using the abs is not a good way to push air out" This is a very interesting comment. After my 238 word post I expected more direct reference to my post.<
From my first post- >Not quite sure exactly what you are asking about, but...<
-----------------------
Sorry. I read it again twice and I really don't know what you are asking/commenting on.
Post Edited (2007-09-18 23:48)
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 01:57
skygardener....thanks for your feedback. I guess I wasn't clear.
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 02:20
Thanks Paul, Point taken about the word flexion. I meant to expand and hold that position. I think what you described in a "crude fashion" is exactly what I was getting at. That feeling for me is the basis of support I don't understand what it takes to push the stomach out or push down but I just assumed there was muscle contraction. thanks again
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 02:52
Alex, There are thousands of clarinet teachers out there. Everyone of them describes the breathing process to students. Surely there must be many analytical and eloquent teachers in that group. Your suggestion to "simply" ask a specialist would seem to be a direct route but why? Isn't there a clarinetist out there with this simple information.? Do you have any direct comments on my description of the process other than that the description was confusing? all the best John
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: EEBaum
Date: 2007-09-19 05:28
I don't have the answers... I've gotten by very well thinking of it metaphorically. Even when someone says "breathe from here" etc., I think it's fairly common that people do something else that has the same effect.
From how your question was phrased, it almost looked like an invitation for people to offer competing metaphors, each claiming to be what's really happening.
The metaphors I cling to, the ones that work best for me, are ones that don't even focus on any particular breathing mechanic.
Thing is, we don't have direct control of lots of bodily processes. We don't consciously make our hearts beat or our foods digest. And we don't control the minutiae of breathing. So, while there's surely a "what's actually happening" answer, I'd wager that most people approach breathing from a more metaphorical, meta-level. Sometimes the most useful answers aren't entirely technically accurate, but it's the useful ones that persist, and that our teachers pass on to us.
-Alex
www.mostlydifferent.com
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2007-09-19 11:23
Arnoldstang wrote:
>> I am trying to understand how we blow into the clarinet. Many articles are complicated and long on the subject.>>
Yes. Most of those long and complicated articles confuse rather than illuminate -- including, I have to say, the one by Arnold Jacobs.
I tried myself to sort the matter out in a thread on this BBoard; several other people joined in:
http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/read.html?f=20&i=714&t=714
...and I think that that thread, though more piecemeal, gives a better idea of the situation than the one that Ken Shaw posted above as representing me.
You wanted us to make comments on your original post, so I do so below. You may find that these comments make more sense in the context of the thread above.
>>Here is my take on this. We inhale while flexing muscles and expanding in the stomach area. This flexing out and down allows the diaphragm to do its' work during inhalation. ie .unfettering the lungs if you will.>>
In fact, the work of the diaphragm can occur without any extra muscle flexion in the stomach area. Those muscles can be as they are normally, when we are standing up, and are just pushed down and out by the movement of the diaphragm.
I need to provide a bit of background.
The most important thing to realise about any muscle is that it works only when it contracts. It bunches up -- 'flexes' -- and pulls on its points of attachment to other body parts. It can never do the opposite, by 'pushing' on them. But because we very often also want to be able to act in the opposite direction on those body parts, we usually have also attached to them another, 'opposing' muscle to do so -- which works also by pulling. So there is a division of labour between the two pulling muscles, and a resultant control of body movement.
The clearest example is probably our control of our lower arm, from the elbow down, by the two muscles 'biceps' and 'triceps', the biceps serving to bend the arm, and the triceps to straighten it.
Notice at this point that it's perfectly possible to use both these muscles simultaneously -- as body-builders do to 'show off' their muscular development. When a body-builder 'strikes a pose', their arm doesn't move -- but that's because the effect of the opposing biceps and triceps muscles cancels out. The only effect is to put a stress on the bones of the arm -- and make the muscles stand out, of course.
The abdominal group of muscles, when they contract, primarily serves to bend the torso at the waist -- as when we perform situps; and (as in the case of the biceps/triceps system) there is another group of muscles at the back that serves to straighten the body -- say, after we have bent over to pick something up.
And just like the biceps/triceps, a body-builder can show off both abs and back muscles in opposition, without moving.
BUT -- and here is the difference from the situation with the arm -- this oppositional flexing of abdomen and back muscles DOES have an effect on other parts of the body. The 'standing out' of the muscles has a squeezing effect on our guts, and it's this action that enables us to BLOW, by pushing the diaphragm upwards. So, blowing is an additional function of the abdominal muscles/back muscles system. (As other people have noted, assisting defaecation is another function of the system -- as, I imagine, is childbirth.)
In normal breathing, the diaphragm doesn't need an opposing muscle for its return -- the simple elasticity of the gut is enough. But when we pant, to recover after violent exercise, we use abdomen/back flexion to speed the return of the diaphragm.
>>..The stomach flexing has nothing to do with air flow. You can flex your stomach and exhale, inhale or remain neutral with no air flow.>>
Your second sentence is exactly true, as above. The diaphragm, acting downwards, can be overwhelmed by the stomach flexing (exhalation), can overcome the stomach flexing (inhalation) or be equal to the stomach flexing (remain neutral). But the first sentence is wrong, for exactly the same reason! It has everything to do with air flow, BUT IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE DIAPHRAGM.
>> The flexing somehow sets up an appropriately firm conduit for air flow. There is tension from the stomach up to the oral cavity. It is flexed and not relaxed.>>
I think this is wrong. There are no muscles governing the firmness of the trachaea, and even if they were they would be independent of the stomach. Nor is it necessary to change any internal properties of the mouth for acoustic reasons.
>> After this conduit is in place we can then move air by blowing. Blowing is a separate function. I'm not sure how we achieve this....perhaps it is the intercostal muscles.>>
Almost everyone is agreed that using intercostal muscles in order to blow is in general not a good idea -- I talk about that in the BBoard post referenced. Essentially (1) you don't need to (2) it complicates what is a very simple and beautiful system driven by abdomen/diaphragm.
I should say that I don't mention on the BBoard the function of back muscles (as opposition to the abdominal muscles, preventing the abdominal flexion from bending us at the waist) because I was concerned to keep the word 'opposition' for the relationship between the abdominal muscles and the diaphragm. Perhaps I should have -- ultimately it makes the matter clearer, because it's TRUE, even though the idea is slightly more complex.
To spell it out: in 'support', the actual opposition isn't between the diaphragm and the abdominal muscles; but rather between the diaphragm and the force generated by the opposition between the abdominal and back muscles.
>> In any case we don't have to teach people how to blow. We figure out how to blow as children.>>
We may not catch on to the power of deep, abdominal blowing, though. Compare -- we figure out how to talk, as children. Yet we can be helped to speak publicly to a large audience by being taught how to use our diaphragm more effectively. The two situations have many similarities.
>>Perhaps the oral cavity is an extension of this conduit. If the cheeks are puffed and oral muscles have no flex the conduit's work is ruined.>>
Dizzy Gillespie did quite well....
The common reason for not recommending blowing out the cheeks is that it can cause counterproductive distortion of the embouchure. (But as Gillespie showed, not for everyone;-)
Tony
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 14:28
Well, thanks for all this! Back to the Arnold Jacobs info.....he said don't use the valsalva.....he is one expert.... Paul disagrees and I think I'm with Paul on this. Stomach out and push down....that seems to be a ubiquitous technique in clarinetdom. Perhaps it is superfluous?
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 14:48
Thanks Tony, I must spend some time with your reply as there is a lot to digest. I'm not in this to debate but only to understand the process. Your reference to oral cavity is weak in my mind. Dizzy Gillespie with puffed cheeks and neck is not the way to go. It is fine in the jazz idiom as it produces an effect....relaxed, broad and free sound. Witness many beginning clarinet students who puff their cheeks....the sound is wooly, unfocused and blatty. The concept of a relaxed embouchure doesn't go this far! Certainly there is lots of room away from "ligit" clarinet where you don't have to sound like Marcellus and this opens up a miriad of tonal characteristics that allows for different oral cavities. My post strictly addresses the "ligit" clarinet tone generating process. I hope I haven't opened yet another "can of worms" here. I'll respond to the rest of your post later after I have a drink. John
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2007-09-19 15:30
Arnoldstang wrote:
>> Your reference to oral cavity is weak in my mind. Dizzy Gillespie with puffed cheeks and neck is not the way to go. It is fine in the jazz idiom as it produces an effect....relaxed, broad and free sound. Witness many beginning clarinet students who puff their cheeks....the sound is wooly, unfocused and blatty.>>
If you want another way of looking at it, I can say that I can myself quite easily produce a 'legit' clarinet tone, hardly different at all from my normal sound, with my cheeks well blown out.
You can probably verify that for yourself, with a bit of practice. (It's actually the first stage in learning to circular breathe.)
>> The concept of a relaxed embouchure doesn't go this far!>>
I thought you were in this to learn, not to debate?
Tony
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 17:27
Yes, I said I'm in this to "understand" the process. I retract my relaxed embouchure statement. I'm not in to this to debate for debate purposes and as such I will try to ask more questions rather than contradicting others. I am a compulsive arguer.... In a nutshell I am revisiting how I support the air while playing the clarinet. It seems in order to support I have to work. Push, tense, firm.....if I overdo this I become almost a rigid board in my approach. Is it accurate to describe Tony's approach as a relaxed approach to support? I would ask this question directly to Tony. How do you physically achieve support in your playing? John
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 17:37
Thanks Alex, Maybe that's where all the discussion ends up anyway.....metaphors. It just that I would like a neat package to describe what should be done. Maybe it doesn't exist.
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 18:12
I am currently reading Tony's articles. I appreciate him rehashing this subject which he already has written extensively about. I glean that Tony would flex the abdominals to support. I understand he utilizes varying degrees of support. How do you support more or less? Is this achieved through flexing the abdominals tighter or by pushing out more or in more? Pushing out or in....are these different muscles than the abdominals? John
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-19 19:11
I think maybe I understand the opposing muscle idea. I take it that in order to flex the abdominals we are in a sense trying to push out and pull in.....the result is muscle opposition..... Flexing?
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2007-09-20 16:35
John wrote:
>> How do you support more or less? Is this achieved through flexing the abdominals tighter or by pushing out more or in more? Pushing out or in....are these different muscles than the abdominals?>>
I didn't reply immediately to you about this because it's something that you can investigate for yourself, and I hoped you might do that. Here's what I find.
First, a word about taxonomy: not being a physiologist, I don't know what the standard nomenclature of these complex and inter-related muscle systems is. But regardless, in what is undoubtedly a simplification, I'm going to take 'abdominal' to refer to the muscles that bend the body around the midriff -- the ones you use in situps. I can flex those whilst continuing to stand upright, and check that in doing that they are opposed by back muscles -- as you would expect -- by feeling what happens there with my hand.
The muscle system that makes me look less fat in a bathing suit (whatever that's called), together with its opposite, seem to me to be essentially independent of the abdominal/back opposition I've just described. (I can bend and straighten my trunk whether I'm looking good or not:-) But, just from personal experience, I seem to be able to play the clarinet much better if I DON'T try to look good in that sense -- and it squares with the conventional wisdom (compare Paul Harvey's "The Clarinet Player's Bedside Book" on 'keeping your trousers up':-)
That's why in the BBoard post I tried to separate out 'blowing the instrument well' from 'playing with support', and suggested a reason why 'blowing the instrument well' probably equated to 'not pulling in'.
In reply to your:
>> How do you support more or less? Is this achieved through flexing the abdominals tighter or by pushing out more or in more?>>
...I would go back to my characterisation of 'playing with support' as 'blowing harder than you play' -- in other words, with your diaphragm (unfelt) resisting the squirty push upwards of your flexed abdominal/back system. For a given dynamic, therefore, 'more support' equates to 'greater abdominal flexion' (and also, greater unfelt diaphragm flexion).
The 'outward', 'being fatter' bit -- which I suggest has more of the quality of a 'relaxation' -- I think of separately, and try to have it be a part of my general performance demeanour both off- and on-stage. I notice that to do so often requires more of a conscious effort, and is made more difficult, if I am particularly concerned about my playing.
You later wrote:
>> I think maybe I understand the opposing muscle idea. I take it that in order to flex the abdominals we are in a sense trying to push out and pull in.....the result is muscle opposition..... Flexing?>>
So, what I wrote above doesn't amount to that.
Tony
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-21 03:32
Hi, I have done some physical experimenting. Lying on my back with hand on my abs I quickly inhaled. There was sudden push from the abs area. In the same position I tried exhaling quickly....I felt a flex but was unsure whether there was a push out or in. I also used some drinking straws to test support vs unsupported long tones. (blowing air) There was noticeable increase in duration of blowing with a supported air stream. It makes sense then that we support so we can play a long phrase. What is different other than that? Is the difference that support evens out uneven responses of various notes on the clarinet or is it evident in tone quality?
Freelance woodwind performer
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Author: Tony Pay ★2017
Date: 2007-09-21 10:11
John wrote:
>> Lying on my back with hand on my abs I quickly inhaled. There was sudden push from the abs area.>>
I find this too; it's what I would expect as the diaphragm pushes against the guts and therefore, indirectly, against the abs.
>> In the same position I tried exhaling quickly....I felt a flex but was unsure whether there was a push out or in.>>
If you look at what happens as you bend your arm suddenly, the biceps flexes OUT -- it cannot flex in, because of the bone of the upper arm. But in the case of blowing suddenly, the abdominal flex -- or rather, the combined abdominal/back flex -- generates the inward push on the guts that forces the diaphragm upwards.
You'd also expect SOME outward movement, I suppose.
>> I also used some drinking straws to test support vs unsupported long tones. (blowing air) There was noticeable increase in duration of blowing with a supported air stream. It makes sense then that we support so we can play a long phrase. What is different other than that? Is the difference that support evens out uneven responses of various notes on the clarinet or is it evident in tone quality?>>
It does seem, doesn't it, that there is a difference in tone quality between unsupported blowing and supported blowing if you play an isolated note. However, careful observation leads me to suppose that my embouchure tends to flex slightly to follow my abdominal flexion, though I can over-ride that consciously.
Further, I most often use a degree of support when -- for musical reasons -- I'm after a precisely controlled and concentrated sound, and it may be that whilst experimenting on myself I still unconsciously associate the two actions, abdominal and lip flexion, just because there's no particular musical reason to separate them. That would of course help to explain your experience of extended duration in long tones, because such an embouchure would tend to economise on airflow.
Apart from that, I can't see any particular reason why airflow generated by 'supported' blowing (blowing partially resisted, and therefore 'supported' by diaphragm action) should necessarily have any different qualities from airflow generated by unsupported blowing. It all has to pass through the lungs, mouth and so on, after all.
Of course, there can be an unfortunate 'creep' of tension from the abdominal muscles to other muscles, as possibly in the case of the lip, above, and in unthinking players, to arm and finger muscles -- that obviously has potential for damage. It needs to be guarded against both in oneself and in one's teaching.
The fact is, 'support' is a fine control system that, as you say, allows you to learn to iron out unevennesses of response; to learn to produce subtle dynamic inflections (even large and sudden dynamic inflections); and to learn to take fast, effective breaths -- if it is operating appropriately.
None of this detracts from the fact that there are other aspects to proper breathing that may be accessed by powerful, general metaphors, and that may have very striking positive effects on one's overall playing. 'Support' is just a part of it -- an important part, but not one that should be overdone. It's unfortunate that something that is so simple in practice should need so much careful discussion just because too many foolish people have obscured its simplicity.
By the way, it's the 'to learn to' bit of the penultimate paragraph above that's most important. Because, it's not the fact that you're 'supporting' that produces these effects; YOU produce them, albeit seemingly by magic, in LEARNING TO USE SUPPORT via modulations of diaphragm flexion in an elegant and unconsciously graceful way IN EACH INDIVIDUAL CASE -- just by listening to the result.
In short, support is useless unless coupled to the EARS.
Tony
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Author: Arnoldstang
Date: 2007-09-21 17:15
Thanks Tony , Now I'm beginning to see...... Stepping back for a minute from your "coupling of support and ears", and dealing with support by itself. Would you recommend the abs coming in naturally as we use up air on the clarinet as opposed to artificially trying to hold up your pants(no reference to suspenders) I take it that all of these procedures are learned and internalized. John ps My coupling prior to your post was definitely support and brain. excuse any paraphrasing of obvious points you have stated many times....
Freelance woodwind performer
Post Edited (2007-09-22 04:11)
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