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Sound of saliva and tonguing

Author: kozzy
Date: 2011-08-04 14:37

Hello,
I've just started clarinet (1 month ago, played violin and recorder before) and haven't got a teacher yet.

When I'm trying to do a staccato by applying the tonguing techniques that I have read on the Internet, I have two problems:
- I produce a lot of saliva and the sound doesn't turn very nice. But I don't understand how to get rid of that, since even naturally, it kind of makes sense to me that the more I'm moving my tongue, the more saliva I produce.
- Even before too much saliva comes to hinder the quality of the sound, the note always come with this saliva noise that is not very pleasant to hear. I tried to keep the surface of contact between the reed and the tongue as low as possible to try to reduce this wet sounding noise, but it doesn't work out very well.

I'll very much appreciate any advice on how to improve that. Just to specify, I found the sound of the notes (even in the high range) pretty good when I'm not trying to practice the tonguing. Before reading about this technique, I was just controlling the staccato with my abdominal muscles (I guess...) and I found it sounded so much better than with tonguing...

Thanks a lot for any help!

Post Edited (2011-08-04 14:38)

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Re: Sound of saliva and tonguing

Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2011-08-04 16:18

Firstly, make contact with the reed just below the very tip of the reed (so that you are not applying your tongue to the orafice formed by the mouthpiece and reed).

Then keep in mind that you are NOT striking the reed; you are only removing the tongue FROM the reed to produce sound.

Try using more air. I find that when an appropriate amount of air is passing through this opening, there is rarely any opportunity for moisture to get gummed up there. Of course, every now and then I have a big glop of saliva that moves into the top inside of the mouthpiece. The quickest, most expedient way to remove this is a quick, sucking back of the offending water to clear the area.

.............Paul Aviles

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