 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: alanporter
Date: 2012-12-20 01:55
I am a self taught, senior citizen amateur, on soprano and bass clarinets, mostly for my own enjoyment and occasionally with community concert bands.
I have let myself down by not practicing for the past five or six months and now that I have started again, I find that I am playing tremolo on all but sixteenth notes.
I would very much value some advice from the generous members of this board. Thank you.
Alan
tiaroa@shaw.ca
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Author: Tony F
Date: 2012-12-20 03:04
Sounds as though your embouchure muscles have lost their condition. You'll need to build up your chops again. I'm a bit like you in terms of age, and I know that as we get older we lose our chops more quickly than when we were younger and they take a bit longer to build up again. Just keep playing and they'll come back OK, but don't overdo it. Muscles driven to the point of collapse take longer to recover than muscles driven to a point short of exhaustion.
Tony F.
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Author: Wes
Date: 2012-12-20 05:07
Could you try long tones, 8 beats on low E and then press register key for 8 counts on middle B, plus on other notes. I've seen this phenomenon on two other people but did not see a solution for it. Good luck!
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Author: kevinbarry
Date: 2012-12-20 17:33
I too am a senior citizen who gave up for a long time and restarted quite recently. When I began again I could only manage 8 minute sessions before my lip gave out. I have built them up to (currently) over half an hour, twice a day. The sessions get longer slowly.
I find starting on low E and blowing pp for 8 seconds, then increasing the effort to around mf for another 4 seconds, then tailing it down until I run out of puff helps strengthen my embouchure. After E I go up in octaves to E below the stave, E in it etc doing the same thing - depending on the reed and my energy that day I might make E above the stave, but mostly I guess I don't manage it!
Then on to low F and I repeat the process (not managed a reasonable F above the stave yet), followed by F#, G etc until I get bored and my lip has had enough.
At this point I take a break for maybe 5 minutes then try an etude to get my fingers moving.
I tried starting the long notes by doing bottom E, followed by middle B, (then bottom F followed by middle C and so on) as suggested earlier, but I decided I did not like the sound of the interval all that much so went to octaves instead. I can tell if the top one is in tune or not more easily that way too.
I do this daily, other than a couple of weeks back when I had a bad cold and stopped totally for a week. It took a couple of days or so to get back to where I had been.
I usually finish off a session by playing a couple of songs from a "Real Book" I bought, just to remind myself that music exists in addition to the exercises.
We are all individuals so IMHO whatever works best for you is what you should do. As long as you are doing some long notes each session, your lip has to get stronger.
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Author: alanporter
Date: 2012-12-20 19:00
My thanks to the three of you. Good advice from each of you. What a blessing this bboard is.
Alan
tiaroa@shaw.ca
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Author: MichaelW
Date: 2012-12-21 21:39
I am 72 and play sitting. My teacher advised me to rest the bell on my knees (he said many orchestra clarinettists do so) for steadying the embouchure and relaxing.
Post Edited (2012-12-21 21:41)
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