 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Khefren Sackey
Date: 2016-04-06 03:41
I've been told for a very long time that long tones are key to a good tone, but is it really? What does long tones do that a regular playing session can't do? And what can I do to make long tones less boring?
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2016-04-06 03:44
Well, a long tone exercise can help you focus your attention on the sound/resonance but keep in mind any time you play notes without tonguing (no matter how fast) you are playing a long tone.
If you are predisposed to hate the idea, the standard idea of long tones is not necessary to achieve a great sound.
.............Paul Aviles
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Author: kdk
Date: 2016-04-06 04:45
The main advantage to long tones is the absence of fingering problems to distract you from thinking about the tone quality and about the shape of the tone as you begin and end it. You can practice control of crescendo and diminuendo, and you can put more focus on using air efficiently without worrying about playing notes or rhythms cleanly.
As Paul has already mentioned, anytime you play sustained (slurred) passage work, you are essentially doing the same thing but with more going on. Even when you add articulation, the basic approach shouldn't change. So long tones are the most simple form of playing.
You don't need to make a fetish out of playing long tones during every practice session. Slow-ish scales or other rudiments will gain similar benefits. Worse than anything is being seriously bored with what you're doing.
Karl
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Author: qualitycontrol
Date: 2016-04-06 05:03
I find they are useful to intersperse with legato or staccato technical work. The underlying air support has to be the same no matter what you're playing. For example, practice a long tone on low and high C for 8 beats, and then play a C major scale in the same tempo in sixteenth notes but make sure to channel the same air support that you are developing in the long tone into the scale. Then play it stacattissimo but keep the same air support in the scale, it's just the tongue that's interrupting the vibration of the reed, not the airstream that's getting interrupted.
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-06 05:30
''I've been told for a very long time that long tones are key to a good tone, but is it really? What does long tones do that a regular playing session can't do? And what can I do to make long tones less boring?''
All of the above responses are relevant to your question.
It IS boring, as you say. What I do is to set the instrument up comfortably and, at the same time do something else (ie) read my email, scan the electronic media, read the Clarinet BB.
The object for me is principally, to build up and retain lip muscle tone. It takes me about ten minutes only, of long tone playing, and then I can move on to something more interesting.
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Author: kdk
Date: 2016-04-06 05:34
ned wrote:
> What I do is to set the instrument up
> comfortably and, at the same time do something else (ie) read
> my email, scan the electronic media, read the Clarinet BB.
>
I can't comfortably support not paying attention to what you're doing when you practice. But whatever works...
Karl
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2016-04-06 06:02
Yeah, I'm sorry Ned, you'd be better off just surfing the interweb and playing later. You need the instantaneous feedback of listening or all is for naught.
...............Paul Aviles
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Author: JonTheReeds
Date: 2016-04-06 09:41
What makes long notes interesting for me is thinking about the sound, concentrating on embouchure, focusing on smooth finger movement, polishing intonation,refining mouth cavity shape, and experimenting with different tone colours. It's a musical laboratory
Obviously quite a lot going on, and often I'm not in the right frame of mind - what with life, work etc. getting in the way - so then I don't do it
You can use anything for long notes: Chromatics, scales, octaves, fifths, big jumps, difficult patterns, whatever
Keep it fresh, play around, stay interested. Just going through the motions has never worked for me, just a waste of time and effort. I find that the more you experiment, the more interesting it is, and the you more you get out
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The older I get, the better I was
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-06 09:48
''Yeah, I'm sorry Ned, you'd be better off just surfing the interweb and playing later. You need the instantaneous feedback of listening or all is for naught.''
& ''I can't comfortably support not paying attention to what you're doing when you practice. But whatever works...''
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Folks who do daily workouts in the gym or on the lounge room floor...or wherever..are just exercising their muscles and seem to get by with listening to the radio in the background or watching a TV on a treadmill.
The keyword is ''exercise''. I'm exercising too - my lip muscles - and it does not need a great deal of concentration. After decades of playing my concert F warm-up note, I'm pretty well attuned...the feedback IS there. I'm well aware if I'm not hitting that solitary note accurately.
The internet is closed off when I get down to the detailed intense stuff, of course.
Don't be sorry for me and all is NOT for naught, I should assure you. As Karl says ''But whatever works...". He's correct...it works for me.
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Author: Nessie1
Date: 2016-04-06 12:39
Hi Khefren,
To me, quite a lot of what you have been talking about in other posts hinges on this point.
Almost all the time your air should be flowing constantly whether there is tonguing breaking it up or not. I hope that you can understand that long tones will help with this.
This will then help your articulation which you mentioned as another issue - think "Air flowing" all the time then just lightly tongue.
Similarly with evenness of tone, try practising another form of long tones on very slow, slurred octaves - listening to the evenness and intonation. Go up 4 octaves as far as you can and then three.
To me long tones are not boring, they are a chance to enjoy your instrument and its sound which is surely one of the things which attracted it first.
Have fun and enjoy!
Vanessa.
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Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2016-04-06 15:40
Ned,
So there is no such thing as a good analogy. However, yours would mean that the point of your practice is to have fat lips.
If you are looking to be a good musician, then the sounds you make are most important, not those of Miley Cyrus.
................Paul Aviles
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Author: WhitePlainsDave
Date: 2016-04-06 17:25
Khefren: I don't mean to discount some good suggestions above about listening while you play, which not only will help you improve, but keep your mind focused. Making minor adjustments to my embouchure during long tones (and listening) has helped me get closer to the sound I seek.
But that said--and I feel a little bit like the child in "The Emperor's New Clothes" when I say this--aspects of clarinet practice can be....boring, (gasp) or perhaps less stimulating than practicing performance pieces: of course it depends on the player. (e.g. I enjoy etude books--I completely get that others don't.)
Repeating exercises until finger perfect at 120 bpm is as hard and monotonous, as it is necessary for improvement in our common love for clarinet. It, and an acceptance of less than perfect playing conditions can help make the player.
If its any consolation, all instruments and players have this in common.
Post Edited (2016-04-06 17:27)
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Author: Carmelo
Date: 2016-04-06 18:26
Found a nice thread on practice styles and long tones that is worth reading.
http://test.woodwind.org/clarinet/BBoard/read.html?f=1&i=54057&t=53791
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Author: kdk
Date: 2016-04-06 18:33
Khefren Sackey wrote:
> And what can I do to make
> long tones less boring?
Maybe to move the emphasis a little from what long tones can do to how to make them less boring, I might suggest simply not spending so much time on them. A few at the beginning of a practice session, maybe a single octave of some scale, each held out to enough length to focus on settling your embouchure and exercising your dynamic flexibility, and then off to something more active. I tend to use moderately paced scales for the same purpose. My fingers by now know the way well enough not to be a distraction, so I can concentrate on all the things long tone advocates find important.
Karl
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-07 08:00
Paul Aviles wrote (jokingly, I suspect) ''So there is no such thing as a good analogy. However, yours would mean that the point of your practice is to have fat lips.''
I may not have been using an analogy Paul. Perhaps my use of the word ''work-out'' baffled you. Maybe I would have been better advised to just use the word ''practice'' instead.
In any event, I was endeavouring to convey the image of oneself in the process of strengthening a particular set of muscles, as would the average person who lifts weights or runs or swims - or whatever - would wish to do.
Notice that I used the word ''average'' to distinguish most participants in exercise, from the serious pumpers of iron, who quite possibly, would be keen to have fat lips, in addition to fat pecs.
Part of Khefren Sackey's query was with regard to the playing of long tones as being boring - a thought with which I thoroughly concur.
I am pleased though, that you see the humour in all of this.
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Author: Bob Bernardo
Date: 2016-04-07 09:26
There's an ART to playing long tones correctly. Starting at low E at ppp < FFF > ppp. It should take about 15 to 20 seconds. To master the art of this everything MUST sound equal. The sound quality from ppp to fff back down to ppp, the intonation cannot change. What sounds best getting louder or getting softer? Then why? Whats going on with your embouchure? Did you run out of air early? Did you < too fast or slow, same with >? Then go to low E#, same thing. Continue up the scale.
You can also work on 12th's. Start with low C as a long tone at MF, hit the octave key and see if you can keep the G from blasting out. Same with all of the notes. Are the 12th's in tune? Most likely no... It's hard to master.
These exercises can take months and years to perfect. The final result is you will have one the finest sounds and complete control of the instrument in all of the registers not to mention an amazing embouchure.
This is kind of written for students that really want to become gifted pros. It's also written for those that have the extra hours to practice and put in quality practice time, such as 1 to 4 hours of practice a day. I'm not sure if the average player will benefit from this if they are in love with music, work full-time, play in a community band and orchestra and really don't have the time to practice everyday. Lets face it, if we work all day at a job well we are tired, we want to eat, relax, the wife/husband kids want attention, so locking yourself in a practice room could cause an unhappy marriage!
Designer of - Vintage 1940 Cicero Mouthpieces and the La Vecchia mouthpieces
Yamaha Artist 2015
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Author: mameshiba
Date: 2016-04-07 19:26
Bob Bernardo wrote:
> You can also work on 12th's. Start with low C as a long tone at
> MF, hit the octave key and see if you can keep the G from
> blasting out. Same with all of the notes. Are the 12th's in
> tune? Most likely no... It's hard to master.
Hi Bob,
This is a very interesting topic, now that my 10 year old son is playing clarinet, and its true, long tones could be boring. I don't understand what do you mean by the 12th.
We just did a father and son clarinet practice earlier and did long tones.
Thank you
Bambang
My son is learning to play clarinet now!
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Author: Ed
Date: 2016-04-07 19:27
I think that it is important to really focus on the details of your sound- the color, the nuances, matching to other pitches, resonance and core, stability of tone and pitch. Be aware of how slight manipulations of the embouchure, tongue position, angle of the instrument, air speed, amount of mouthpiece, etc, all affect the tone. Try to emulate the sound of players you admire.
In time, with careful, thoughtful work, you will learn to achieve your ideal tone. Add in dynamics and intervals as Bob suggests. Try to make the work you do on the clarinet "quality time", or to use a popular term, "mindful". Be aware of what you are trying to achieve and have a goal. To just sit and drone on in a mechanical fashion without complete awareness to what you are doing does not accomplish much.
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-09 12:04
Ed wrote: ''I think that it is important to really focus on the details of your sound- the color...''
Colour, I venture to say, is not a term I would use to describe the sound of a clarinet. What other term would be more descriptive of the picture you are conveying?
Someone else wrote regarding the tone of Yona Ettlinger's clarinet as being '' incredibly pure''. As opposed to what? Impure? Something else?
These terms, when applied to a clarinet sound, are fairly meaningless.
Is is not my intention to deride someone who is trying to describe an action or event or the perceived quality of something, but let's try to find more appropriate nomenclature.
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Author: Morrigan
Date: 2016-04-09 15:00
For me, long tones consist of physically warming up. Simply breathing, maybe light stretching, and paying attention. Attention is the most important thing: is there tension as you're doing something as simple as breathing in? Are you sure you're ONLY breathing in and not raising shoulders, or tensing a part of your leg? Things like this will keep you playing better and for longer.
Then once you're actually making a sound, again you're PAYING ATTENTION. What's the sound like? Loud, soft, harsh, is there a buzz, does it have ring? Then you can use your imagination a bit: play blue, play pink, play dark, play fluffy.
Your long tone practice will be over in no time, and you will be a little zen-like and have learned that little bit more about yourself and your abilities.
To me, this is why long tone practice is relevant.
Trust me, I'm one of the few lucky ones who get paid to play the clarinet for a living.
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Author: Ed
Date: 2016-04-09 15:43
Ned- the term tone color or timbre is not new to the discussion of music. Plenty of definitions are available. For example, a quick search found-
Sound "quality" or "timbre" describes those characteristics of sound which allow the ear to distinguish sounds which have the same pitch and loudness. Timbre is then a general term for the distinguishable characteristics of a tone. Timbre is mainly determined by the harmonic content of a sound and the dynamic characteristics of the sound such as vibrato and the attack-decay envelope of the sound.
Feel free to use other terms that are meaningful to you.
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-10 07:53
''Ned- the term tone color or timbre is not new to the discussion of music....''
Yes, of course, although I didn't see the word timbre used in the post immediately above mine Ed. This word conveys a little more meaning to me I would say, although it's still inadequate. I think all words are pretty much inadequate. Hearing is the only way to distinguish one sound from another - that is - in any meaningful way, and we can't do this on a bulletin board very effectively.
Perhaps correspondents who are wishing to convey their perceptions of tone could search out electronic links for us to listen to, whilst at the time writing up their comments of the performances contained in these links.
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''Be aware of what you are trying to achieve and have a goal. To just sit and drone on in a mechanical fashion without complete awareness to what you are doing does not accomplish much.''
I for one, am completely aware of the purpose of using long tones - for this correspondent - it is to strengthen the lip muscles. As I alluded to earlier it is a workout, its purpose is not to teach me anything new, but rather, to ENABLE me to learn something new.
I need to cross the discomfit barrier daily, before I can play anything meaningful or teach myself something new.
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Author: DaphnisetChloe
Date: 2016-04-10 12:06
Well I thought the purpose of long tones was to improve your sound; to increase the beauty of your tone. But oh well...
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Author: Morrigan
Date: 2016-04-10 12:17
Ned, do you have any sound clips of your playing? I'd love to know if simply 'exercising' the lip while having your mind on something else works. If it does, I'd certainly adopt the practice!
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Author: Ed
Date: 2016-04-10 17:15
To me, timbre and tone quality are the same and I use them interchangeably. Perhaps others perceive it differently. I would agree that words are somewhat inadequate and open to interpretation.
I am not discussing one particular type of tone, but how to refine one's sound and make the session productive, addressing the original question. I leave it to each player to find their ideal, which is why I mentioned trying to emulate the qualities of your favorite players.
I tend to agree with the statement above from DaphisetChloe. To use a term popular with runners and cyclists, I try to avoid "junk miles". If others prefer different methods, that is great.
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Author: seabreeze
Date: 2016-04-10 18:51
In response to the request for a video demonstrating productive ways to practice long tones, I suggest watching Scott Andrews' YouTube video on sound production for the clarinet. Search YouTube for
Sheldon Online Music Academy: Scott Andrews Clarinet Sound Production.
He demonstrates particularily the kind of practice that Bob Bernado suggested in his post in this thread, including varying the dynamics by crescendos and diminuendos.
Personally I think there is little or no value in just "exercising" lip muscles in a distracted sort of way while you are multitasking on some other activity. The entire purpose of lip training is to produce a certain sound and quality of music performance. For this, absolute concentration rather than a divided mind is the ideal. The legendry trumpet player, Aldolph Herseth, who played principle trumpet for over 50 years in the Chicago Symphony, counseled his students never to practice but always to perform. Don't absent mindedly practice or "work out" on a C major scale; shape the scale into a beautiful sound object. No one is listening to weightlifters, cross-fit trainers, or marathon runners when they do their work-out, but someone is ALWAYS listening to musicians when they make sounds.
Its up to you to always sound good, even if you're just testing the instrument for leaks, breaking in a new reed or warming up. If you just honk, you will sound like a duck call, not a musician, even if your lips are strong enough to crush walnut shells. You can never really separate your "exercises" from the sounds you make. As a musician you are, par excellence, a sound maker. You are like a rain maker; you can shake your rattles and say your magical spells all you like, but if the drought-ending rain doesn't fall, you are a humbug. The magic for you is in the SOUND, and (if I may change the metaphor) like a good genie it won't come our the lamp without stroking. That requires rapt attention, not mindless distraction and monumental muscle work.
I always think of what Wenzel Fuchs, Berlin Philharmonic, said on the subject of tone production. "The sound begins in the mind." He didn't say to first get abs of steel and lips of titanium, and then the sound will follow--because it doesn't.
In reality, your lips need only strength enough to produce the sound you want and need in your musical environment and the endurance to sustain it. I believe this is the point Tony Pay was making on the recent double lip and Ettlinger threads. Pushing down on your top lip flexes the bottom lip, but to produce the sound you need in any given passage, too much flexing might be the wrong choice. In fact, you may need to relax the muscles and apply less pressure at any given moment. How would you know what sound you want, if you practice in a fog of other activities that compete for your attention? That would be like DaVinci practicing on iron man hand squeezers or rock climbing up walls to build up his forearm muscles and finger strength when he really wants to paint the Mona Lisa. How much "force" does it take to apply the brush to the canvas and get the tone and texture you want? How much force does it take to sound like Harold Wright, or Cahuzac, or Sabine Meyer, or Fuchs, or you, at your very best? Probably not all that much. Finesse, control, focus, color, expressiveness require something other than just muscle tone and strength, and you have to LISTEN to yourself with at least 4 ears (yours and a member of your omnipresent audience) to find that elusive element.
So, to get back to the original question of what you can do to make long tones less boring, the answer is you can paint with them and make music out of them, and that should never be boring.
Post Edited (2016-04-10 22:52)
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2016-04-10 18:55
Some learning can happen without the conscious mind focusing on it. The muscles act, the ears hear, the nerves feel, and the unconscious mind adjusts. Sometimes the conscious mind can actually slow up the process by focusing on less relevant aspects or prioritizing things wrong. That's SOMETIMES.
In the past I've practiced resistant technical passages while watching television. The passages got better, and it didn't take very long. That surprised me, yet it was repeatable. If you don't believe it, try it.
I haven't done that in years, but I can't discount said method. It brings into question the degree that conscious, foreground brain focus is required during practice. After all, the goal is to be able to perform the muscular activity without conscious thought - why can't we just practice that?
So, Ned, what you do sounds reasonable to me. However, you lost me with your problems with terminology. I think that metaphoric terms descriptive of people's subjective response to different clarinet sounds are about as good as you can get, words all being fairly approximate anyway.
If instead you listed numerical strengths of specific audible frequencies it might be more accurate, but it would fail to convey an experience to anyone, except perhaps to those mathematically inclined enough to nitpick it anyway. Legalese attempts to avoid misunderstanding, but at that it invariably fails, and only prevents many from understanding at all.
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Author: seabreeze
Date: 2016-04-10 19:34
Philip,
I Agree that you can train your fingers that way to remember the paths between the notes, because fingers have excellent muscle memory, and you are just trying to show them which way to go. Once they have become accustomed to the path, you can then use direct brain control to make them more legato or snappy or whatever you want. Jose Franch-Ballester says that when he is travelling in airplanes, he often reads through difficult passages or finger taps them from memory, without having a clarinet in hand. This works great for the fingers, and is a technique I like to practice. But in sound production, you want your lips to "memorize" not just any old foghorn sound that seeps out but rather beautiful shading, coloration, and phrasing. How are you going to do that if you don't even pay attention to the quality of the sound? Then you would be asking the lips to memorize or recall quite pedestrian and uninteresting production of sound. That would become an ingrained habit. Instead, you want your lips to remember the most interesting and musical sounds that they can produce. I would say the boredom element creeps in precisely because one is not paying attention to the sound of the long tones. If they were paying attention, they wouldn't be bored. How can a player be bored with their own playing when they are really sounding good???
One trick that experienced players can use to make long tones more interesting is to practice them sequentually on several very good but different-sounding mouthpieces. Wow, this would be great for Debussy, or this would be perfect for Brahms, or this is just fine for the Martino Set for Clarinet, this one is better indoors, and the other one close up in a small hall. But that advice would not apply to most beginner or intermediate players, who are understandably trying to get a nice sound out of just one mouthpiece. Still they could learn to use it when trying different reeds. Which reed gives the most focus? Which the most cover? The most depth? And so on.
Ridenour has a good youtube video on players who never listen to great clarinetists and therefore never establish a reasonable model to imitate. As a result they have no idea of how they might want to sound on the instrument, and their sound never really gets any better in musical qualities no matter how much they practice (though it might get louder and more overbearing as they gain in "strength.") Again "the sound begins in the mind." not the distracted mind, but the focused goal-oriented mind. And long tones are all about making interesting sounds, not "stengthening" the lips. When you find the captivating sound, then the lips are doing what they should to make it. Neither more pressure and strength nor less. That's the "sweet spot" a player wants to ingrain in their playing. Each time you play you want to recover the sweetest spots in your sound that you have discovered, just as painters want to acheive the exact shading and tint to realize their artistic vision. Think of how the Impressionists studied the way a cathedral looks when different angles and degrees of sunlight engulf it. Approached in that way, long tones are no less interesting than light rays. Listen to Daniel Bonade play on the old recording of Afternoon of a Faun. The way he "materializes" the long tone entrance, both matching and contrasting with the flute timbre. Listen to Harold Wright on the first few long tones in the clarinet entrance to Schubet's Shepherd on the Rock recording with Benita Valente. What could be more interesting or deserve more attention than these? Nothing boring about them--not if you really like music. The long tones in the Pines of Rome clarinet solo are another possible model for the player to internalize. How to sound smooth and even the way McLane or Wright (or other great players) do in this solo. Any book of clarinet orchestral excerpts can supply many more examples, especially when studied with a good teacher. Or the opening Bb to the Weber Concertino. That is a long tone that should sound really good to catch the listener's attention.
Post Edited (2016-04-10 23:17)
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-11 09:05
DaphnisetChloe wrote “Well I thought the purpose of long tones was to improve your sound; to increase the beauty of your tone. But oh well...’’
If your instructor taught you this – well and good – but do I detect a note of sarcasm with your ‘’But oh well…’’ sign-off?
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Morrigan wrote ‘’ Ned, do you have any sound clips of your playing? I'd love to know if simply 'exercising' the lip while having your mind on something else works. If it does, I'd certainly adopt the practice!’’
I’m unsure precisely what you are asking here - what would you like to hear? If you genuinely want to hear what I sound like, I could possibly find something to put up. Perhaps you could reciprocate with a sound clip of yourself?
With your credentials clearly shown though, I suspect you may have your tongue firmly planted in your cheek. And, yes, exercising my lips DOES work.
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Ed wrote ‘’ To use a term popular with runners and cyclists, I try to avoid "junk miles". If others prefer different methods, that is great.
At the age of sixty eight I have learned not to waste my time on non-essential activities. I don't think that junk miles has anything much to with what I pursue.
My ‘’work-out’’ IS essential, and it can be done whilst I do other undemanding tasks and it works for ME. This may be the third time that I have mentioned this in this thread.
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Seebreeze wrote ‘’ Personally I think there is little or no value in just "exercising" lip muscles in a distracted sort of way while you are multitasking on some other activity. The entire purpose of lip training is to produce a certain sound and quality of music performance’’
By ''lip training'' you DO include long tones, I presume? Clearly, it is not just for the attainment of a ''certain sound''. It's not MY reason for playing long tones and others on this BB seem to agree.
And also…
’’ In reality, your lips need only strength enough to produce the sound you want and need in your musical environment and the endurance to sustain it''
‘’..endurance to sustain it…’’ Precisely! If I tried to play musically meaningful passages immediately – from ’’cold’’ as it were – it would be junk. It takes me about ten minutes to cross the discomfort barrier, prior to playing something meaningful. I’m sure I stated this too, in an earlier post.
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Philip Caron wrote “So, Ned, what you do sounds reasonable to me. However, you lost me with your problems with terminology. I think that metaphoric terms descriptive of people's subjective response to different clarinet sounds are about as good as you can get, words all being fairly approximate anyway.’’
Yes, I think you are correct. It is extraordinarily difficult to find words to describe sounds adequately.
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Author: Bob Bernardo
Date: 2016-04-11 13:39
mameshiba - Hi! You asked what 12ths are. I don't get to read this site everyday so forgive the delay in responding to you question. With the flutes and saxophones when you hit the octave key you hit the next octave. For example if you play a low C you will hit the C above it, however on the clarinet you will go past the C to a few notes higher called the 12ths. So an octave is 8 notes higher with the sax and the flute, but on the clarinet it is 12 notes higher, thus the name 12ths. Hope this makes sense.
Good question. Bob
Designer of - Vintage 1940 Cicero Mouthpieces and the La Vecchia mouthpieces
Yamaha Artist 2015
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Author: D Dow
Date: 2016-04-15 00:56
Without getting into a semantics discussion I feel long tones are primarily important for clarinet. To make a beautiful and sustained sound on clarinet is not easy.
On top of this...
the avoidance of the dead sine wave sound will show a player is not mature or just plain unimaginative. Eveness is great but shows the lack of technique in this matter.
The music is going somewhere always...so be sure to know when to alter the tone color...ie at the end of phrases or changes in harmony. There are loads of solos where the clarinet begins by playing a sustained note...so even at low volumes a nice tone must carry and also be part of the overall line. Make sure the pitch is steady but never drops or is overtly sharp at the end and beginning of long notes. Practice holding notes with a well tuned piano and work on disappearing into the sound of the piano like a soft echo.
David Dow
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Author: Bob Bernardo
Date: 2016-04-16 16:52
OK here is a simple example. The orchestra I'm in is playing the Beethoven Egmont piece. Not hard, just maybe 6 notes quarter notes repeated with the oboe ad the flute several times during this beautiful amazing composition. There are very simple slurred solo's right in the 4th measure starting with an E to a D then slurred to high C. Quarter notes. That high C WILL pop out. Out of control. Without long tones, a decent reed, great breath control going from the middle D at pp to high C will pop out at F and stick out like a wrong note. Do you want this to happen? Not me. Took me 45 minutes of practice to get a beautiful smooth transition from the D to the high C for several days. Sure I could forget about it and just play the high C at forta but it's wrong. Deadly wrong. This will be recorded on PBS in May. I soft reed won't work. A long facing and a close tip opening for me won't work. As a double lip player I have to toy a Matson short facing with a 1.05 tip opening and a 4 Steuer Advantage Austrain German cut reed that that fits the Frech mouthpieces and has a thinker tip. The rehearsals are finally going in the right direction. My lips hurt a bit from double lip playing. The sound quality with the La Vecchia mouthpiece, a Chedaville copy, but darker, is is getting a lot of feedback from the orchestra members. A pure liquid velvety sound. So practicing 30 to 45 minute on just the 5 notes repeated throughout the Beethoven piece sounds like liquid purity. I've always had a great to professional sound.
Practice your long tones and the 12ths, also extreme breathing control.
Again these are just 4 or 5 or 6 notes throughout the piece, make every note could like Mercellus Wright, and Gennusa.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kFlERWZSTg Marcellus with George Szell.
The Solti recording is good, but I like Szell's temple better. /a mean **************, not too liked by musicians, but he got what he wanted out of the musicians and he redesigned the Severace Hall in Cleveland to , made it smaller to fit the orchestra sound better. Bringing in the walls. You can't go wrong with either. Later after Szell died the hall was was expanded twice, but the best recordings, were from the 60's and 70's. Perhaps the worlds best orchestra at the time. Not just Marcellus, but excellent musician. Georg had an incredible ear, to balance the orchestra. He added basses. I think 3, to get that right sound. Just an example.
Remember these are just 4 or 6 quarter slurred notes. You cannot in a million years play these without long tone practice going from pp < fff > to pp without complete breath control and amazing sound form practicing long tones for years - if you want to be a big league top professional including amazing having a respected top symphony sound. Each notes have to be the same same volume and loudness. The notes are hooted together as one unit. I went way overboard here, but this is what it takes to get on PBS TV and just play notes with no real meaning won't make it on PBS or recordings . Hope this helps how important sound and long tomes, 12th's work together, as well as breath, reeds and mouthpieces. It's not easy work. Bob
Designer of - Vintage 1940 Cicero Mouthpieces and the La Vecchia mouthpieces
Yamaha Artist 2015
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Author: JHowell
Date: 2016-04-20 08:56
Check out Marcel Moyse's "Tone Development Through Interpretation." The works he uses are a bit much, but I think the concept is excellent. As soon as students are capable of understanding what a phrase is, I try to get them to use simple tone studies in lieu of long tones. A beautiful sound is good. A beautiful sound across an interval is better. A beautiful sound carrying a musical idea is best.
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Author: Wes
Date: 2016-04-20 11:45
Because the clarinet is so easy to get a sound out of, many clarinetists and saxophonists never learn to breathe to play musically. Long tones help a lot because one can practice relaxed breathing at the same time. The ppp-fff-ppp long tones in 18 counts are really necessary. The low E for 8 counts to the middle B for 8 counts, as done by Grizez, Handlon, Marcellus, et al is also important. It's easy to write about, but not so easy to achieve.
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Author: Ed
Date: 2016-04-20 19:17
To add to what Bob and others have mentioned, it is difficult to play with great sound and control at all dynamics. To be able to play with a range of colors and sounds to fit different styles and situations adds a whole other element. Listen to Harold Wright and hear the range of color, depth and personality that he could achieve and how he could mold his sound to fit the music. Add intervals and register jumps to the mix and you find a world of things to challenge you and add to your range as an artistic and musical player. All of these can be part of good warm up and tone study.
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Author: seabreeze
Date: 2016-04-20 19:45
Ah, yes, the last 4 posts explicate why long tones are musically interesting and why it is best to listen rather than "space out" into some distraction when you play them. Long tones are an intrinsic part of all music and they require regular and careful attention. As these posts have said, long tones can be isolated, or played across intervals, or as part of a musical phrase. If you are bored or distracted when you play them, your audience is also likely to be bored and distracted. A yawn elicits another yawn; a smile and a wink, another smile or wink.
Post Edited (2016-04-20 20:00)
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Author: Philip Caron
Date: 2016-04-20 19:48
Regarding clarinet tone, what are colors? How are they done? How are they chosen? How are they perceived?
As a long-time listener to numerous recordings, plus a few pros in live performance, I'm skeptical about this.
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Author: seabreeze
Date: 2016-04-20 20:52
Philip,
You may enjoy reading this opinion from David Hattner:
http://chnani.perso.neuf.fr/ejma/tonemails.html.
Hattner makes the valid point that the busy schedule of many pros precludes their having the time to practice long tones. Better to spend time practicing scales and arpeggios and actual passages from the music they have to perform. Who can argue with that? He also thinks that clarinetists are too sensitive to concepts like "color" in the tone and that their minute distinctions do not carry over to anything that audiences can perceive especially in orchestral performance. That may also be true.
But notice he does not make a case for practicing in a distracted, non-caring way. If a player need not listen for suble tone color shadings, they still must listen very carefully for rhythmic accuracy, tuning, and blend. But that, also, involves long tones (as well as short tones and everything inbetween). Music is everything that goes into it, not just beautifully shaded long tones. Who can argue with that? He also says listen to Wright and Marcellus, who incidentally happen to be masters of long tones and beautiful shading, in single tones, bridging interval tones, and in connected musical phrases. Ha, Ha. So the more we try to escape long tones, the more they return to haunt us?
Personally I prefer to practice intervals for flexibility. Like the Expanding interval study No 25 on page 166 of the old Lebanchi method. I do these as slow quarter tones first and then gradually increase the speed, trying for the best legato I can get. My main principle is always to listen to what I am playing and take a personal interest in it rather than playing it in a distracted, ho-hum, chewing gum way. But like many other players, I will ride the rainbow of tonal coloration when I can. That just means, can I make this passage with more or with fewer overtones, more pointed, more blunt, more focused, more cloudy. Everyone can do this. If you think "buzz" the tone brightens; if you think "woo," the tone darkens and deepens. Babies can do this when they're born. They can google, and boodle, and coo, and rasp, and razz. The human animal, clarinetist or not, is a creature of a thousand sounds.
Post Edited (2016-04-20 21:34)
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Author: Morrigan
Date: 2016-04-20 21:28
Ned, a link to my SoundCloud is in my signature. Go have a listen. For the record, when I work on tone, I'm not doing anything else, just consciously working on tone.
PS. Hope my hometown is as lovely as ever, I want to move back in the next few years!
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-21 07:21
seebreeze writes ''Ah, yes, the last 4 posts explicate why long tones are musically interesting and why it is best to listen rather than "space out" into some distraction when you play them.''
That's fine for them.
Just for the record though, I for one, don't just ''space out'' distractedly. I'm just doing lip exercises.
I then move on to more exacting practice, similar I guess, to the sorts of things you folks have mentioned in your preceding posts. Part of my more exacting practice, will naturally enough include long tones.
My initial ten minutes is a limbering up, or workout, if you like...sigh...hopefully I have nailed it with this explanation.
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Author: Ed
Date: 2016-04-21 16:20
While I respect David Hattner's fine playing and musicianship, I see things a little differently. I don't think tone study has to be a huge part of one's practice time.
As to tone colors, I would think of it as the ability to mold your sound in many ways. Make it sound more like an oboe or flute or other instrument, create a penetrating intense sound, a sound that may have a little less character to blend and melt into an ensemble, work to develop a sound with more or less overtones, etc. There are countless variations one can come up with. Use your musical judgement when playing to determine what character best fits the piece you are playing. Experiment with slight variances in air, embouchure, vocal cavity to see how they affect the tone.
There is an interesting video with Don Menza showing differences that he can achieve in tone on his sax to emulate different players. Some of it is about how he musically approaches each passage, but also how he alters his playing to get different tones or colors.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Oc0VzGBPxY
It is likely that you would use a more subtle approach in a classical setting on clarinet, but he makes some good points.
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Author: MoonPatrol
Date: 2016-04-23 02:51
If you practice while reading or observing content, you are cheating yourself. What are you going to do playing Beethoven's ninth when you have that long tone B at the very beginning of the piece? I hope not thinking about some data you saw while playing a B.
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Author: ned
Date: 2016-04-23 03:41
MoonPatrol wrote: ''If you practice while reading or observing content, you are cheating yourself....''
I say yet AGAIN...
''...I'm just doing lip exercises. I then move on to more exacting practice, similar I guess, to the sorts of things you folks have mentioned in your preceding posts. Part of my more exacting practice, will naturally enough include long tones. My initial ten minutes is a limbering up, or workout, if you like...sigh...hopefully I have nailed it with this explanation.''
***************************************
I guess I didn't make my point clear.
I give up.
This is my last comment.
I don't care at all, if you agree or not, if you can't get it through your head that different people practice in different ways, then you're the loser, not me.
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Author: alexoclarinetto
Date: 2016-04-25 00:21
It's very important to always do long tones, it helps you not only in your tone, you get more endurance and a tone more consistent in all the registers
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2016-04-25 03:32
William Kincaid used to have students play a difficult passage on a single note. He said that the music was not in the notes but in your head.
I use my long tone practice to play slow slurred major and minor scales, straight and in thirds, around the circle of fifths, concentrating on evenness, support and making music.
Ken Shaw
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The Clarinet Pages
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