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Re: Growth to expect in tonguing speed

Author: Paul Aviles
Date: 2019-03-23 05:27

Couple of things.

I am glad to hear that your teacher is not dogmatic about anchor tonguing. It IS NOT a legitimate, classical technique. The only caveat there is that there are some pretty amazing players that use that method but it can hold you back.

The proper stance is to place the VERY TIP OF THE TONGUE (as pointed as a tongue can be that is) upon the very tip of the reed. Larry Combs (former principal of the Chicago Symphony) would draw a dot just at the very crest of the tip, at the very center and call for that to be the target for your tongue.

The other part of this is that I said PLACE your tongue. The tongue can ONLY stop the reed from vibrating. So it is best to think of the action of tonguing as moving quickly AWAY from the reed (after quickly placing it on the reed). There is only enough force required to prevent the reed from vibrating. Thinking "light" and "away" should help speed things up quite a bit.

HOWEVER

I firmly believe that the tongue is a muscle (well, a bunch of muscles) and as such some of us have "quick twitch musculature" and some of us have "slow twitch musculature." I further believe that there are a good number of us with a burning desire to be great clarinet players who are cursed with genetically slow tongues. As a "slow tunguer," I advocate to fellow "slow tongures" to learn double tonguing early on. You are still pretty new to all this and it may be too soon to worry about double tonguing, but it is something to keep in the back of your mind not too many years down the road.

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

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