Author: vboboe
Date: 2006-05-18 13:09
... it's a major challenge, tonguing
... it never ceases to amaze me how very fine-grained our motor muscle coordination has to be on oboe, fingers hovering and making tiny increments of movement, air support held in and squeezed just ever so exactly for dynamics and emotive content, lightest and most careful tonguing to get just the right amount of attack and emphasis when releasing air into the reed
... and of course, fine grain responsive reeds scraped just right so they're willing to sing beautifully
... but it isn't just oboe that's challenged with tonguing
... here i am in band, 'dynamically challenged' behind me by these big bright shiny brasses and saxes, and the saxes in particular have been told, on more than one occasion, to tongue more delicately, those big reeds are such a temptation to thunk vigorously
... here i am on oboe with its tiny reed, still trying to play just the tip, and prevent myself swallowing my reed which muffles my own sound (especially during the exposure of everybody sight reading new music!) and feeling around in my mouth for that optimum placement of reed so my own tongue, not yet muscularly fine-grained enough, can do tonguing with any degree of delicate rapidity
... my summer teacher gave me an exercise doing an adagio 2 octave scale in 4-4 16ths up which is supposed to last 2 minutes, every 16th note lightly single tongued, it's comically pathetic, my tongue's turned to aspic by 9 bars, but i have to admit that's progress from 3 bars when i started a year ago, it's given new enlightenment to the phrase 'just -- one (sixteenth) -- more'!
... light tonguing, and i mean light flicking of the very tip of the tongue, under the lower blade seems to be a good method, although very hard to maintain by under-developed tongue muscles while holding optimum embouchure with good jaw drop position (and dang impossible when the reed keeps sliding into mouth past the tip!)
... it all takes lots and lots of practice practice practice, and it takes time -- years for me in particular i reckon -- to build the tongue muscles so they're able to do rapid, accurate and very light tonguing movements over long periods of playing time
... i turn the reed over periodically so both blades get about equal treatment
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