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Author: joeyscl
Date: 2007-02-04 07:46
Well, uptil the past thursday, I haven't really practiced/played the week prior. Now when i had my lesson on thurday, i was able to tongue lightning fast ( well, to me it is). In fact it was faster than my teacher(or so he says). Now that i have practiced for 2,3 days, my Tonguing has slowed down to a crawl of a max of Very-early-100s. This is the speed that i had before i took the week of break. What gives? Any suggestions? Its also a fact that I have only learned the proper tonguing technique a month or 2 prior...i've been doing it wrong all these years and it was only recently that we decided to fix it.
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Author: William
Date: 2007-02-05 12:26
Hmmm......sounds kind of like when I used to be able to bowl 190s all the time, but took a class to learn how to throw the ball "properly" and could not break 110!!! If it "ain't broke, why fix it". Perhaps there's a little bit of over analysis paralysis going on here and your tightening up. Try to accept your instructors recommendations as guidelines, not mandates. If your tongue was already fast, maybe only a slight tweaking of your technique is necessary, not a complete overhaul. Take what works for you without the extra baggage that may not. In the end, it's performance that matters, not perfection. Nobody can argue with Robert Spring's articulative mastery ("Dragons Tongue" CD), but there is probably something about his technique that is "not quite right" if you could analyse microscopicly enough. But when he plays like he does, who cares if his tongue may not hit the reed just right!!! If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Just kick the tires and check the oil--then (with only a quick check of your roadmap) step on the gas and keep on going................................most importantly, see all there is to see and have fun along the muscial way.
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Author: skygardener
Date: 2007-02-05 15:12
just like any muscule, it can get slow from over working. building good technique will make practice benificial- as redundant as that sounds.
-S
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Author: joeyscl
Date: 2007-02-06 05:56
Well, sorry, i guess i wrote in a confusing manner. BEFORE WE FIxed it, my max wasn't even 90. Then after i FIXed it, it was maybe a little over 100 ON A GOOD Day. Then after the ONE week of REST, it was like like 140+... then after i practice for 2~3 days, went back to 100... It didn't slow down gradually, i was just suddenly unable to tongue as fast as i could Right after the 1 week of rest. I have a feeling that my Tongue is TEnsing up and not relaxed... any excercises to help me relax my tongue? (Meditation? lol)
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Author: Kchui999
Date: 2007-02-06 06:06
I experience the same thing after playing for about an hour. My teacher and I have yet to isolate a problem besides "you're tongue is getting tired." If anyone else has any tips on how to keep the speed and crispness(?) consistent, I would like to hear it as well.
BTW....what I know the numbers (90...100...140...etc) correspond to speed, but how so? anyone care to explain?
Chui
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Author: Tobin
Date: 2007-02-06 14:10
Hello Chui,
90, 100, 140 BPM or Beats Per Minute.
Hello Joey,
One idea you could explore would be to give your tongue a greater amount of rest between tongue excersises. This presumes that your tension and decrease in speed comes SOLELY from the articulation itself.
If your tongue is tensing from playing the instrument then you will have a hard time increasing speed until you discover why this happens.
Are you learning a new tongue position? Are you forcing your clarinet to produce a sound with a poor fundamental? Are you playing too stiff a reed which you feel allows you to tongue fast but in reality tires you out?
Are your shoulders, arms, or wrists tense as well? Do you play with a great deal of tension in the first place? (Tension spreads like the plague!)
What do you think?
James
PS: What was fixed? Were you an anchor tonguer? What was the problem?
Gnothi Seauton
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Author: joeyscl
Date: 2007-02-07 02:52
I wasn't anchor tonguing (i think), just the back of my Tongue was not fixed up there, so when i tongued, my whole tongue was moving-- which explains the severe lack of speed. After i fixed it, i could get it to 100something (4 16th notes at 100BPM), but its still nothing compared to 140~ish which was what i was able to produce after i took the week of break off. Im assuming that by playing, i am creating tension. So after I took a week off, all the tension is gone---something like that. As to Tension from the excercises or from playing-in-general-- i dont know, but ill try to find out today.
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Author: Tobin
Date: 2007-02-07 13:50
As you begin to learn a new habit there is often an increase in tension until that habit becomes "effortless".
The longer you play this tension becomes worse and more inhibiting. In your case it sounds like the you have created the proper fundamental (tongue position) but are now creating endurance.
Hopefully the great speed you experienced is a taste of what you have to come!
In this case I would again recommend that you rest frequently, or whenever you discover your tongue is weary. No! I don't mean take a week off every other week! Maybe 5-7 minutes for every 30 min you play.
Good Luck,
James
PS...you may try tonguing with just the mouthpiece and barrel. The comparative "weight" of the note is very light, and you will have time to concentrate solely on speed and accuracy.
Gnothi Seauton
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Author: sherman
Date: 2007-02-07 15:17
When a youngster I went through all of the tongue trauma named above and more. The first lesson, all I did was squeak and I vowed that I would not squeak for the next lesson, a vow I kept. Then, I was able to imitate my teacher and to be able or gifted, who knows ,to make a beautiful sound , and then I went on to tonguing with which I was terribly successful and was playing solo clarinet in our band, and then playing the Concertino 14 times in my senior year, and two years into playing the clarinet.But....soon after I found that I was tonguing incorrectly, from only the roof of my mouth, my tongue never touching the reed.
This was disaster,for I had to learn to tongue correctly and this is gruesome if you've achieved status in your high school band. Every tonguing sounded hideous to me and it was a lengthy process.
In all of this, I have learned some great lessons about playing and about tonguing.
One has to always go from the sound, which yes, had lead me down the wrong path at first, but the sound of the tongue is most important, for it simply must be musical and have the correct impact. I remember my first teacher and the way he played staccato which was nothing short of gorgeous, and always musical.
So in conclusion, I must suggest that one never forget the sound of the stacatto, and always forget the speed. Please, although it seems so, speed is not important in this aspect of the clarinet technic. Correctness and musciallity is.
This same teacher used to play "the Young Prince and Princess" from Scherherazade, the clarinet solo and the way he played it was hypnotic.
I still play that little solo when testing reeds and my mind always goes back more than 60 years to those first lessons. So does my ear.
Sherman Friedland
http://clarinet.cc
Post Edited (2007-02-07 16:24)
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Author: bookron ★2017
Date: 2007-02-07 19:52
There is another factor at work here, one familiar to many athletes. When you came back from the layoff, your body/mind had absorbed the new technique, and you were playing purely. As you continued, you "relearned" some of the old bad habits. Some coaches, in fact, recommend short practice sessions on returning, so you quit as soon as you feel the new ability decline.
The good news is, the great day of tonguing at 140 was no fluke. It just takes work to get it there and keep it there. Pressuring yourself to match that pace again won't help. Just continue to work on the technique, and remember that the breakthrough will come.
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Author: joeyscl
Date: 2007-02-08 01:54
Wow, thanks for all the Info guys. One questions tho, will increasing my endurance decrease the tension? I seem to get tension even from just general playing, and even more when if i have to tongue alot. How do i decrease/prevent the tension build up in my tongue?
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Author: sherman
Date: 2007-02-08 02:02
Field and Track, Football and Bowling are athletic events, tonguing is a part of the discipline of playing the clarinet, the main feature and "raison d'etre" being music. I guess it is part of being young, asking oneself how fast one can tongue, and being bothered about a lack of speed, however if we stay within the realm of music, it really becomes the particular passage of articulation, certainly the tempo and even where within the range of the instrument articulation becomes difficult, speed never being the issue.
It is and has always been the beauty of the way a person articulates that draws the most attention from other players and it is the control of the articulation which impresses the conductors at auditions.
Sherman Friedland
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