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Re: Tongue Position

Author: kdk ★2017
Date: 2016-02-09 06:56

Well, I understand about holding the volume constant and reducing the aperture you push a fluid (air or water) through. I also understand that Bernoulli's principle says (in part) the speed of air over the convex surface of an airplane's wing moves faster than the air under its flat surface. But whether the air speed is significantly - meaningfully - faster over a raised tongue than it is over a flattened one isn't necessarily clear to me. The eventual aperture is the same.

I think you're closer to the point when you say that focusing your air at the tip of the mouthpiece is what's important. That's still more of a mental image than an objectively provable phenomenon, but it's intuitively hard to argue that funneling the air directly into the mouthpiece aperture isn't more efficient than having quantities of the air bouncing off other surfaces and rummaging around the inside of your mouth.

To be honest, I use Bernoulli to explain to students why they're producing tubby, unfocused sounds by over-relying on stretching their "throats" open to make the sound full. But I preface it by saying, "the theory is," and not presenting it as scientific, verifiable fact. When the sound improves because they've allowed their tongues to come to a more neutral (or slightly raised) position that's more relaxed and less rigid, the explanation then becomes superfluous. The result is convincing enough.

Karl

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Tongue Position new

Agomongo

2016-02-08 04:51