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Re: Practicing with reed strength 2, playing with 3

Author: September
Date: 2019-01-19 23:56

Thank you all for the comments and advice.

I tried taking more mouthpiece, but didn't notice much difference in sound (it was more difficult to keep the chin down, though!). Changing the angle helped a bit; I've been holding it on at a quite wide angle, and lowering it helped the tone quality some.

I've experimented with reeds (#2, #3, #3,5), two different ligatures, and with swapping my mouthpiece (Vandoren M15) with an old RV5 Lyre. The "breathiness" persisted in both of them, though changing the ligature helped a bit. Playing lighter reeds really did help the breathiness - it didn't disappear completely, but it was a lot less audible.

My articulation is far better with the lighter reeds, and they effortlessly play up to C6 at least. With the heavier reeds, blowing takes so much effort that I fall back to the old embouchure habits I'm trying to train myself out of whenever I get to technically challenging parts. With that in mind, I think I'll stick to the lighter reeds until I'm positive that my embouchure has improved, since I simply play better that way. I'm in an amateur ensemble with a quite large clarinet section; even if my tone quality won't be perfect, it'll hopefully not be too notisable among the eight others *g* I'll definitely keep practicing my embouchure, and try getting used to taking more of the mouthpiece.

Post Edited (2019-01-19 23:58)

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