The Clarinet BBoard

The Clarinet BBoard The C4 standard

New Topic | Go to Top | Go to Topic | Search | Help/Rules | Smileys/Notes | Log In

Previous Message | Next Message

Re: Embouchure Fatigue

Author: Micke Isotalo ★2017
Date: 2020-01-27 22:02

Chartcom, since you haven't played for years my prime suggestion would be to accept for yourself that you are now starting from zero considering embouchure strength (after all that strength is considerably weakened already after not playing just for a week, or less).

So first of all, don't be overly concerned about getting quickly tired. You may consider going down a half or a whole reed strength from what you used previously, to be able to play for longer sessions. If you want to fasten your progress, you could play for several shorter sessions during a day instead of one single session.

Another thing concerning me is your bottom teeth cutting into you bottom lip. It could suggest that you have a "biting problem", which has been covered largely on this board.

For short, and as I understand, 50 years ago when you started playing "biting" wasn't considered a problem. Instead, it was even taught as a proper way to exert pressure on the reed. Later that approach has largely been abandoned in favour of embouchure pressure exercised only (or at least mainly) by the lips, not the jaw. I think most players nowadays agrees that "jaw-pressure" tend to have a negative effect on the tone (as some says, killing the reed vibrations) compared to "lip-pressure".

If you would like to try this "non-biting" approach you could deliberately keep your jaw and your lower teeth somewhat downwards to ensure that there is some empty space between your lower lip and your lower teeth (or at least that there is no pressure at all from the teeth into the lip). At the same time, don't overdo the pressure from your lips more than you feel comfortable with and which doesn't tire you out too quickly. Form your lips around your mouthpiece as you do when you whistle. From there, and if you feel that you need to tighten up your lower lip, you could just pull it a bit backwards/to the sides (I also have a fairly thick bottom lip and I do the same).

For my part and with my setup, I don't use any jaw pressure at all in the whole first and second register, but for tuning reasons I need some of it in the third register. Trying to exert the needed pressure there only with the lips is just too tiring, and in that register I can't detect any harm to the tone from some moderate "biting".

Post Edited (2020-01-27 22:25)

Reply To Message | Avail. Forums | Flat View

Newer Topic | Older Topic

Topics

Author

Date

Embouchure Fatigue new

Exiawolf

2020-01-16 04:38