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Re: Anchor tonguing? really the wrong way to go?

Author: kdk ★2017
Date: 2020-03-27 04:26

rob4 wrote:

> What do you say about tone? I sound like a kazooo again, like I
> did 20 years ago! Also sorry but each note sounds like I am
> squeezing out a soggy sponge.
> Help! 😬

These problems may be tagging along with your switch in tonguing approach, but they aren't a direct result of tip-to-tip tonguing or the switch. They come from something that's wrong in your approach to embouchure and/or oral shape when you tongue with the tip. The two don't necessarily go together. There are lots of tip tonguers who don't sound like kazoos or produce a note shape like squeezing out a soggy sponge.

Not only that, but tip tonguing may not improve your speed, either. Sluggish tonguing comes from tension in the tongue and associated muscles and/or unresponsive reeds and/or a weak or unsteady air stream. Tension can happen with anchor tonguing or tip-to-tip tonguing.

Tonguing that's simply slower than other players may well be just who you are - some players can tongue faster than others.

You'll have to concentrate when you go back and forth between tonguing styles on what *else* is changing in your face and inside your mouth. If you produce a sound you like when anchoring, you have to figure out how to redirect your tongue, which is not in itself a large change, without reshaping everything else.

BTW, there are lots of clarinetists who sound perfectly fine who anchor tongue. You don't know it because you can't hear it if everything is optimal. You *can* tongue lightly with the middle of your tongue as long as you're not pressing into the reed and you aren't forming a hollow in the middle of your tongue (which will create noise and can produce a classic slap tongue effect).

Karl

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