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Another try

Author: SecondTry
Date: 2023-06-17 18:59

I feel myself partly to blame for not honing in on what I seek an answer to.

In my last post, where I asked why "the switch was made," I was unclear that the switch I was referring to was "double to single lip," not "reed on top of mouthpiece to below." Sorry.

I really hope I am not being a pest. Apologies if I am.

Fact: at some point a transition occurred where clarinet mouthpieces started featuring the reed in a place closer to the ground than sky.

We certainly can debate or justify why or even when this was done, and that would all be good, but away from my inquiry.

What we can't disagree on is that this change now allowed, but did not require the teeth to come in contact with the top of the mouthpiece, permitting a single lip embouchure that would have been impossible under a reed on top paradigm.

But this change to single lip embouchure, while now mechanically permissible, by no means was required. Clearly, double lip embouchure has always remained a viable approach before and after the mouthpiece/reed positioning switch.

What we also can't disagree on is that players switched to and new players adopted single lip embouchure in very large part.

Why? Does it have to do with the ease of controlling the instrument with single lip outweighed benefits often accrued to double lip play like improved harmonics?

Asking the question differently, granted he was one pedagogue, but Opperman had his students play double lip, switching to it need be, and felt strongly about it. Were/are all single lip players wrong? Was it just difference of opinion? Was it that double lip solved or prevented certain bad habits that a fair number of single lip players didn't have, and therefore didn't need to switch to double lip to solve?

Why did double lip lose its predominance?

I can understand why we don't go back to double lip. Teachers who don't play this way tend to not teach the technique, but why did the transition occur?

Again, Thanks in advance (TIA).

Post Edited (2023-06-17 19:02)

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Another try new

SecondTry

2023-06-17 18:59