Embouchure mechanics certificates?

[Doug Elliott]

There's a lot correct about what he's doing. He just needs a little more strength and stability, and a bigger rim size would probably help in several ways.

[Wilktone]

I'm sorry, Doug, I can't give you the points because you didn't identify his embouchure type first.

Do you have any speculation why "very high placement" type players tend to do noticeably better with larger rim sizes?

And, for that matter, what are your current thoughts on rim sizes for "low placement" type players? A while back you had me systematically try out bigger rim sizes and the larger rim made for noticeable and immediate improvement.

[AndrewMeronek]

There's a lot correct about what he's doing. He just needs a little more strength and stability, and a bigger rim size would probably help in several ways.

I definitely agree - the trombonist in that last clip looks pretty good in general. It's important for me to remember to not forget to acknowledge positives in the course of trying to learn how to analyze this stuff.

[Savio]

Andrew, I agree so much. Easy to just look for negatives and forget the things that seems to be right. He do the right movement for IIIA, sliding up to ascend and have the mouthpiece high up on the mouth.
Dave, I believe the jaw movement should be more still, or opposite from what he do? Maybe IIIA players needs bigger mouthpiece to make room for the upper lip?

Leif

[Doug Elliott]

In terms of function, a very high or very low type, if playing a relatively correctly, typically has a problem with playing low range without some sort of large adjustment. That may be a shift of mouthpiece placement or an excessive jaw drop, in either case disrupting the embouchure in terms of what works for the rest of the range.

A larger rim minimizes or eliminates the need for that large adjustment and therefore helps the entire range. Typically this embouchure type can play high range equally well or better on a larger rim.

[Doug Elliott]

One more thing-
Sometimes playing on a different size, maybe even trumpet or tuba, can help you learn mechanical things you need to learn on your primary instrument but they're not working. I think that happens sometimes with bass trombone players a play on something the size of a 1-1/2 G, then use something much larger which helps them with some of the mechanical issues of playing low notes, and then they can go back to the smaller 1-1/2 G size and have better success than they had before.

When I was first learning this stuff I tried spending a few minutes playing trumpet and it taught me a lot about mechanics. Now I'm playing some tuba and it's helping me to understand some things even better.

I have a friend who plays at a very high level although is not a professional, who has branched out with my guidance, into playing everything from piccolo trumpet through French horn, alto and tenor trombone, bass trombone, and tuba, using exactly the same embouchure mechanics on everything extremely successfully.

[imsevimse]

As usual I'm late to this one (Tromboneplayer 3) also because of work and a rehearsal with a Symphony Orchestra. I have not looked at your answers so if I'm making a fool out of myself it is not because I can't read, it is because I did not want to read, not until I made up my mind. I don't want to be influenced in any direction.

My diagnose is he looks like a "High placement player" who plays downstream, but he "Push down" to ascend and up to descend. I think he is doing rather well, but there are air pockets and some irregularities in his setup. If you compare the extremes of his register it looks very different. The low contra Bb is not very good, he is to loose in his mouth corners when he tries that note.

If he should try something new it would be either to move his mouthpiece down a bit or reverse the pivot.

/Tom

[imsevimse]

Okay I read your answers now. It seems we agree he is doing rather well.

I thought it looked like he was doing the reversed pivot for his emboushure type, but it is not that easy to see in front and when we saw him from the side he was playing in the high register already, playing b and the high f. (we need more icons of the ). The pedal Bb is straight out and when he playes his highest notes his horn angle is pointing down.

If he was my student I wouldn't suggest a change if he had not played that pedal Bb. That looked very strange. For that note he is not forming an emboushure at all.

As Doug said playing different sized mouthpieces can help correcting an emboushure. When I switched career to computing I still worked as a brass teacher but during those three and a half years of studies 1996-1999 I almost quit playing the trombone (never practiced) and only played trumpet. I did this because I had only a pair of trombone students and all the other were on trumpet.

I did get better on trumpet during that time, and the trombone was not terrible, but not as good as when I practiced. I had no gigs on trombone, I even said I had quit the trombone and said I will never play trombone again, this was if someone phoned. That was really silly

When I changed my mind and started to play trombone again the year 2000 I noticed some details in my playing had changed to the better. It did not take that long to pick up the trombone again. I don't play trumpet anymore.

/Tom

[imsevimse]

I just found out I have no problem to switch to a "Low placement player" and to play upstream instead of downstream. The sound is a little different compared to my usual sound with "Very high placement" and downstream. It sounds like a new version of me I wonder if I should experiment with this. I could spend 15 minutes a day to try to play another emboushure, just to see where that leads and to understand the mechanics.

/Tom

[Doug Elliott]

Go for it, you will definitely learn something.

But I wouldn't tell someone with playing commitments to do that.... It could have the potential to mess you up, but you sound like the kind of player who can keep it separated and under control.

[Basbasun]

This last players biggest problem is that he is compressing his lips to much and is not using his air.
To much lip power to weak air-flow, well there is no air-flow really. The mouthpiece placement is hard to do anything
about as long as he does not blow his horn, I would have him to sing, yes sing with his voice to feel the air-flow.
Sing wath is gonna be played, listen for a good sound, play the horn the same way. Eventually he may find his personal best mouthpiece placement.

I think you're missing the point. Sure, if you've got nothing else to go on you're better off helping with something, but address the problem, not the symptom.

I don't want you to get the impression that I don't think it would be helpful for this trombonist to improve breathing and work on singing. Those are useful and would probably make for improvements in his playing. But I see no way that breathing and singing are going to have any noticeable effect on any player's mouthpiece placement. That's ignoring this trombonist's problem and hoping it goes away if you work on something else. It didn't work with the tubist or the trumpet player I posted earlier, why do you think it should work with this trombonist?

Dave

Well, I understand that you like to talk about mpc placement first because you believe that is the most important and should come first. In this case I believe we can´t find a good working placement as long as he squeze his lips together like that he is doing. I believe that nobody introduced him to brass playing in a good way from the beginning. The remedy is to work some away from the horn. How about free-buzzing? The "sound" he´s making is the symptom here, the problem that he is doing way to much resinstance, the air is staying in his mouth. His idea about embouchure is a missunderstanding. Sometimes we have to work on something else, and latter go back to the problem we like to work on. The tuba kid was another issue though, but in no case we should not ignore any problem.

[Basbasun]

I just found out I have no problem to switch to a "Low placement player" and to play upstream instead of downstream. The sound is a little different compared to my usual sound with "Very high placement" and downstream. It sounds like a new version of me I wonder if I should experiment with this. I could spend 15 minutes a day to try to play another emboushure, just to see where that leads and to understand the mechanics.

/Tom

Hi hi, that is exactly what I did in the 80th, not to perform like that but to be able to understand more about different embouchures. I could play with lots of embouchures including just one lip.
Actually I can still do. I could also play doubble high c and nice pedaltones on trumpet. The doubble high c is gone by now though .
Just be sure to find a good way to get back to your normal embouchure!!!!! Everytime!

[Trav1s]

Thanks for the conversation everyone. I am just here to learn

I am very curious and fascinated by it so far as I started on trumpet in elementary school, developed some bad habits and worked to correct them only to slip back into the same trap. Towards the end of 7th grade, my well-respected teacher suggested switching to another instrument. After a round-robin event with the rest of the brass family, I landed on trombone with euph a close second. After several years of getting the tbone chops developed, he moved me to a larger mouthpiece using a blind test. Once I settled into that mouthpiece, I stuck with it until I went to ITF 2018 and was fitted by Doug. In the end, a wider rim is a better fit for me, no matter the horn I am playing. The only caveat is that I need to practice more to stay in shape. As for my embouchure type, I am not sure I know nor is it relevant to the discussion.

Again, thanks for the conversation.

[Wilktone]

So if you can't tell or are still confused, that last trombonist is a "very high placement" type.

Doug, what you say about "very high placement" and wider rims "mirrors" my personal experience with the wider rim too. Didn't Reinhardt actually come to the opposite conclusion about upstream players and rims? Or is that just a preference of how to describe it ("play on as wide a rim as works/play on as small a rim as works")?

If he was my student I wouldn't suggest a change if he had not played that pedal Bb. That looked very strange. For that note he is not forming an emboushure at all.

Tom, I don't think he needed any major changes, but he does "collapse" his embouchure formation to get the pedal out. That could be worked on some and this could be a case where practicing playing correctly in the lower register could help him work out how to better play in his upper register.

It would have been interesting to see a comparison with him playing on a wider rim.

Dave, I believe the jaw movement should be more still, or opposite from what he do?

Leif, regarding the jaw, I will try to find some other examples that maybe can help us understand the role the jaw has in the brass embouchure. The short answer is it's as personal as mouthpiece placement.

Sometimes we have to work on something else, and latter go back to the problem we like to work on.

Basbasun, I think we both agree on the bigger picture. I think I've confused you, though.

Well, I understand that you like to talk about mpc placement first because you believe that is the most important and should come first.

Not exactly. If I'm trying to help a student succeed, everything is equally important. As a teacher, it's my job to prioritize what a student should work on first. That's going to be different according to each student.

In the U.S., at least, the most common approach you'll find to helping players with embouchure issues is to work on breathing or mental focus or something other than looking at the embouchure. Students who need something like a mouthpiece placement change or a correction to their embouchure motion are rarely going to find breathing or musical expression fixes it completely - but it's sometimes a good way to learn how to disguise it.

So to clarify, I think it's fine to tell a student, "I don't know what to suggest for your embouchure, yet. Let's make some other corrections and come back to it." I think we are agreeing on that point.

I just found out I have no problem to switch to a "Low placement player" and to play upstream instead of downstream.

You will have to keep us posted about what you learn.

Sometimes I will demonstrate free buzzing into the horn while teaching it to a student I think can use it, even though it doesn't directly relate to how I play best. It's interesting that if I force myself to play as a "very high placement" embouchure type (which I am not) that I take on those playing characteristics, albeit with severe limitations. For example, my embouchure motion is down to ascend and up to ascend, but if I free buzz into the instrument and place like a "very high placement" type player it works better to push up to ascend.

Dave

[Doug Elliott]

Very high and very low placements are best looked at as the same, upside down.

[imsevimse]

I just found out I have no problem to switch to a "Low placement player" and to play upstream instead of downstream. The sound is a little different compared to my usual sound with "Very high placement" and downstream. It sounds like a new version of me I wonder if I should experiment with this. I could spend 15 minutes a day to try to play another emboushure, just to see where that leads and to understand the mechanics.

/Tom

Hi hi, that is exactly what I did in the 80th, not to perform like that but to be able to understand more about different embouchures. I could play with lots of embouchures including just one lip.
Actually I can still do. I could also play doubble high c and nice pedaltones on trumpet. The doubble high c is gone by now though .
Just be sure to find a good way to get back to your normal embouchure!!!!! Everytime!

Why am I not surprised

In case you dont know Basbasun, he is a very well-renewed bass trombone player and teacher in Sweden. He was the first call on bass trombone in Sweden from the late 1960-ies and for at least 40 years and with probably more than thousonds of recording sessions. I want to explain this since the profile information here is so sparse. He was the teacher who helped me in the 80-ties and most Swedish trombone players born before the year 2000 know him by name. A lot of trombone players here have studied with him including Håkan Björkman who now is the principle of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and also have made some solo records.

I owe everything to him. If he had not helped me I had probably quit playing in my teens.

Now back to more videos we can type. I really enjoy this thread.

/Tom

[Wilktone]

This trumpet player is a professional musician. He happened to be recovering from Bell's palsy when I took this video, so it's not him at his best, but I think he's a good example of his particular embouchure type.



Watch for his embouchure type first and then go back a second time and pay close attention to his jaw. What do you see?

[JesusVicente]

Thanks for this thread! Learning a lot, despite I'm not sure yet about analysis and steps to take.

I think he is Medium High Placement, and his jaw goes forward when he plays high notes.
Maybe his embouchure is too centered? That makes him work a bit more than necessary?

Thanks

[Wilktone]

I'll wait to reveal embouchure type after others have had the chance to do it.

Don't assume everything I am trying to point out has something to fix. In order to know how to spot something going wrong you have to know what things look like when it works well. This may be more important early on when you're just learning about this.

[ghmerrill]

Sometimes playing on a different size, maybe even trumpet or tuba, can help you learn mechanical things you need to learn on your primary instrument but they're not working.

Going the other way, starting to seriously play the bass trombone showed me some basic things I wasn't doing right with my tuba embouchure (and could get away with because that can be much more forgiving on a tuba). Not anything really dramatic, but a realization of "Hey, I've been doing that not quite right,". It definitely helped me improve my tuba embouchure, resulting in better/easier articulation and pitch control.

I think that happens sometimes with bass trombone players a play on something the size of a 1-1/2 G, then use something much larger which helps them with some of the mechanical issues of playing low notes, and then they can go back to the smaller 1-1/2 G size and have better success than they had before.

Absolutely. And there are a couple of things going on here, at least in my experience. The first is the purely mechanical issues you mention. The larger mouthpiece allows you to get the "feel" you need for articulating and playing those low notes (which you haven't been able to get on the smaller mouthpiece because they're harder to articulate and play on it). The second is that the larger mouthpiece -- since with it you really can reliably articulate and play those notes -- lets you learn and fix in your mind what such a note should SOUND like and FEEL like, so you know what you're trying to produce.

I had this experience in going from a 1.5 to an MB to an LB size mouthpiece. Then at some point, I put in my Kelly 1.5 ("backup" mouthpiece) and without effort could play those notes I'd previously been unable to. Definitely not as easily (and I don't want to go back to a 1.5 for several reasons), but they're there.

[Doug Elliott]

That is all exactly right, great description.

[AndrewMeronek]

Watch for his embouchure type first and then go back a second time and pay close attention to his jaw. What do you see?

Another one with very little vertical movement, so I find it hard to tell - but I suspect the medium-high where he lowers the mouthpiece to raise the pitch. I'd say more definitely that I can see him raise the angle of the trumpet as he goes lower in pitch, and vice versa for going higher.

He's extending his lower jaw to go higher, and I'm thinking this may be a 'substitute' mechanism for getting the lower lip more engaged for the high register since he's not moving the mouthpiece much. But, this may also be contributing to the angle change I see.

[imsevimse]

As usual I'm late and have not read the comments after that trumpet player. He looks like a downstream, "Very high placement" player, push up to ascend and down to descend.

About the jaw
He moves his jaw forward which also push his mouth corners forward. It looks like there is more weight on the upper lip in the high register which is why I think he push up to ascend.

/Tom

[AndrewMeronek]

Given Tom's observations are pretty different from mine, I look forward to feedback from our experts. It goes to show - this stuff isn't always easy.

[Doug Elliott]

There are several clues to his embouchure type.

He has a very fat sound.
His horn angle is somewhat downward.
I think his motion right in the first slurs is relatively obvious, pulling down to ascend - and it obviously works well for him.

Those are the three major characteristics of the medium-high placement (IIIB) embouchure type.

As for his jaw, I don't see it as going out or in, I see a slight opening for low notes and closing for higher notes.

Everything is working well for this player. I would only suggest minimizing the jaw opening and closing motion, which I think is mostly unnecessary.

[Savio]

Yes, I thought IIIB too! Hurray! He push just a little bit down to ascend. And his sound is really fat yes. Nearly like Chet Baker. His jaw movements are not so big. But at the end of the movie it seems he push jaw out to ascend? Maybe I watched it wrong? What jaw movement should a IIIB player have? If any?

[Doug Elliott]

I see that jaw now... when the video is that close it's hard to know how it looks on the entire face. Whatever he's doing is working for him. You can't necessarily generalize about what a IIIB's jaw "should" do. That embouchure type is quite variable - I've seen a lot of different-looking embouchures that would all be in that category. Sometimes you can't really see any motion.

Trombone examples of (IIIB) Medium-high placement - to show how varied they are - Jay Friedman, Ralph Sauer, Charlie Vernon, Christian Lindberg, JJ Johnson, and Dave Steinmeyer.

[Basbasun]

I see his jaw open and slightly moving in for low tone, closing and slightly moving out for higher tones.
I believe his lower lip slides over the lower teeth with the movements.

[Wilktone]

Medium high placement embouchure type for that last trumpet player. His mouthpiece placement is more upper lip inside, so it's downstream. His embouchure motion is in a downward direction (and off to his right) to ascend and up (and to his left) to descend. You'll be able to see this more clearly in the following clips from the front.



So returning to the jaw, I think we can see that he doesn't just open/close slightly or protrude/recede, but with this player there's a significant amount of side to side motion as well. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, it depends on the player. This player could perhaps minimize the amount of motion he relies upon and maybe fine tuning his horn angles as he changes octaves would make things work more efficiently so he wouldn't need to rely so much on his jaw changes.

But as a general observation, I note that this trumpet player is pretty consistent with the jaw motions. When he ascends he consistently pushes his jaw slightly forward and to his left and does the reverse to descend.

From the beginning of this video up until around 38 seconds in are clips from me just asking him to play some octave slurs for me. After about 38 seconds in I asked him to try out some different horn angle changes as he made ascending and descending slurs. Listen for intonation on the high Cs. The differences in angle changes for the low C is a little bit easier to hear and see what doesn't work for him.

What do you notice with the horn angle changes?

[Wilktone]

I might as well get this one out of the way while I'm at it.



This subject is a professional trombonist. There are some things he can do to improve his playing that you might spot. What I notice in this clip is related to his inhalations and the attacks.

I should say that while this trombonist's playing is highly questionable, he is easily the most handsome of all the brass musicians I have video recorded.

What's his embouchure type?

[JesusVicente]

I should say that while this trombonist's playing is highly questionable, he is easily the most handsome of all the brass musicians I have video recorded.

This video remembers me of the picture on the left hehe

Upstream. According to inhalating, is there a bit of delay between inhalating and exhalating no? A bit of tongue tension then for this. I use to keep my mouthpiece out when I inhalate, but I don't think it is a problem if you don't do that, maybe it is good thing.

[Redthunder]

I might as well get this one out of the way while I'm at it.



This subject is a professional trombonist. There are some things he can do to improve his playing that you might spot. What I notice in this clip is related to his inhalations and the attacks.

I should say that while this trombonist's playing is highly questionable, he is easily the most handsome of all the brass musicians I have video recorded.

What's his embouchure type?

I won’t say the embouchure type of this completely objectively handsome trombonist since I already knew it prior to this video, but I will take a guess as to what could be done to improve his playing.

I see the breaths through the corners of the mouth, but there almost seems to be a split second of hesitation between when the breath is finished and when the note is actually started - would it be advisable to try and work on starting the note more immediately after inhalation?

Also, I’m noticing your embouchure motion almost seems to reverse direction once you get to your pedal B flat each time (from right to left, not up to down). Is this something you have worked on consciously? I only ask because I’ve noticed that my pedals also seem to work best that way too.

[JesusVicente]

I hope it is appropiate, I found this video excerpt very useful to explain breathing, it is only one minute of this interview.

(btw, Mr Sorense is very high placement I guess)

[AndrewMeronek]

This subject is a professional trombonist. There are some things he can do to improve his playing that you might spot. What I notice in this clip is related to his inhalations and the attacks.

I should say that while this trombonist's playing is highly questionable, he is easily the most handsome of all the brass musicians I have video recorded.

What's his embouchure type?

Low placement, lowers mouthpiece to ascend. I'm thinking that your profile pic must be horizontally flipped.

Do you ever get into situations on some horns where the bell tubing on your neck obstructs you getting to an ideal angle in the high range? I discovered this for myself in my first Doug lesson. I adopted two solutions: on my jazz horn, I got a slide custom made with larger distance between tubes (and hence a wider crook); and on alto I flip the horn around and play it right-handed.

[BurckhardtS]

One more thing-
Sometimes playing on a different size, maybe even trumpet or tuba, can help you learn mechanical things you need to learn on your primary instrument but they're not working... (snip)

Interestingly, I've always had a problem with the upper register on trumpet, I can't really get much above a written top space G without chopping out hard. I think some part of it has to do with the mouthpiece size, but some of it might be something I'm personally ineffectively doing that I haven't figured out yet that might be present in my trombone playing that doesn't hinder me as much there.

[Savio]

I might as well get this one out of the way while I'm at it.



This subject is a professional trombonist. There are some things he can do to improve his playing that you might spot. What I notice in this clip is related to his inhalations and the attacks.

I should say that while this trombonist's playing is highly questionable, he is easily the most handsome of all the brass musicians I have video recorded.

What's his embouchure type?

I think he is upstream, IVA. He change his embouchure when he breath. I would tell him to breath through the corners without changing the lips formation that much. Im not sure but think so?
Leif

[Redthunder]

Low placement, lowers mouthpiece to ascend. I'm thinking that your profile pic must be horizontally flipped.

Do you ever get into situations on some horns where the bell tubing on your neck obstructs you getting to an ideal angle in the high range? I discovered this for myself in my first Doug lesson. I adopted two solutions: on my jazz horn, I got a slide custom made with larger distance between tubes (and hence a wider crook); and on alto I flip the horn around and play it right-handed.

I have the same embouchure type as Dave and have noticed this as well about the tubing, but only once I really started playing large bore regularly, where the tubing is usually much wider anyway. After a month straight of big horn, going back to the small bore was rough because I had to readjust to compensating for a horn with too narrow of a slide for my neck. Before that I just assumed everyone dealt with the neck tube being crammed up against them.... because of this I find myself more often going to the large bore simple because it’s more comfortable.

I was thinking about getting one of my small bores modified to have a wide slide. Who did yours, and are you happy with the results?

[AndrewMeronek]

My slide crook was made by Benn Hanson about 5 years ago. I don't know if he's still making them. Mine was built into a Shires slide.

I really like it. It has the 'feel' of a bigger horn even though it's only a .508 bore slide; it feels more open and there's less resistance. For people who like more resistance in the horn, this may not be a good solution, but I like less resistance.

[imsevimse]

The trumpet player moves his jaw not only back and forth but he also moves his jaw sideways. He moves to his left when he ascends and to his right and down, to descend.

The tromboneplayer is a " Low placement player" with upstream emboushure and he push down to ascend and up to descend. He switch register without any change of the angle. He hardly moves and it looks like he consentrates to hold the horn still. The highest Bb is impressive but the Bb next is a bit unstable. I wonder if there is an emboushure change there of some sort even though we can not se that.

/Tom

[Wilktone]

First, the trumpet player above:

The trumpet player moves his jaw not only back and forth but he also moves his jaw sideways. He moves to his left when he ascends and to his right and down, to descend.

Yes! His jaw motion is more side-to-side than most, and also a larger motion than typical as well. It's tough for me to say what he might experiment with, but I would expect a player with that much jaw movement going on to have more horn angle changes to accompany it. If you go back and look at the second video I posted of him you can see us experiment a bit with this horn angle change. It's harder to notice more efficiency in the upper register, but the opposite horn angle change for his low register clearly doesn't work.

I suspect that with some fine tuning and coordinating embouchure motion, jaw motion, and horn angle changes that the larger changes this trumpet player makes in these videos would become more minimal. Of course, some of what we're seeing here may be related to his Bell's palsy. For what it's worth, I played a gig with this player a year or three after taking this video (and not run into him between) and he sounded good.

Now on to that very handsome trombonist:

The tromboneplayer is a " Low placement player" with upstream emboushure and he push down to ascend and up to descend.

Low placement, lowers mouthpiece to ascend.

I think he is upstream, IVA.

Yes! I'm a "low placement" embouchure type player. Prior to my first lesson with Doug I had been playing with what I suspect was a "medium high placement" embouchure type. Playing on a downstream embouchure really made me work hard to play and was a serious hinderance for me.

FYI, the IVA embouchure type is one of Reinhardt's labels for the "low placement" type. Essentially a IVA is a low placement player with a receded jaw position and a lowered horn angle. This isn't as common as upstream players who align their teeth and have a horn angle closer to straight out (rewatch the upstream trumpet player from earlier for a good example of this more typical upstream horn angle).

Mechanically speaking, we can probably think of all of Reinhardt's upstream embouchure types as variations of Doug's "low placement" type. It really doesn't change the basic advice you would give upstream players in any meaningful way.

I'm thinking that your profile pic must be horizontally flipped.

Yes, that photo was taken and edited by Doug in a lesson I had with him from 2011. He flipped it so that in looking at my embouchure motion it would look to me in mirror image.

By the way, the video I posted above is from 2013, a couple of years later. Looking through the notes Doug gave me from my 2011 lesson it appears that I still have some things to work on.

Do you ever get into situations on some horns where the bell tubing on your neck obstructs you getting to an ideal angle in the high range?

Yes, sometimes, but I don't really think that my horn angle to the left is extreme enough where it really gets in the way. I have a Benge 170 that has the tubing along that side slightly curved to help with this, but I don't feel that it makes much of a noticeable difference to me.

I see the breaths through the corners of the mouth, but there almost seems to be a split second of hesitation between when the breath is finished and when the note is actually started - would it be advisable to try and work on starting the note more immediately after inhalation?

Yes!

I would tell him to breath through the corners without changing the lips formation that much. Im not sure but think so?

Yes!

That is something that I've been improving on. When I don't pull my right corner so far back to inhale it does a much better job of snapping into place without hesitation. I'll see about posting some more current video to show a better example (assuming that it is, in fact, a better example).

Also, I’m noticing your embouchure motion almost seems to reverse direction once you get to your pedal B flat each time (from right to left, not up to down). Is this something you have worked on consciously? I only ask because I’ve noticed that my pedals also seem to work best that way too.

Yes, but I don't think this is something to imitate. I'll have to go back and look for some other videos from earlier when this embouchure motion reversal was even bigger. It seems to be caused by going too far in my descending direction and then having to backtrack on the pedal in order to get it to the correct spot.

He switch register without any change of the angle. He hardly moves and it looks like he consentrates to hold the horn still.

A while back, I think after I took that video above, Doug advised me to pay closer attention to my embouchure motion and horn angle changes in the low register. I wasn't moving enough and the pitch/tone were on the high side. I think that I've kind of brought my low and middle register further in my descending directions these days. I'll try to post something more recent to demonstrate the change (which may feel like a bigger change to me, but not look like very much of one). How all this relates to my reversal in the pedal range is also something interesting to keep an eye on.

Dave

[Wilktone]

Looking at my calendar and upcoming commitments this video will probably be the last one I will post for a while. But I think my points have been made:

1. Embouchure issues exist that cannot be fixed by breathing or focusing on musical expression or anything not related to addressing the actual issue. But those things can cover up the problem and players can get better at playing wrong. The longer these embouchure problems continue the harder it can be to make the correction. Sometimes the issue stays hidden until it completely breaks down.

2. It's not all that hard to learn how to diagnose and come up with likely corrections for embouchure issues. Everyone who has been following along with this thread now knows more about brass embouchure technique than pretty much any professional teacher or player.

3. Every brass teacher and player should *want* to learn about this simply because it's an important part of brass technique. Resistance to this idea usually is because someone doesn't understand that it's not that hard or because of inertia. The culture of ignorance is a cycle, the teacher dismisses embouchure analysis does it wrong and his/her students go on to misinform their students and so on. Breaking the cycle means that more brass teachers and players need to learn this stuff.

OK, on to one more embouchure for you to type.



I think this player's embouchure type is fairly easy to spot, but he has one feature that is unusual for players belonging to this embouchure type that we have really discussed too much here.

Dave

[imsevimse]

Looking at my calendar and upcoming commitments this video will probably be the last one I will post for a while. But I think my points have been made:

1. Embouchure issues exist that cannot be fixed by breathing or focusing on musical expression or anything not related to addressing the actual issue. But those things can cover up the problem and players can get better at playing wrong. The longer these embouchure problems continue the harder it can be to make the correction. Sometimes the issue stays hidden until it completely breaks down.

Yes, this is absolutely true. My smile emboushure I had when I started could not be much helped with just more air as another example of emboushure problems not talked much of in this thread.

2. It's not all that hard to learn how to diagnose and come up with likely corrections for embouchure issues. Everyone who has been following along with this thread now knows more about brass embouchure technique than pretty much any professional teacher or player.

Yes, it is obvious in many cases and with the plastic mouthpiece as a backup a lot of questions about an emboushure can be revealed.

3. Every brass teacher and player should *want* to learn about this simply because it's an important part of brass technique. Resistance to this idea usually is because someone doesn't understand that it's not that hard or because of inertia. The culture of ignorance is a cycle, the teacher dismisses embouchure analysis does it wrong and his/her students go on to misinform their students and so on. Breaking the cycle means that more brass teachers and players need to learn this stuff.

I think I have no problem to be a student, because this is what it means to consider new knowledge. My experience is its best to be open-minded to anything I do not know because I have learnt best that way. I find no point to dismiss anything just because I don't follow. New knowledge takes time. As a successful student of anything, I collect from any source of the actual subject available, I try and experiment with it and ask questions. Then I use my judgement and sort the information. Some I will use and some I will not use. It is like religion.

I think that if you want to understand Islam then one way to do it would be to read the Koran. To be able to put that in the right context you need to study the bible too, and to be able to put those two in the right context you need to study the other religions as well. As a student you should seek the area that question your beliefs, it is in that area you evolve a lot.

I'm fully aware not all learn the same. There are people who do not like to be "taught" as they learn. They instead seek knowledge only if they think they need it. This makes the situation "teacher-student" not as easy as if you just do your best to absorb. Often these students are very clever.

Different personalities. Neither is better it is just different.

OK, on to one more embouchure for you to

I think this player's embouchure type is fairly easy to spot, but he has one feature that is unusual for players belonging to this embouchure type that we have really discussed too much here.

Dave

I will diagnose that player later

/Tom

[AndrewMeronek]

I think this player's embouchure type is fairly easy to spot, but he has one feature that is unusual for players belonging to this embouchure type that we have really discussed too much here.

Dave

Another downstream, very high placement, from what I see. He sounds like a very solid player. He has a lower default angle of the mouthpiece, but I don't think this is too unusual. I know a guy here in the Detroit area who I believe has a similar embouchure with a large downward angle. Also a great trumpet player.

Embouchures like this definitely provide reasonable suspicions of why some marching bands' insistences of holding an instrument perfectly horizontal to the ground can really mess someone up.

[JesusVicente]

Hello, I's say he is downstream Medium High Placement, because of the movements he does with his lips to go to higher register (pushing his lips to the down of the mouthpiece) and going to low register, moving his lips toward the center of the mouthpieces.

BTW, sometimes it is difficulty for me whether we talk about moving the mouthpiece or the lips down or up , maybe because of I don't know english language enough.

Is it true that I see his mouthpiece pipe is a little curved towards up?

[imsevimse]

The trumpet player is a "Very High Placement" player with downstream emboushure. "Push up" to ascend and "Pull down" to descend.

I looked a second time and saw the angle he use is very steep. He has bent the mouthpiece as to make the bell point more straight out. What I saw was he uses quite a lot of force on the upper lip on that higher octave. I think there lyes one of his problems. How much pressure can his lips take? He needs at least to get a fifth higher.

/Tom

[Savio]

Yes I believe he is downstream. The sliding of mouthpiece and lips are the same as for IIIA, up to ascend. His horn angel is very much down. And isn't the lower lip a little bit to much dominating in the low register. Shouldn't the upper lip dominate inside the mouthpiece in all registers? Does he change to upstream in the low register? Maybe I see it wrong. Im not used to look at embouchures and analyse. In case he change the direction he should maybe choose one.

This week I have started to analyse my small students, its interesting. But I dont feel I know enough to correct anyone yet. Mostly they are OK but there are a couple with pinched thin sound I would look more at. And also one strange one with horn angle up. He have a sound like a bee and I dont know what to tell him. He doesn't have any register at all. I will look closer at him.

Leif

[imsevimse]

And also one strange one with horn angle up. He have a sound like a bee and I dont know what to tell him. He doesn't have any register at all. I will look closer at him.

Leif

The "bees" are very difficult to type.

/Tom

[BurckhardtS]

He's downstream, Very High Placement to my eyes, and the movements seem to be correct for him. His inhalations he takes the mouthpiece off his mouth completely and opens his mouthcenter to breathe it looks like, and then kind of rams it all back together to get started again. I used to do this, still do sometimes, and I know how detrimental it can be. Also, his jaw position seems to be more receded than players of this embouchure type usually. Maybe his high range would be stronger if he moved it out slightly more than it is now?

[Doug Elliott]

Those "breaths" were edits.

It all looks pretty normal IIIA to me, I'm not sure what special feature Dave is referring to.

[JesusVicente]

Hello. Oh yes, I see now after watching again all videos, there is very high placement.

Is there a curve in the mouthpiece pipe?