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Thread: expanding my range

  1. #21
    Join Date
    Apr 2014
    Location
    Summerfield, Florida Sturgis, SD (summers)
    Posts
    1,867
    Quote Originally Posted by iMav View Post
    So, you two are saying you don’t like and/or can’t buzz your lips unless you have the back pressure of the horn?

    I often buzz into my mouthpiece while covering part of the end with my pinky finger.
    I can buzz if I try hard enough, but once I try hard enough, it is not something that I want to do or continue. And I can't imagine that my buzzing is the same thing that is happening when I actually do play the horn. For the record, I have attempted buzzing with just the lips and with a mouthpiece. Both I found rather useless for ME and something I would never want to do on any regular basis.
    Last edited by John Morgan; 12-31-2022 at 03:58 PM.
    John Morgan
    The U.S. Army Band (Pershing's Own) 1971-1976
    Adams E3 Custom Series Euphonium, 1956 B&H Imperial Euphonium,
    1973 F. E. Olds & Son Studio Model T-31 Baritone
    Adams TB1 Tenor Trombone, Yamaha YBL-822G Bass Trombone
    Year Round Except Summer:
    Kingdom of the Sun (KOS) Concert Band, Ocala, FL (Euphonium)
    KOS Brass Quintet (Trombone, Euphonium)
    Summer Only:
    Rapid City Municipal Band, Rapid City, SD (Euphonium)
    Rapid City New Horizons Band (Euphonium)

  2. #22
    Join Date
    Dec 2011
    Location
    Central North Carolina
    Posts
    2,369
    I have to agree with John on this. For a while after I started playing tuba, I spent some time on buzzing -- often to or from work in the car, or for short periods at home. I think that it probably contributes in a kind of general way to muscle tone in the lips and jaw, but I never felt that it was otherwise beneficial. I did feel that I must have been missing something because at that time buzzing was highly recommended by quite a variety of performers and instructors as an important (if not critical) approach to embouchure development.

    It always seemed to me that any time spent on buzzing was better spent on exercises with the instrument as a whole, and so that's the direction I went in. It's also difficult to be sure that any apparent benefits to buzzing are real as opposed to illusory -- since people who are willing to devote time to buzzing, for the most part, are also devoting time to more typical practice with the instrument. It's hard to see how buzzing would be BETTER than playing the instrument -- at least as an ongoing activity. It may have some benefits as a substitute if you can't otherwise practice with the instrument. And it may have some (episodic?) "diagnostic" benefits, but, as a programmatic approach to your practice, it's hard to see (or to determine) that it has a kind of "stand alone" benefit that wouldn't be better served by practicing with the mouthpiece in the instrument. At least that's how it seemed to me over time.

    But it also may be that it just works better/differently for some people than for others.
    Last edited by ghmerrill; 01-01-2023 at 12:40 PM.
    Gary Merrill
    Wessex EEb Bass tuba (DW 3XL or 2XL)
    Mack Brass Compensating Euph (DE N106, Euph J, J9 euph)
    Amati Oval Euph (DE 104, Euph J, J6 euph)
    1924 Buescher 3-valve Eb tuba (with std US receiver), Kelly 25
    Schiller American Heritage 7B clone bass trombone (DE LB K/K10/112/14 Lexan, Brass Ark MV50R)
    1947 Olds "Standard" trombone (Olds #3)

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