Embouchure types

[DutchEupho]

According to a article I found by Doug Elliott:

All brass players fall into one of three general embouchure types. They are listed and described below:

Very High Placement: 70% to 90% top lip (downstream)
Horn angle is close to straight out, or slightly down.
Embouchure motion: moves up towards the nose for high range.
Bright clear sound, easy high range.
Examples: John Marcellus, Joe Alessi, Bill Watrous, Conrad Herwig

Medium-High Placement: 50% to 70% top lip (downstream)
Horn angle is usually more downward
Embouchure motion: moves down away from the nose for high range.
Darker fuller sound, good flexibility.
Examples: Jay Friedman, Christian Lindberg, J.J. Johnson

Low Placement: 50% to 90% bottom lip (upstream)
Horn angle can be down, straight out, or up.... wherever it works.
Embouchure motion: moves down away from the nose for high range.
Bright sound, everything is easy when it's working right and a nightmare when it's not!
Examples: Kai Winding, Rob McConnell, Dick Nash (studio player in LA), Russell McKinney (Utah Symphony), J.P. Torres (Cuban jazz player, NY), Bobby Burgess (see picture, p.48, fall 97 ITA Journal), Larry Wehe (former soloist, USAF and U.S. Navy bands; see ITA pictures)

Out of curiosity what embouchure types do you all have?

[DaveBj]

My teacher (Martin Cochran) said that he and I both have "downstream" embouchures. In my case, I think it is the medium-high placement. I do tend to slide to low placement with a Grumpy-Cat lip expression for notes from low Eb to, say, pedal Ab.

[davewerden]

I don't know where I fit! I have maybe 60% on the top lip and the mouthpiece is straight out or slightly up because my teeth form an even bite (no overbite on the top). I'm not aware of the mouthpiece or embouchure moving up or down for high register playing. However, I do use the pivot system for low register sometimes. So where does that put me?

Forgot to mention... I play slightly off center, which is to fit around my teeth better.

[paulmaybery]

Hmm!! I'm getting out the old mp visualizer.

About 60% on the top, but also off of center to the left about 1/4 inch to accommodate some problematic teeth.
(I still have a ring from yesterday's concert)

I have a natural overbite, but when I play I compensate and push the bottom jaw out pretty even with the top.
No I do not get the "lock jaw" effect as I do not let it get tight, only firm.
As I change registers I move the jaw in or out but never up and down. I find that causes me too many intonation issues between registers.
At one time I lost most of my low register simply by having the jaw so low that the lips would not touch. I took too literally a teacher's advice when he said drop the jaw in the low register to open your sound. In the long haul it never really worked for me.

I also try to avoid head pivoting and for the most part work to keep the tongue in the lower part of the mouth to avoid crushing the wind way.
Anchor tonguing in the low register helps enormously as do firm corners that are generally forward and supple.
Placement of the head over the spine is important and a lot of pivoting and goose necking throws off the open throat and chest.

It is important for me to be able to quickly thrust the jaw out and back for rapid register changes. I rarely use a downstream blow as for me the meat of my sound is in the lower lip and rolling it back in is counterproductive. I will push the jaw out, but return it simply to an even position. I believe that air stream, lip muscles, and corners are the important elements for maneuvering around the registers. Of course a cooperative buzz is a given.

In the extreme upper register, I use very minimal pressure and keep a pretty normal angle on the mp. No extreme pivot or downstream blowing. You might say that I favor not moving away from the nose, but I don't feel I move toward it either. The point is that with an open mouth, the air movement will easily cause the lips to vibrate if there are not a lot of isometrics going on.

Other than the jaw moving in or out, I rarely show much facial movement.

My daily routine is an important fixture to make sure all of this is functioning for me.
I do find that the embouchure can not really be divorced from the breathing mechanism.
So much embouchure distortion comes from when we are not delivering a free flowing wind supply. (without isometrics)
It is then that we force, use nonproductive pressure, jam the mp and pinch our sound and do other nasty things.

Thank you Doug for your interest in the various methods that we use in playing.

[TheJH]

Low placement. I think between 70 and 80% of bottom lip and a little bit of upper lip...
This has only developed in the last few months, when I felt my dental structure became more 'solid in place' after almost 5 years of having braces (1,5 years to cure my 6mm overbite, almost 2 years to replace my teeth so they wouldn't overlap as severely anymore, and the remaining time to let it grow stuck in that right structure).

Since the 'solidifying' of my teeth my embouchure went all over the place, going from a very high placement (which is logical because of my overbite) to a medium high placement with just over 60% upper lip when my braces were just done (1,5 years ago) and then a phase of shifting embouchures which ended around last October or November to my current, aforementioned Low placement embouchure.

During that last phase of shifting I began the Mouthpiece Safari, because my bottom lip needed more and more room. My Besson 5 mouthpiece, that until then played fantastically (to which extend you can say for a teenager), I could get a reasonable sound out of it, could hit high notes relatively easy, and was very stable in overall performance (again, as a teenager in the middle of puberty). So from October/November on I felt the Besson 5 was getting too small (which you could expect from a 24.7 mm inner diameter? ) and I had to use excessive pressure to get my high notes out. This was actually made clear to my at a rehearsal two weeks ago when I took the Besson mouthpiece in a hurry instead of my Schilke 51D. I felt like a beginner. couldn't even get my lips buzzing in the d*mn thing. Now getting settled on a Schilke 51D, although I might get something a tad shallower because it sounds empty on my Besson International. But let's not go there.

Fact is, since November I've consciously begun practicing with the Low Placement embouchure, to make sure it sticks, because after 5 years of embouchure change i want it to stop. And i'm improving and letting my drop in form behind, slowly but surely.
I was actually surprised I got my D-diploma last summer (In the Netherlands the diploma you need to attend conservatory) because I felt I played dramatic compared to my C-exam two years before that.

So all in all, going from top-down to bottom-up (literally ) Although I don't agree on the sound; when I had (or still sometimes slip to) my High Placement embouchure I had quite a sharp sound, almost trombone-like, and as my embouchure got lower my tone became rounder (In dutch we use terms like 'round' and 'sharp' instead of 'dark' and 'bright') and less agressive. But I think this is also down to the individual.

[cochranme]

Medium High for me. Here is a great explanation of the three types (his other videos on embouchure issues are also excellent): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sE1fn45b44c

[ghmerrill]

I seem to use distinctly different embouchures for tuba and euphonium. I think this shouldn't be altogether surprising since a tuba mouthpiece is significantly larger than a euphonium mouthpiece and there is more room to "move around in it" for different effects and results. I really noticed this difference when I was playing the euph this year for all the holiday music and events.

My "default" tuba embouchure seems to be something along the lines of medium-low to low, shifting more in the low direction for the the contra bass area. I also will tend to get a bit more of the lips into it for very low range as well. Keep in mind that I don't use one of the enormous tuba mouthpieces that have become fashionable in the CC and BBb world (like the PT-88). I regard the Wick 2XL as slightly big for me. At 32mm rim diameter and a rounded inner rim, it's right at my limit for that. And it's pretty deep. The 3XL is actually a bit more comfortable, but I just can't get decently rich tone with it. That said, my upper range with the 2XL is fine, and is very close to my upper range on the euph . The 2XL requires more focus and control on my part than does the 3XL (or a Schilke 66, or TU17, or even PT63). In the upper range, my embouchure becomes closer to my euph embouchure.

My euph embouchure needs to be a bit more precise overall, and tends to be more in the genuine "medium" (or "center") range. Since I use a fairly large euph mouthpiece, I don't do much, if any, shifting for the low register -- or so it seems to me.

[DutchEupho]

I myself belong to the 3^rd category. I’m an upstream player. I tend to play on bigger mouthpieces because my sound has some brightness to it naturally. Not realizing I’m an upstream player has led me into a mouthpiece safari multiple times. I’ve had periods where everything works fine and all feels easy and I’ve had periods where I’ve really struggled….
Since I’m aware of being an upstream player I can focus on directing my air correctly and my high register is back as it was in the periods where all looked like it happened by itself.

[BDeisinger]

I'm a medium/high. I try to keep as much pressure off the top lip as possible. Because I have an overbite, I tend to be more high. I also attempt to get some air between the dental and top lip which helps with the vibrato. High range I tend to press more on the bottom than the top. One thing I did notice, lack of practice tends to tire the embouchure quicker. There is a good book out there by Philip Farkas (sp?) that gives some good photos of the muscle structure.