Mouthpieces

There has probably been more written about mouthpieces than any other aspect of tuba, or any brass instrument for that matter. I was never very much a mouthpiece person, I have friends and colleagues who have tried almost every mouthpiece that exists and can tell you everything about each one of them; they know the cup size, the rim size, the rim thickness, the choke size, every idiosyncrasy of the back bore and the exact weight. Further, they can give you a detailed verbal description how each of these aspects affect the way an instrument plays.

That’s a pretty dense paragraph and at first read it may appear to be sarcastic, it absolutely isn’t meant to be; I deeply admire those mouthpiece sages, I’m even a little jealous of them. I would like to know the secret formulae to match the perfect mouthpiece for a specific tuba or a specific player; instead all I have is my ears to depend on for forming an opinion.

Testing and listening to various mouthpieces, especially with a group, can be a very educational experience, it enables us to listen into the sound as though with a microscope; the fact is, a mouthpiece is very much like a lens, but instead of focusing light it focuses sound.

As light of an image passes through a lens it will project a picture on a surface. For example, the image of a light fixture on the ceiling of a room is easily recognizable, but with a very high quality lens the image is recognizable, including the dirt, dust and dead flies in the light fixture. A mouthpiece is very similar, it can take a sound and focus it, or if it’s a very high quality mouthpiece it will focus the sound including the extemporaneous noises, the dirt, that exists in the tone. The lesser-focused mouthpiece can mask the extemporaneous noises in the sound and give the player or listener a seemingly beautiful tone. However, with the clearly focused, highly refined mouthpiece, we frequently find that it sounds bigger and more solid, plus the fact that the clearer sound is much easier to manage regarding intonation.

Of course, not everyone will like the highly focused sound but as a therapeutic device it can be very useful in exposing the extemporaneous noises that might be part of our tone. When we can hear our unmasked sound with all its distortions, hisses, snaps, crackles and pops, we will quickly make the micro-adjustments necessary to minimize those noises and when the sound is “cleaned”, the tone produced on the lesser-focused mouthpieces will be probably be more beautiful.

Mouthpieces, like instruments, have a proclivity to change with fashion, very similar to the way skirt lengths raise and fall in women’s fashion. When observing the ultra heavy mouthpieces that seem to be so in fashion today, I can’t avoid remembering the early sixties when the players of the Chicago Symphony, the brass section that was looked up to as the standard of reference at the time, led a trend to skeletonize their mouthpieces. The external surface of these skeletonized mouthpieces followed the internal contours at minimum thickness and, of course, were very light. Arnold Jacobs himself led another fad of using an adjustable cup mouthpiece; within a few years he abandoned the adjustable cup and returned to more standard equipment.

It’s our nature to experiment, and the one thing we can depend on is that there will always be this tendency. History tells us that we can expect more changes in mouthpiece design, that astute players will try these changes and after some period will either adapt or reject them; this is how we learn, this is how we grow. 

Tokyo, Japan, New Years Eve, 2006

Tyoko, Japan, November 3, 2012

Balancing Dynamic and Intensity

The Great Italian Maestro Carlo Maria Giulini used to tell the members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra in his thick Italian accent: “My friends, please don’t confuse dynamic with intensity”; I’ve been thinking about those wise words for the last 30 years.

The dictionary defines intensity as a measurement of energy, but regarding music it needs to be a little more defined. Of course, just a measurement of energy would include the difference between loud and soft; certainly, dynamic is a measurement of energy, but for the purpose of this article I will refer to dynamic as the amplitude, the loud and soft of music, and intensity as the ratio of harmonics; that is tone quality.

The nature of sound as we play, speak, or sing, normally increases with intensity when the dynamic increases, and in piano it decreases. For example, compare the soft timbre of a sweet lullaby compared to the hard aggressive quality of a rock and roll singer. However, it doesn’t necessacerely have to be that way, there is much more to sound than just dynamic variety.

Luciano Pavarotti, for example, was able to sing very softly with great intensity, and a great actor can speak a text in a very soft voice, even a whisper but with frightening intensity; some of the most terrible villains in film and theater speak in a menacingly intense soft voice.

Intensity can be the regulator of our musical quality; a pianissimo with no intensity is a weak, often unstable sound, which is nearly impossible to play with regarding intonation. And a fortissimo with too much intensity can simply be ugly.

In playing music we have both dynamics and intensity as our tools of expression, balancing the two leads toward a much richer sonic vocabulary; it’s important to use them both and not to confuse them.

Part of our job as brass players, as well as maintaining our techniques of fingers, breathing, articulation, and embouchure control, is to be aware of that chronic balance calibration between dynamic and energy and to make our personal decision for the correct mix for the correct occasion. But particularly, as lower brass players we need to formulate our opinion as to whether the bass notes, the tuba notes, those that are required in most of our playing, should simply be a big sound with wide amplitude to put a basic bottom on a brass section, or to calculate an energy to that sound that is more homogeneous with the higher brasses. I won’t offer an opinion regarding this but I will only say that I have been fascinated by this question for my full playing career. We, with the help of the people we work with, have a choice. Certainly, the correct solution will very from person to person as well as through diverse styles and repertoire. Personally, I recommend keeping an open mind and continuing the search for that correct calibration, the correct mix; it’s more interesting than staying with the comfortable and predictable. Sound is part of our musicality and musicality is a growing aspect that needn’t ever stop evolving. Enjoy this search.

August 29, 2009, Tokyo

Reissued October 25, 2012

Simultaneous Multiple Teachers

This Blog was written shortly after my dear friend, colleague, brother and competitor past away six years ago. Although it’s only been a year and a half since the last reposting, it seems a good moment to post it again; jealousies and insecurities seem as prevalent as ever among teachers to the detriment of our students. Can’t teachers please get past these jealousies and insecurities and remember our responsibility is to expand the knowledge and vision of our students?

It’s only natural that some of my thoughts have been in reflection of my long friendship with Tommy Johnson. Among those thoughts were the many students we shared, to us it was a natural thing and was never problematic. In the 25 years that we both played and taught in Los Angeles we have recommended to dozens of students that they take some lessons from the other teacher. Similarly, I also remember receiving many telephone calls from Harvey Phillips over the years asking if I would please give lessons to a student who would be passing through Los Angeles. Fortunately, most of our brass community agrees with this practice of a student studying with more than one teacher.

It’s hasn’t always been that way, however, and even today we occasionally encounter jealousies and insecurities from some of our colleague teachers. It’s been known that certain tubists giving concerts in major European cities have been made aware that local students were discouraged from attending the concert. “I don’t want my students exposed to those kind of things” was the explanation given by the nervous teachers. However, human behavior being as it is, the ban on the concerts resulted in the very students who were discouraged to attend being all the more motivated to go and listen. There have also been occasions of masterclasses that were canceled, especially in the old Soviet block Eastern Europe countries because, “It would influence the students in a unhealthy direction”. Happily this kind of thinking is rare and diminishing.

Of course, there have never been any rules about studying with more than one teacher but there are a few commonsense things that deserve our thought.

Both for teachers and students it’s very important to be honest about the lessons; if it’s necessary to be secretive, which is a very clear sign there is a problem, one simply has to question if it’s worth it.

For students, it is a wise idea to avoid studying the same repertoire with both teachers, especially, when one of the teachers has strong and singular ideas regarding that repertoire. And as a teacher, I have avoided working on repertoire that another teacher is helping to prepare for an exam or a recital unless I have a specific request from the permanent teacher to do so.

It is always a very good idea that both the permanent and temporary teachers communicate as much as possible. A phone call from the permanent to the temporary teacher requesting he accept his student for some lessons is a wonderful way to avoid any awkwardness and, of course, it is a great advantage to the student when the two teachers can discuss the student’s strengths and weaknesses. It’s also a wonderful thing when the initiative to study with another teacher comes from the permanent teacher, especially when the permanent teacher can guide the student to the visiting teacher’s specialties.

The principal duty of a great teacher is to provide the student with as much quality information as possible and recommending study with other teachers certainly is part of that teaching responsibility. We are very lucky that this practice is usually accepted in our unique community.

December 20, 2006, Kyoto, Japan

Reposted March 31, 2010, Tokyo

Revised October 14, 2012, Tokyo

Dedication, Obsession, Fanaticism and the Happy Hobbyist

It’s not the same for everyone; the only thing we know for sure is that in our quest to be successful in the musical world it takes work, how much work and the intensity of that work is personal, but it takes work. Sometimes the decision of how much work is made by choice and sometimes it’s made simply because of our individual unique natures. Whatever our personal nature though, there is still room for some choice; we are all our own teachers and that being so, we all need to make our individual personal teaching decisions.

With a Smile or a Tear?

Let’s hope the “Good ol’ days” are gone forever: “The good ol’ days” when the enraged maestro would strike the student’s fingers with a cane or a ruler when he or she missed a note!

In our personal practice habits, where is that optimum line where patience and perseverance are in good balance?

I have a very good friend, an old colleague, exactly my age, from the Los Angeles Philharmonic, who used to profess, and I fear believed, “A good musician is a scared musician!” What a sad (and inefficient) approach to making music!

I also know an extremely talented young woman whose mother believed she should practice for her piano lessons only when she wanted to. Of course, the young girl always opted to go and play instead of practicing and consequently a great talent was never developed. Another sad approach, and today that young woman regrets that actively participating in the performance of music is not a part of her life. 

To be sure, our philosophies of how to think when we make music differ from the happy hobbyist to the tough hided, seasoned professional musician. Since the “Good ol’ days” we have learned through educational psychology research that knowledge and skills develop more efficiently without unnecessary stress. Quite simply, learning and performing work better when we’re happy!

The Greatest Teaching and Learning Experience

Perhaps the most significant and successful learning experience of mankind is that moment when a child takes his or her first steps. In all countries, in all cultures, it goes something like this: When the parents think it might be time for those first steps one parent takes the child’s hands and the other stands about a meter in front with arms held out. The parent holding the hands lets go, the child takes one or two steps and the other parent catches the child when it falls. After the steps the parents hug and kiss the child and tell him or her how proud they are; that’s the way it’s been through thousands of years, billions of times.

It would be hard to imagine that story any other way. But what if the story went like this: The mother holds the child’s hands and the father stands in front; the child tries to take a step but instead falls down. The father then slaps the child in the face and says in a loud voice, “Stupid kid, can’t even take one step without falling down”! How might that terrible scenario have affected the life of that child?

Fortunately, its dubious if such a terrible story has ever taken place but it shows the power of positive reinforcement over negative. Teaching is a huge responsibility whether it’s as a parent, as a teacher of a student, or as being our own teacher.

Of course, the work still needs to be done, and finding our individual balance between dedication, obsession and fanaticism is strategic; it’s different from person to person and for one single person it may differ from one day to another. Wherever we may find ourselves in that balance, we will reach a higher level of performance if we enjoy our work.

Happy working.

December 28, 2006, Tokyo, Japan

Revised October 7, 2012, Tokyo, Japan

Don't worry about Missing Something --- Worry about Not Trying

It’s been my privilege and extraordinary good luck to have held faculty positions in many musical institutions in North America, Europe and Japan; There was one period when I was teaching at the Fiesole Scuola di Musica, Italy, Conservitoire de Lausanne, Switzerland, Bern Hochschule für Music, Switzerland, Rotterdam Conservatory, Netherlands and the Royal Northern Collage of Music, Manchester, England, all at the same time.  As I recall I was tired most of the time from the chronic commuting, and although I would never do it again I remember it as exhilarating and perhaps more of an learning experience for me than the nearly 40 students I was seeing as often as possible. It was in this period I starting writing essays for the now defunct TubaNews.

Today I am still writing essays but now they are called Blogs. Most of them are pedagogical in content but I have tried my hand at many subjects, even a few short stories. Usually when writing the pedagogical blog messages I try targeting them to a specific musical environment. That could be an instrument group, an institution such as a conservatory, symphony orchestra, or brass ensemble or even a country; through the blog media we are able to address any of these specific musical entities. Since Japan is the center of my present musical life, I would like to address this blog specifically to my Japanese students, particularly those in the various ensembles that I coach.

None of us want to sound bad; none of us want to miss notes, whether it’s a cracked high note, loss of control in a fortissimo or a technical passage that breaks down simply because it’s fast. Certianly, we try to avoid sounding bad while playing with other musicians and frequently we try to avoid not sounding good even in the privacy of our own practice sessions. We hide these problems, whether it’s because of high register, loud dynamic or technical demands, simply by stopping during the problematic passages.

‘Hiding’ from the problem happens most frequently when we play into the high register. Many of the young players I work with play beautifully until it goes into the high register at which time they just stop playing until it returns to an easier lower register; they don’t want to take the chance that they might miss something, they don’t want their co students to hear them miss anything. THIS IS EXACTLY THE WRONG THING TO DO TO IMPROVE A HIGH REGISTER PROBLEM! The problem will never go away by avoiding it or by hiding from it. Of course, the necessary strength to play in the high register has to be developed by playing in the high register. To build the strength for the high register we need to aggressively continue trying to play those notes. Sometimes it will work sometimes it won’t but it will get better. We have very fine instrument etudes written specifically for development of the high register but just as important is that we stubbornly play the high passages that give us problems in our various ensembles.  

It’s very much the same when developing a fortissimo; the strength needs to be developed to have a beautiful ff. Every brass instrument has a repertoire of cantabile studies that are usually beautiful melodies, IE, the Bordogni Vocalizes. 10 or 15 minutes a day playing these beautiful cantabile melodies in a beautiful fortissimo can be, in conjunction with forte orchestra or quazi-orchestra passages like the Blazhevich for Trombone and tuba or Brandt studies for trumpet, a strategic part in building a beautiful fortissimo.

There’s another danger area: Many players stop when things get difficult in technical passages. Fast passages, when the tonal material gets more complicated or the fingering gets more difficult, are another situation where players just stop playing. This is much easier to correct. The obvious solution is practice! It’s easy, even fun, to work on fast passages but when the harmonic material gets complicated or the fingering gets difficult it’s time to work on the ear training to clearly hear the notes in your mind’s ear or during more difficult fingering. Practice those things rather than just enjoying hearing yourself playing fast; concentrate on the difficult technical passages.

We hide from the hard passages; high, loud or fast, so we won’t be heard either by our colleagues or ourselves, so no one will hear us missing. If we hide, we won’t improve. Please don’t hide from your weaknesses; let them be heard as you work to improve them. It’s like preparing for sports; sometimes it takes hard work to perform better.

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We go to conservatory to get better! Don’t be afraid to show the work you are doing to do that. Like a baby learning to walk, we all fall occasionally, we all miss occasionally; Please get back up and try again!

October 1, 2012, Tokyo