Re: Starting over again...


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Posted by Rick Denney on April 21, 2003 at 15:08:08:

In Reply to: Starting over again... posted by Jeff on April 21, 2003 at 14:37:00:

Air production will be your biggest challenge. It seems to me one of the best ways to work on that and also to strengthen your embouchure is to buzz on the mouthpiece. Without the resistance of the tuba, it forces you to move lots more air. And as you make adjustments to acheive as pure a buzzing sound as possible, you'll be improving your efficiency also. You'll be surprised by how good the tuba sounds after five minutes of buzzing.

Also, be careful of extending your range too far too soon. Do it with embouchure strengh, not with pressure against the mouthpiece. Lip slurs through the middle range of the horn (notes in the bottom half of the staff) will expose your embouchure weaknesses. I wish that I'd done those sorts of exercises when I was starting again--I wouldn't sound so bad on them now. High notes that you achieve through mouthpiece pressure do more harm than good.

At first, you'll only be able to buzz an F at the bottom of the staff, or the Bb on the staff, or other pitches in that area. When you really start moving more air more slowly, the low notes will come. If you can't buzz a mouthpiece at first, cover half the opening with you pinky finger as you hold the mouthpiece to give you some resistance. Eventually, you won't need that, either.

If you spend the 20 minutes that follow a long-tone warmup working on these fundamentals every time you practice (10 minutes of buzzing and 10 minutes of lip slurs and flexibility exercises), you'll force yourself onto a productive improvement path. I'm doing it now, and I wish I'd done it when I started again.

Of course, good lessons from a real tuba professional might point you down that path even more effectively.

Rick "who has paid for lack of discipline" Denney


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