By Keith Fiala
In the world of brass playing, mouthpieces becomes a touchy subject amongst players. It's the one piece of equipment that everyone seems to be very opinionated and closed minded about.
For years, I was guided toward mouthpieces that were on the larger side of the scale. Being told that if I went to a smaller diameter cup (diameter being measured from inside edge to inside edge) that it would severely hurt my tone, tonguing ability, range, endurance, and the list went on! I've played trumpet for over 32 years and only recently was I brave enough (smart enough?) to venture away from the common myth and try something for myself!
About 2 years ago I was at my wits end with mouthpieces, myths, endurance, inconsistency with range, and sometimes just downright tired chops! So, I moved down about 5 sizes. A SIGNIFICANT drop... In trumpet mouthpiece terms, I went from a 5C to the equivalent of a 11C Bach (trombone from a 61/2AL to a 12C). Pretty drastic!
At first, it felt very strange and almost uncomfortable... but as I gave it a fair chance and warmed up PROPERLY, did my exercises (Clarke Studies) and worked with it, I noticed that EVERYTHING was improving. My peak range did not improve as I had bad habits that I had to break, but the my tone, consistency, endurance, and over all comfort greatly improved.
Now after being on a smaller diameter for over 2 years, I have noticed that a lot of the "bad habits" that I had developed were largely from over compensating with an extremely large diameter cup.
If you would like to learn more about this concept, you can learn more at http://www.brassplayersolution.com
Keith Fiala / Anna Romano
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Keith_Fiala
http://EzineArticles.com/?Your-Trumpet-Or-Trombone-Mouthpiece-May-Be-Too-Large!&id=2113154
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=edc21b6c-9213-42e4-aa68-2af9642596cc)
Related posts: