The Embouchure Change Chronicles: Part 1 (Days 1 – 52)

(Embouchure Change, Day 1)

Many BTB readers are trumpet players embarking on the path of finally getting their playing in order. Sometimes, this is after a long string of consistent practicing and performing, and other times it’s a comeback after many years of not playing at all.

Either way, most of us understand that after that initial burst of motivation there comes the realization of the sheer amount of work it takes to make seemingly small amounts of progress. That, coupled with fact that it can be difficult to know what we even need to practice in the first place, it’s easy to get bummed out and off track.

This is something I understand well and good. When I decided to truly apply myself to this beast, even at the risk of failing, I had already been playing for 17 years. Though I had a fair amount of experience, I knew I was basically getting lucky with a small streak of talent, and being in good places at good times.

Feeling that I lacked an appropriate technical foundation and understanding of the instrument, I did not even consider myself a trumpet player. Rather, I was a guy who played the trumpet. And as silly a distinction as that may sound, often it was more like the trumpet was playing me.

So I decided to go about figuring out what it took for me to play in a way that I felt good about. This led to a somewhat drastic embouchure change and a few tough years. That was the summer of 2011.

I know that many trumpet players are going through a similar time. I also know that they have questions about the general process of an embouchure change as well as how to deal with continuing to perform during that time.

To that end, I’m going back through my first practice journals with the intention of outlining the initial three years of my own experience. So far, what I’m finding is that I made just about every mistake imaginable.

However, it was through those dark days that I found a more joyful and musical experience playing the trumpet – and I hope that reading this will inspire others to keep going. Of course, the usual disclaimers apply: I’m just some guy with a trumpet, a laptop and the crazy belief that we can all learn to play a little bit better and maybe help a few others do the same.

Please enjoy part one of, “The Embouchure Change Chronicles.”

The First Two Steps in ‘Fixing’ My Trumpet Playing

First of all, no one told me I needed to change anything about my trumpet playing. I just felt like it needed to be done. I had some pretty severe limits to my playing, although I was decent at hiding them.

At the time, I didn’t really know what it took to play well. However, I knew what two of my greatest plagues were; needing to play on bone-dry chops and a mouthpiece placement that was very low on the top lip, while drawing as much lip out of the mouthpiece as I could get away with.

The low placement and thinning of the lips seemed a problem because it felt uncomfortable and I was bruising my upper lip after hard playing. The drying of the chops was something I figured out at a young age and I honestly thought that was how the trumpet “worked” for me. In reality, these crutches prevented me from developing an embouchure that was capable of sustaining even a mid-range pitch without the added friction.

Unbeknownst to me at that time, I was also playing super sharp and had a generally brittle and shearing tone.

So based on what I knew, I outlined two main goals for myself:

1. Stop frantically drying the chops
2. Play with the mouthpiece higher on the upper lip/teeth (basically the more comfortable setting I could play a low C or middle G on)

What I Practiced

With these two guideposts I went at it – hard. I was practicing about three hours a day while continuing to perform with multiple rehearsal bands and gigs per week.

Within the first two months, I was playing bits and pieces from every method I had familiarity with. I figured that each exercise had some magic to it and I needed to find a way to balance them all. I ended up hitting about 12 or so different exercises per day in an attempt to figure out what I needed.

I was practicing out of books, routines and suggestions by:

• J.L. Small
• Vincent Cichowicz
• John McNiel
• Laurie Frink
• Walt Johnson
• Gary Grant
• Frank Greene
• Clark Terry
• Carmine Caruso
• Bill Adam
• Boyd Hood
• Herbert L. Clarke
• Charles Schlossberg
• Charles Colin
• Ralph Scaffiddi

Aside from these well-known resources, I was also making up exercises for single tonguing, double tonguing, triple tonguing, pitch bending, lead-pipe buzzing, transcribing jazz licks, trying to lean new tunes, pontificating on the Pimsleur approach to language learning, and doing my best to play melodies in all 12 keys by ear. All the while taking notes on all the little bad habits I wanted to fix like; playing test notes, stopping to adjust the embouchure for different ranges and aimless noodling.

Even then I was obsessed with trying to add more and more, thinking that was what was needed.

How I Tried to Develop Consistency

More recently, I have come to appreciate that the aperture – as controlled by the strength and flexibility of the embouchure – to be the biggest limiting factor in trumpet playing. What I mean is that the better the embouchure is at holding the pitch at the aperture, the less everything else seems to matter and the more ease we can find in playing. However, back when I started on this journey, I didn’t know much, if anything about the trumpet embouchure.

Up to that point in my life I’d rarely even heard the word “embouchure” muttered in instruction. I think this is because many people learn to play without thinking about it, and others feel uncomfortable discussing their experience and are quick to fall back on the “we are all different” stance. It wasn’t until a bit later when I began reading old texts that those pieces of playing became more clear.

However, I was hearing a lot about the air. And two of the greatest players I was hanging with at that time straight up told me that it was just about the sound and the air. So, I started thinking about the breath and how I compressed the air.

Since I had basically no developed musculature or understanding of the embouchure, focusing on the breath – something I had relatively more control over – helped me get some decent results from the get-go. Essentially, I was experimenting with ways to get an open feeling in the upper torso while singing “ahh” in my head as I played in all registers. It helped.

I still felt in my guts, though, that I needed some direction with the embouchure. To that end, I watched some YouTube videos of an effortless high note player and tried to copy his seemingly “relaxed” approach to the mouthpiece. I later found that sense of physical and psychological relaxation in defining more practical guidelines for how I set the mouthpiece to the lips.

And just FYI, these days I take a pretty pragmatic approach to the breath and occasionally like to warm-up the muscles involved. Try breathing in slowly and deeply. Then, fill and allow the middle part of the breath to expand, and finally raise up a bit to expand the top part of the rib cage. Hold the breath without closing the throat (kind of like a super slow inhalation) for a few seconds and then exhale. It feels good and can make playing a little easier from the start.

How I Tried to Speed Up the Embouchure Change

During this time I was a big fan of a gentleman’s writing named, Pavel Tsatsouline. He is the ex-physical trainer of the Soviet Special Forces. After moving to the United States to become a “capitalist dog,” he wrote a bunch of books on how to train strength and flexibility.

One of his main strength building concepts is called “Greasing the Groove.” GTG basically states that the key to strength is practice. And the key to maximizing productive practice time is to stay as fresh as possible, as much as possible, by severely limiting your “time under tension.”

This is not a new concept to brass playing – play a bit, take a break, play a little bit more, take another break – but I was trying to apply this concept beyond its practical limits in an attempt to get good as fast as possible. However, it did reveal a great struggle that many of us face in improving our embouchure – when is enough, enough, and when are we doing more harm than good?

At the end of the day, I believe it is a bit too idealistic to think we can improve as trumpet players without getting banged up from time to time. It simply takes more repetition to learn how to play a three octave range with a good sound than it does for a human body to learn how to dead-lift a couple hundred pounds. Some days you feel great, others days, not so much. And I’m not so sure that ever ends. But the further you go, the days that aren’t as good as your best can still be good enough to get the job done.

What Was Happening On the Gigs

After reading back through these notes, all I can say about gigging is that I was a total mess. I don’t mean for this to discourage anyone, but rather let you know that you are not alone.

The interesting thing is that even though I was practicing my ass off during those first 52 days, I made very little noticeable progress in my technical ability. However, I learned a TON from crashing and burning on the bandstand over and over again.

This journal was filled with many pep-talks about how it would all pay off in the end. My playing was wildly inconsistent, one night popping some decent high F’s, the next day unable to maintain a solid C in the staff, and I didn’t understand why.

The approach to gig days was an “anything goes” attitude. Since I was paying the rent as a trumpet player I felt I needed to let the chips fall where they may in an effort to keep making money. The types of things that were particularly challenging were playing split-lead (switching between section and lead parts), being overpowered by section players,  and playing in the lead trumpet range in a three-horn section without the support of other trumpets. Often, I’d take things down 8vb just to survive.

As crazy as it sounds, I was always ready to get fired, and looking back, I may have been better off doing something completely different for cash – but then again, I was on a steep learning curve.

At this time I was also very susceptible to changes in resistance, or back-pressure, and I really screwed myself up a few times with too much heavily muted practice. Again, steep learning curve. As you get stronger this matters less and less.

I must say that this early experience taught me a great deal. Particularly about economy (pacing), and most importantly, having compassion for others who are along different parts of their journey. Before having so much of my ego cut down, my insecurities often lead my thoughts in the direction of being overly critical of others. I believe they call this, “projecting.”

It’s a tough thing going through these changes, and you kind of have to accept where you are and take it from there. If you’re overly concerned people think you suck – don’t be. No matter who you are, there are people pointing to all your flaws, as well as those whom you inspire. For the most part, nobody cares. Keep working.

General Progress Timeline Over The First 52 Days

It only took about 18 days for the urge to “frantically dry my chops” to subside. It’s still a work in progress.

By the end of two months, the newer mouthpiece set higher on the lips felt much better than the old. It still took quite awhile to develop any real strength and consistency, but a general feeling of comfort took hold rather quickly.

After about four weeks, I could go for the high notes on gigs using a butt-load of compression from the torso/rib cage – plus the “anything goes” mindset. It wasn’t terribly reliable but I could do it.

Mistakes in My Thinking and General Approach

One of the biggest mistakes I made at this time was severely underestimating the amount of work and time it takes to “level up.” We can have all the right knowledge, but I don’t know that any of that can change how long it takes for the body to adapt.

It’s funny now to read my notations assuming two weeks of solid practice ensured a good playing foundation. To be clear, doing something new, in a positive direction for two weeks is great – and the psychological aspects of committing to a predefined ‘Daily’ is something we go into great depth in as a part of the Ultimate Comeback Kit. Still, getting on track with consistent practice habits is not the same thing as mastering the trumpet in a month or less.

By bouncing all over the place with different routines I did get the ball rolling, but it would still be a few years before I stuck with something long enough to make any solid progress in my playing coordination.

I was also doing a lot of thinking during this time – and I do mean a lot. This particular notebook was filled with endless theorizing – most or all of which I have basically abandoned for a more pragmatic, repetition-based approach to learning. Having a theoretical base or knowledge is helpful, but for me, a “hypothesis-based” method doesn’t seem to do as much good as just doing something for long enough to see what it does for you.

One last thing that proved to do more harm than good was pushing, pushing and pushing for greater heights. This may be purely based on personality, but I’ve found a much more doable, enjoyable and ultimately successful practice in limiting those heights and reinforcing good playing habits.

Other Things I Learned In Those First 52 Days

I now realize a big part of this process was organizing my thinking so that I could practice confidently. I had my two guidelines in regards to mouthpiece placement, but all-in-all I was mostly searching. You don’t need to know everything and you’ll get smarter as you go, eventually figuring out some solid ways to make improvement if you stick with it. In my case, this took longer than the actual trumpet playing improvements that came later.

So, if you think you have a bad habit, do what you can do without that habit and build from there.  If you can’t do ANYTHING without that habit, pretend you are a total beginner and get going.

Be kind to yourself and get used to the waiting game 🙂

Stick around for The Embouchure Change Chronicles: Part II!

If You Enjoyed This Article, you might like to give Concepts for the Advancing Trumpeter a read. It was written to help trumpet players grasp the mechanics of brass playing in a simple, easy to understand way while offering practical suggestions for getting the most out of your practice time.