Posted by Klaus on December 19, 2001 at 16:01:02:
In Reply to: false tones posted by udder on December 19, 2001 at 15:14:02:
Mary Ann:
If these false notes actually are playable (will find resonance) on your particular tuba, they are mostly a matter of ear and feel.
There are two ways, that I know of, to get started.
One of them might be familiar to you from playing the horn. There are some embouchure slacking exercises, where one tries to fill the tritonus gap above the pedal of the Bb single horn. They can be done on all horns. One should only stay away from the extra options provided by the 4th and 5th valves of single horns and from the F side of double horns.
Applied to tuba it could be done this way:
Play your open 2nd partial. Gliss down a fifth by lowering and protuding your lower jaw. At the same time lower your diaphragm while keeping the air going.
Depending on instrument, mouthpiece, and embouchure strength, you should get a note approximately a fourth over the pedal. When your bodily playing apparatus and the control center of your ear have got a feel for that note, your might go directly for that note (the glissing is a very good tension releaser anyway).
The other way is to play chromatically down from the 2nd partial with normal fingerings. When you have reached 1+2+3, then try to get the lower chromatic neighbour on the open tuba. This resembles the way false notes are used for real, but at the first try the change in fell and timbre will be much more abrupt, than if you started out the gliss way.
Getting the other 4 false notes can be tried by repeating the gliss method with fingerings 2, 1, 1+2, and 2+3. Or by descending from the open false note.
My own preferred method obviously is the glissing one. And I find that the larger a mouthpiece one plays, the more control one gets over the full register incluidng the false notes. On an Eb tuba these false notes even can be played one octave down with the same fingerings.
Klaus