Posted by Andy on February 20, 2004 at 12:51:06:
In Reply to: Re: Re: An interesting lesson posted by Mary Ann on February 19, 2004 at 17:24:13:
I am very happy to hear that things are working so well for you with your new teacher. I hope you understand that I was not trying to throw cold water on your achievements.
In fact, when I studied with Mr. Jacobs, he worked with me on a "fault" I had with my embouchure. When I would take a breath, I would drop my jaw and completely lose contact between the rim and my lower lip. When I would reposition the mouthpiece after the breath, it would be too far toward the bottom of the cup, resulting in poor tone quality.
He had me practice on the mouthpiece alone, in front of a mirror, taking breaths without losing contact with the rim and my lower lip. I would do this for 15 minutes a day, working on this one aspect alone. Then, for the rest of my practice, I would't think about it, and work on other things. But the focus was just on keeping contact with the rim, and not on a specific placement. The mouthpiece was placed wherever I got the best results (i.e., the best sound).
Now, I probably wasn't a very good student, because I never totally got the hang of this new habit. But it was because I didn't work on it daily for a long enough period of time for it to become ingrained as a habit.
But, here was an example where something I was doing physically was interfering with achieving the musical product. However, the focus, when playing each note, was always on the sound, not the meat.
Anyway, I am so glad that you are achieving the results you desire, and are enjoying the experience, which is really what is important. I just get a little nervous when I hear of people talking about mouthpiece placement. I have several friends that have really screwed themselves up trying to manipulate the muscles of the lips, rather than using Mr. Jacobs ideas.