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Continuing our series, we have more ideas for developing the high range.
Breath accents?
In A Practical Guide to French Horn Playing Milan Yancich suggested when warming up to apply the concept of breath accents to aid in high register production.
In applying the breath accent… one’s attention is drawn to the source of his breath power in playing the horn. It is important that when going for the higher notes and especially the top note of the arpeggio, the force of the air in the breath accent rather than a squeezing of the lips or a violent pressing of the mouthpiece should help attain the note. It is far better to make the correct approach to the high note and miss it than to get the note by squeezing out a tight, small tone. Eventually one develops the feel of securing the high notes by having the tone ride on the air.
A different way to think of aperture control
This series has been looking in each installment at books in chronological order by date of publication, so next we turn to Fred Fox. Fox has much to say on this topic of quite a bit different nature than other authors. In a chapter titled “The Key to High Notes” in Essentials of Brass Playing Fox points to a way of visualizing aperture control, inside the mouthpiece, to focus high range production.
The embouchure consists of two pairs of separate control muscles. The corner pair, the ones used when pronouncing “eeeeee,” and the middle pair, the ones used to pronounce “mmmmmmmmmmm.” It is possible to tighten the corner pair and keep the middle pair relaxed. Conversely, it is possible to tighten the middle pair and keep the corner pair relaxed. Try it. Notice that you can control the corner or middle muscles separately. If the embouchure consisted of one muscle only, the corner and middle muscles could not be controlled independently of each other.
The tendency, as one goes to the upper register, is to tighten the corner muscles and increase the mouthpiece pressure. The lip area inside the mouthpiece remains comparatively relaxed. Obviously, beyond a certain point, there can be no high notes possible with the vibrating area inside the mouthpiece too relaxed, no matter how much the corner muscles strain, and no matter how much the mouthpiece is pressed into the lips. The “safe” won’t open unless the middle muscles are tensed properly.
The middle muscles must be exercised and developed consciously for high notes….
Changes of notes are made with the middle muscles spearheading the action, the corner muscles acting only as secondary support to the middle muscles. If the middle muscles do not tighten properly, then at a certain point, no matter how much mouthpiece pressure is applied, no matter how much the corner muscles tighten, the flaccid lip vibration inside the mouthpiece will not give you higher notes. Nothing will occur.
Tighten the lip area inside the mouthpiece consciously. Use that action in all registers primarily, and you are on your way to greater facility and better higher notes.
Try the “eeeee” and “mmmmm” idea out, it gets at a bit different concept of aperture control than that presented by Farkas.
Getting toward the idea of “support”
Fox also offers the following suggestion to obtain the best sound on the highest note in a phrase. First, Fox reminds us that for his purposes he calls “the abdominal muscle above the belt line the upper diaphragm, and the abdominal muscles below the belt line the lower diaphragm.”
It is common for high notes to tend to sound somewhat strained. The cause is a tight throat. This tightness can be overcome.
…The upper note will sound freer when you harden the lower diaphragm at the moment of attack. The vowel sound does get smaller with the upper note. The lower diaphragm kick is only used to keep the throat open….
If the lower diaphragm is hardened before the attack, there is no beneficial effect. If the lower diaphragm hardens after the note is played, there is no beneficial effect. It must harden at the moment of the attack, like a tug on a rope to be effective….
There is one physical act that opens the throat. That is sudden tensing of the lower diaphragm. This action causes the throat to open up more, sympathetically.
…The basic purpose of the downward kick is to neutralize the throat, keeping it the same opening on the high not as when the lower note was played…. Simply enough the kick is used to keep the throat from tightening.
I call this “the accordion effect.” Visualize an accordion being squeezed together, then expanded. Imagine the same accordion being played in a vertical position….
Rule: The lower diaphragm kick can be used for the highest note of any phrase in any register. It sets the best and fullest sound for the high note, which is the most important note of a phrase. The lower diaphragm relaxes after the highest note is played and thus can be used again whenever the next highest note occurs. With some practice the “accordion effect” will keep the throat open at all times. This is one of the most important factors in effective wind playing tone production.
Of course, as presented in the preliminary article to this topic, elements of what he is saying are clearly only visualizations. Any good instruction, taken to extreme, can lead you to problems. But hopefully his instructions will still be helpful ones for readers, and to his credit I like that he is willing to talk about the throat at all. A lot of teachers studiously avoid the topic, with the idea being if you even mention it you will create problems by thinking about it too much.
When the series returns we have even more tips on the high range.
Continue in Hornmasters Series
