- - Please visit: Legacy Horn Experience - -
Any fine horn player or teacher is concerned with the development and control of the full range of orchestral horn dynamics. The quotes below provide ideas on how to improve this that range from the very practical to the somewhat obscure; in them look for threads of ideas and things you can apply to your own playing.
The aperture control model
For Farkas in The Art of French Horn Playing the key for producing a controlled soft dynamic was his concept of the aperture.
When working to develop a fine pianissimo, remember that the very small amount of air going through the lips makes the size of the lip opening of critical importance. If the opening is too large, the weak air-stream gets through without the friction necessary to produce vibration. If too small, it can completely clamp off the weak air-stream. Experiment to get this opening exactly the correct size and tension. There will be no doubt in one’s mind when it is just right, as the softest pianissimo will then seem to float out of the horn without effort.
It was all about applying the concepts already stated involving the points of resistance and the embouchure. Farkas does add this caution.
Players continually experiment with instruments, mouthpieces and methods to enlarge the tone, and then revel in the fact that they have such a big tone. All this they do while conductors the world over gnash their teeth and frantically wave the brass down! A big tone is a wonderful gift to have. Revel in it if you wish, but please, not at the expense of your pianissimo.
Looking closer at air at the end of a diminuendo
Fred Fox in Essentials of Brass Playing focuses the function of air in the technical side of playing a diminuendo.
One of the most consistent problems found with students on brass instruments is a weakening in the fullness of the sound as the player runs out of air. It shows up most strongly in the playing of a crescendo-diminuendo—four beats up, four beats down. Invariably there is a collapse of the body of the sound on the diminuendo part….
To pinpoint the problem, try the following: Take a deep breath, then blow a steady stream of air into your hand. Keep the flow of air steady until you are completely out of air. Notice that towards the end the lungs are exerting much more effort to retain that steady stream of air. Why does one have to work so much harder toward the end than at the start to retain the same flow of air into the palm of the hand? …
Review blowing a stream of air onto your hand. Get the feeling of how much greater the effort becomes as the lung capacity decreases. Hold out a long note on your instrument. In order for the note to remain identical in sound quality, notice how much more effort there is towards the end of the note.
I’ve been tempted to cut this quote, and it is shortened from what I once had posted. On one hand, Fox does clearly articulate what one problem is — people do better at the crescendo than the diminuendo. On the other hand, I don’t agree with it taking much more effort toward the end of a diminuendo, it seems to me like I’m being more gentle with the air at the end, which is balancing the size of the lip opening and the lip tension. Which is one way to read it when he continues below.
Keep the lips soft
In the addendum to Essentials of Brass Playing Fox also has this suggestion on achieving a better pianissimo.
We, on the brass instruments, tend to tamper too much. We not only blow less air, but we also make the lips harder, we help (we think) the pianissimo by pressing them together more, making them stiffer and thus less resilient—less pliable. It would be similar to a red player using a medium hard reed for a mezzo-forte passage and changing to a hard reed for a pianissimo passage! Obviously that wouldn’t work out well for the woodwind player. Making the lips harder doesn’t work out too well for the brass player either!
Blow a note forte and diminuendo it in your usual way. Try it again. This time, as you get softer, simply blow less air, do nothing to the lips. Let them alone as if they were a double reed. You will find a greater pianissimo can be achieved, and a purer sound too.
The essential things to do: smaller aperture, slower air
In A Creative Approach to the French Horn Harry Berv speaks to aperture control in relation to soft and loud dynamics. In terms of soft dynamics he notes that “the aperture is much smaller and the speed of the airstream slower.”
Douglas Hill also notes in Collected Thoughts on Teaching and Learning, Creativity, and Horn Performance that
To play very softly you must develop super-sensitive control of a tiny aperture with a slower, solid, and steady airstream. Do not let the gentle, mellow quality of the softer sounds mislead you into being too physically passive with your airstream. Think of the air as if it were a laser beam projected through the horn.
This is one of those topics for which, if you have troubles, the solution may be somewhat individualized.
Watch your pitch, and another tip
One final point I would suggest watching is pitch, as the tendency is to go sharp, especially at the end of pianissimo phrases. And see this article for another tip on soft playing.
Continue in Hornmasters Series
