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Over the course of my studies, I changed my embouchure twice while in college. The first time was in the summer of 1982 while studying at the Aspen Music Festival between my sophomore and junior years of college, working with David Wakefield.
A glimpse into my thinking process
In some recent cleaning of files, I found my notes from early in the summer of 1982 that outlined the pros and cons of changing my embouchure. Why these were saved all these years I don’t know, but it is an interesting window into a critical piece of thinking.
I had the previous year changed my major from music business to horn performance. The thoughts below are a combination of my thinking, my reading of the Farkas book, and things Wakefield must have said in the first couple lessons that summer.
The old embouchure
I listed these pros regarding my existing embouchure, which was 2/3 lower lip:
- Playing fairly well
- Good high range to mid-low range
- Good tone
- “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”
- Possibility I’ll [still] master low notes, or at least a smaller shift
The cons were:
- Extreme low range hard – big shift
- Not “textbook” placement
The new embouchure
The new embouchure was 2/3 upper lip. As to the pros:
- Good extreme low range
- Possibility to be better
- “Textbook” placement
- Possibility that someone will later try to change it
I think what I meant with that last point was that if I did not change it now, likely I would still need to later.
The cons were:
- No high range
- Struggle in most of range
- “Waste” about a year learning new [embouchure]
- Little playing done at Aspen
- Worst horn here
Those were some big negatives but the pros did win out. It really did take close to a year to work out, as the change was so large, 2/3 lower to 2/3 upper. My entire junior recital did not go higher than G at the top of the staff! By the next summer things were very stable with the new setting. I used that embouchure until early in my Doctoral studies, when I shifted the embouchure up a little more, working carefully with Mike Hatfield (with a goal of improving endurance).
How it looks now
Today, my embouchure is about half-way between the Aspen embouchure change and the IU embouchure change. So, things clearly did work out. It is always a topic to think out carefully, as there are pros and cons to weigh in relation to your performance goals. If you are in the midst of an embouchure change, be encouraged that you will see the light at the end of the tunnel, as I did.
