Steven embechure method
Paul Ayick
RAD
www.bbtrumpet.com. Great stuff there....
Daniel Matus <rxt...@email.sps.mot.com> wrote:
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>Does anyone have any information on the 'Stevens embechure' method? Any
>links?
>
>Thanks,
>Dan
>
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Pops
The embouchure is the mechanism which produces the sound as the air
flows. The lips need to be moist, or the air stream will separate them
and there will be no sound. This moisture causes surface tension, which
facilitates the buzzing process. The air blows through the lip aperture.
The higher or softer that you play the smaller the lip aperture is. The
lower or louder that you play, the larger the lip aperture will be. High
notes need a lot of lip compression and abdominal pressure, not
mouthpiece pressure. Lip compression is something all teachers make
mention of. Their advice is, tighten up to play high. They don't tell
you that this compression is lip against lip, like when you squeeze your
thumb and forefinger together to grab something. It's this lip pressure
that you need to fight the air stream and soar into the sky. Excessive
mouthpiece pressure against the lips will separate your lips by pushing
them apart. This lowers your range and causes a poor, thin tone,
sluggish technique, shortened endurance and overall a shortened career.
As you play your horn you will have a natural tendency to either
blow the air stream up towards your nose, or down towards your chin.
This tendency is based on your own physical traits, like tooth
formation. Don't try to change the direction of your air stream, it
never works well. You have to learn to use what nature has given you.
Upstream players usually have a tendency to smile or thin out their
lips. You must guard against this, as it will hinder your endurance and
tone quality. The jaw should be thrust out and horn pivot up to ascend
in 85% to 90% of upstream players. A lot of upstream players tend to
bunch up their lips and create a roll under their lower lip. This is
natural in an upstream player. Upstream players usually have a brighter
tone than downstream players and their range is easier to produce, but
not higher. An upstream player needs to look at mouthpiece shapes and
larger bells to darken his sound.
Downstream players tend to rely on mouthpiece pressure to play high.
This is exactly the opposite of what they need to do. This pressure will
cause lip strain and require more and more air. It could also cause an
injury. Downstream players should pivot with the bell down while
ascending. Not all will. This downward pivot will help you to back the
pressure off of the top lip. Backing off the pressure will enable you to
soar. You must resist the tendency to over pucker. Downstream players
usually have a darker sound and need to look at double cups, or shallow
mouthpieces for range.
The Costello-Stevens Embouchure is used by a lot of high note
artists. It was first used in the 20's and disappeared for about 40
years. It uses a slight rolling in of both lips and touching evenly all
the way across. It also uses 50% top lip and 50% lower lip in the
mouthpiece. The teeth will be ½ inch apart and the jaw thrust forward
so that the teeth are even. This will give you a level, or slightly
elevated horn angle. There is little mouthpiece pressure. To practice
this hold your horn by laying it on its side in the palm of your hand.
Do not grab it. Place your lips on the mouthpiece and play. At first you
will get nothing, but you should get so you can at least play a high C
with this exercise. There are some teachers who tell their students to
lock their elbows with the mouthpiece 1 to 2 inches away from their
mouth and then make the head chase the mouthpiece. Doing this it is not
possible to use much pressure. You must use lateral lip compression to
play your upper register. Relax the chops and back off the pressure.
Make the air do all the work. Not only can it, but you will add an
octave to your range. As your top lip pushes down and you bottom lip
pushes up you may get a roll of skin under your lower lip. In this
system it is normal. This embouchure uses a tongue arch and a pivot.
With this embouchure different people pivot in different directions. It
is based on how far forward you thrust your chin and which way your air
stream goes. Try both ways. It's a lot easier to tell if the pivot going
down is right or not. Play a low G, pivot the bell up and then down. One
way will sound free and clear and the other will be really bad.
Points to remember:
1. Good posture. Chest, arms and head up.
2. Relax jaw and open throat.
3. Teeth 1/2 inch apart. Jaw forward.
4. Pull the mouth corners in toward your lips.
5. Roll both lips in slightly.
6. Let the lips touch and expose to air. Say "M".
7. Buzzing firmness before placing mouthpiece. 8. Place mouthpiece
gently on lips.
9. Little mouthpiece pressure.
10. Breathe and blow. Don't hold it in.
11. Pivot to keep mouthpiece lined up with air stream.
12. Lip compression will give you upper register. Lip against lip.
13. Relax the chops. Back off the pressure and make the air work.
14. Always set chops, place mouthpiece, blow.
Problems
Nine times out of ten if your upper register does not speak it is
because your lips are too tense. Relax and make the air work for you. If
your sound is thin and weak you are using too much pressure. To get a
brighter sound roll your lips in, or direct the air stream behind your
upper teeth.
To get a darker sound, roll your lips out, direct the air stream down,
or make a more oval lip aperture by drawing the corners in slightly. Too
flat a lip aperture will produce a bright, hard sound. You will not be
able to play softly and will have air in your tone. No matter what
embouchure you play, make the air do the work, relax your chops, back
off the pressure and use the right equipment for the job. If you need a
dark sound, you need a deep cup and wide bell flare.
Remember, as a player you will need to play more low A's and G's in
public than high A's or G's. Practice your low register and make it
sound good.
The first reference to the jaw forward embouchure, now known
as the Stevens System, was in a book by Cesare Bendinelli called "The
Entire Art of Trumpet Playing" and written in 1614. The next one was in
"The Trumpeters' and Kettledrummers" Art" by J. E. Altenburg and written
in 1795. Out of 42 books about embouchures, only one from the 1920's,
taught the smile system. One taught the Maggio Pucker System, three
taught to overlap the lips at all times, and one liked both the
overlapped lip and smiling. Thirty-six books taught the Stevens System,
even if not by name.
Dr. Stevens' mistake was to demonstrate that you do not
need mouthpiece pressure to play high. I read the same demonstration in
Rafael Mendez's book. Mendez was not criticized because he was a "legit"
player, and Stevens was criticized because he was a high note player.
A final note on embouchure. Remember, the key points are: teeth
apart, head up, throat open, say the letter M to set the chops, breathe
and blow. A few people have problems going from low to high. They tend
to reset on a breath. This is caused by placing the mouthpiece on flabby
lips and not ready to play lips. Jacoby always had his students set for
a G on top of the staff before placing the mouthpiece. From there you
can relax for the two lower octaves, or firm up for the top octave. This
technique also eliminates most of the lip rolling, both in and out. H.
L. Clarke and Rafael Mendez shared Jacoby's view.
'Pops'
A collection of some past posts & information about my book.
http://www.Bbtrumpet.com
Pops
Paul Ayick
I think you are a little off on the Stevens chops.He
advocated more bottom than top lip.(2/3 1/3).From his book:
Mouthpiece placement and weight distributionAnd,as regards the teeth opening he has this to say:
In the small mouthpiece brass instrument family (trumpet, cornet, French horn, etc.), the placement should be a little more than half (about 60 - 65%) below a gently closed lip aperture. This permits the bottom lip facing to extend, left to right, beyond the top lip vibrating area and insures a complete seal of facing and reed. In the larger mouthpiece family, (trombone, tube, etc.), the placement of the mouthpiece should be closer to 50 or 55% on the bottom.
bringing the jaw forward to an even (parallel) or slightly forward
bite of the lower teeth while maintaining an aperture of approximately
1/4th inch.
Not 1/2".
Actually in his lessons Roy would say never less than 1/8th with 1/4" inch being the optimum.You could always spot his guys walking around Manhattan with pencils in their mouths, jaws thrust forward like so many 1952 Pontiac hood ornaments.It would either work real well for a guy or turn others around big time.Back in the 60's the take was usually that Roys students could all play good "G.s" but lacked good middle register sounds and flexibilty and most everybody was down on him and the Costello system.It's funny that it seems to be making somewhat of a comeback as witnessed by members of this Newsgroups interest.Here's the whole book:
http://abel.hive.no/oj/musikk/trompet/stevens/stevens.pdf
http://abel.hive.no/oj/musikk/trompet/stevens/stevens1.pdf
http://abel.hive.no/oj/musikk/trompet/stevens/costello.pdf
--
Pops
Both Roy Stevens and William Costello were hardheaded about their
embouchure. If you were a down stream player even with a forward jaw
position they did not want to teach you. If you had dental
irregularities or an over / under bite they didn't want to teach you.
Even you stated that their players were noted for high g's and bad
middle registers. Don Jacoby showed me WHY this was the norm. It is not
my fault that Roy chose not to listen to Jake. Those changes although
minor make a HUGH difference in sound.
Nobody is going to carry a ruler and measure the space betwqeen their
teeth. Even Roy wrote " let's take a hypothetical teeth openning of 1/4"
" That is on page 10. Several times he stressed that even when moving
the jaw the lips both needed 1/8" to vibrate freely. Well 1/8 for the
top and 1/8 for the bottom is 1/4 " . But that is the smallest
acceptable gap in the upper register. As you lower the jaw and come down
the gap gets bigger. I've seen hundreds of people with weak sounds that
got a hugh sound by openning their mouth and allowing the lips room to
vibrate.
Roy stated mouthpiece distrubition of WEIGHT 10 - 12 times in his book.
More weight on the lower lip. He stressed many times lips exposed evenly
to the air column. If you are not going to use it why expose it to air.
Also if I say 50-50 and a student is a little off then he may end up
with 1/3 - 2/3 or 2/3 - 1/3 . Some people play both of these quite well.
If I say 1/3 - 2/3 and a student is off then I've seen them come in
1/10- 9/10. Really.
So you need to stress the idea of moderation. Even amounts of each lip
+ or - , big open space between the teeth to allow the lips to buzz. The
use of a modest tongue arch not to eeee but to aaaaa. This is BIG.
Conserve the use of pressure. Roy never meant NO pressure. He was trying
to get a point across.
If you were in the woods and someone said lookout a 10 foot snake is
trying to bite you. Would you complain if it were only 9 feet and 10
inches?
Paul Ayick
I told you a while back I
was no fan of Roy's teaching methods ,but,I thought you were relaying to
the group what he taught not your interpretation of it.I am only
relaying to you what he told me over and over and over .........
IMHO dogmatic teachers are the downfall of many potentially good players
and I think Dizzy,and Louie,and Conti Candoli,and so many others who broke
the rules but played their asses illustrates this.
Paul when I'm off it is because I chose to be.
Jeez Pops I get the feeling you are taking all this personally.We all can make mistakes nes pas?
If you were a down stream player even with a forward jaw position they did not want to teach you.
You know I am a downstreamer and Roy had no qualms about taking my $30
an hour actually when I think back I know quite a few guys that took from
him that were not upstream types.He was very dogmatic about the 1/4" opening
(a good concept). Dogmatic too about the 1/3 2/3 's crap, and, that was
a terrible thing to lay on a student.And 1/3 2/3 is very much different
than 50/50.And for me (closer to 2/3 1/3) trying to make that adjustment
was ridiculous.
Paul
'Pops' wrote:
'Pops'
A collection of some past posts & information about my book.
http://www.Bbtrumpet.com
Pops
better than I did.
Pops
embouchures". The way many of them were applied I agree that they
deserved some of it. But really Costello was way off on stuff like
"There is only one true way to play". This is of course nonsense. They
were also off base in trying to change the airstream direction of
players. That rarely works. And the Stevens can work with a 50 - 50 ,
1/3 - 2/3, or even a 2/3 - 1/3 mouthpiece placement. So can the Farkas.
It is NOT the direction of the air stream or the mouthpiece placement
that make an embouchure work. Those are 1st grade lessons. It is things
like HOW to make compression, moving mouth corners , lip aperture shape,
proper pivot for your playing type, making BOTH lips accept the
workload, efficient use of tongue arch (not to eeeee ), breath control,
breath support, increasing your endurance by adding a pucker in upper
register. These things ARE what makes any embouchure work. These are
also the things that are NOT taught. I know band directors who play
the trumpet and took lessons 4 years in college that do NOT know about
a pivot. I teach that to beginners to aid in lower register tone
production. What about using aperture shape to control the tone . I know
college grads that don't know about that. Again I teach it in the first
year for beginners. It is an easy concept and it gives quick positive
results. I had to talk to a local band director because he kept trying
to screw up one of my beginners. Who BTW is the best in his class and
already as good as the second year students at his school after 1/2 a
year.
Trumpet playing is treated like a mystery or some rite of passage.
Teachers holding back information to either stay better than the student
or to keep the student taking lessons for a long time. I am crazy. I
want to be the WORST trumpet player in the world. I want all of my
students to pass me and I want their students to pass them. I got this
idea from my first teacher who was in his 70's . He wanted to share what
he knew. He lived 2 blocks from me and my grand parents lived 2 blocks
past his house. I saw him several times a week. He had some regrets
about NOT always teaching all that he knew. He had been afraid that he
would no longer be needed if he taught everything. Trumpet playing does
NOT take a lifetime to learn. Every few years some kid comes along and
proves that. Jacoby, Ferguson, Brisbois, Marsalis all killer seasoned
pros in their teens.
Some are natural players but most of us have to be shown how to do it.
The sad thing is that every town has a couple of golf pros but few towns
have trumpet teaching pros. Sports turned to science to improve both
teaching and performance. We are still in the voodoo doll stage.
Paul Ayick
Oh ok Pops I was afraid I had said something wrong.Costello came so very
close on a lot of stuuf but I think his stubbornness impeded the whole
deal.If he and Roy had just been a litle less rigid and maybe gotten
together with Doc Reinhardt they would have had something there more
viable.
Paul
'Pops' wrote:
> Oh BTW Paul I was not mad at you I was mad at ME for not explaining
> better than I did.
>
Pops
a defense against the attacks that their critics were making. Funny
thing is that Mendez was using a great deal of their ideas right. And
Reinhardt perfected them. A big ego can be a terrible thing.
Paul Ayick
In a way I understand the critics,most teachers when I was a kid took
basically a Bel-canto approach to teaching,if it sounded good and a kid
didn't have any real major short comings well them it was
Arban,Clarke,Schlossberg,St Jacome,etc etc etc.Reinhardt I feel was a great
asset for he took many years of research and observation and basically just
reported what he had found.The real funny thing is that when I was seeking
out teachers in NY nobody ever suggested driving down to Philly it was
either go see Roy or Carmine or Vacchiano period.It was many years after the
fact that I became aware of Doc,and,it was like a weight off my shoulders so
to speak,very enlightening.I came to realize that the things I did naturally
as a kid were the things that worked best FOR ME and as soon as I forgot all
about Roys rigid approach the better I began sounding/feeling.I understand
Doc used to say that every student should watch Clark Terry play for his was
a perfect embouchure.It also goes beyond rolling in rolling out, 1/2 1/2,
2/3 1/3, 1/3 2/3,etc etc etc.............the ears must be developed,music
must be listened to and studied,I feel there's a real danger in isolating
the musical from the physical to a point where that becomes the
approach.Over analysis can paralyze a player with a highly developed musical
sense.I guess like everything else in life it's relative to the circumstance
and the player.
Paul
'Pops' wrote:
--
Wayne Brenner
Much thanks to Paul and Pops for adding so much to our common interests.
Wayne Brenner
Anaheim CA