That actually sounds more like what I was doing before WindWorks when I was clamping my lips in the middle as I ascended.
I remember rolling my lip in and feeling like I ran out of lip as I ascended and tilting my head back/bell down, etc.
Now, when I tighten the aperture corners as I ascend, I try to use as little movement / tension / engagement as possible to change pitch. I try to stay relaxed and move as little as possible as I ascend and try to use as consistent of an embouchre as possible as I ascend, focusing on the ahhhhooooohhh (corners sensation) and avoiding tension in the middle of my top lip.
I don’t know if Greg agrees with this, but I found whistling helped me figure things out a bit–when I would whistle and focus on clamping the middle of my top lip down, the sound would cutoff, whereas as I go higher I am arching my tongue and tightening my lips (aperture) around the air column as I go higher.
My bell no longer goes down and I don’t tilt my head back and run out of lip. We don’t need to move much at all–watch the videos of Greg and other great players, they’re not moving a lot. What little movement there is is coming from the corners like the tightening of a hose nozzle from around the diameter of the air column.
I wonder if you’re overblowing? You might try backing off the air a bit and focusing on your sound a bit.
Or you might be overdoing / overthinking the mwwwahhhooohh thing as you place the mouthpiece on your lips. I don’t want to contradict anything Greg says, but if you watch the videos of him playing he’s not really extremely forward as he puts the mouthpiece to his lips and plays. For me, when I’m having great sensations / range / flexibility, and feel like I’m in the zone, I have the sensation that my lips are kind of tightening around the air column towards the center of the mouthpiece (almost a light gripping sensation NOT CLAMPING) and my lips feel like they’re moving forward and I’ve realized I don’t need to tilt or roll my lip, etc. I can “go straight through the front door” as I ascend, I don’t need to wrestle with myself and the horn. It’s a subtle thing.
The video posted above was very helpful to me as well.
The biggest thing, for me, that helped was avoiding chromatic (i.e. Clarke) scales ascending–I had years of bad habit ingrained in me playing Clarke and would tighten as I ascended and I would move too much. I avoided Clarke for a long time and am just now going back to it as I feel like I get what I’m supposed to be doing now with it.
Instead, I focused on octaves and forcing myself to be relaxed–thinking of it like patting your head and rubbing your stomach at the same time. Playing softly, starting with low G (i.e. 1 and 3), then G on the staff then G above the staff and focusing on how little difference in effort it takes. Playing soft is key and using less air and not kicking above and just tightening the aperture corners a bit.
For me, the big revelation was A–A above staff was the very top of my range for many years. When I stopped playing chromatics and just tried to simply play A on the staff then play A above the staff with little movement as possible, it came out easily like nothing. It wasn’t much longer after that that I played my first high C ever in 40 years… And now I own C through E and am nudging higher, hitting Double G but trying not to focus too much on range but solidifying my mastery of playing correctly and having a good, resonant sound and flexibility, etc.
It took a while and I had some successes and failures, wound up going backwards a bit, but have been having great sensations and success consistently for a while now, thankfully.
I think the key for me is “less is more”. When I overthink things and try to do too much, which I start doing when I get tired, I start feeling myself moving more and starting to fight the horn a bit. A lot of times, I actually can recover a bit by relaxing, backing off the air and focusing on using as little movement as needed.
My $.02 / experience–hope that is helpful to you. Good luck!
That is awesome! Thanks John!!!
