“John, what do you advise if you feel you are using the aperture corners properly but the aperture closes off? I suppose there’s only so far you can pull the drawstring before the bag closes up completely.”

By contracting the corners inwards towards the center of the mouthpiece / the air column to reduce the aperture (as opposed to pulling the corners backwards and stretching the lips out / clamping down top to bottom), this makes it easier to reduce the size of the aperture and is less limited–we can always drop our jaw down to open things up if we have the sides of the aperture pulled in tight. Whereas if we’re pulling the corners back and stretching out our lips, we are very limited–we can only go so far and we thin out our lips / have reduced endurance, etc.

Others have touched on the bottom lip a bit–Greg mentioned the “milk spout” concept, etc.

I try to keep things centered and try to employ a “less is more” concept to things–when I’m successful at that, I find things feel and sound the best for me. I experiment with slight differences in motions in my lips and tongue as I contract things as I ascend to get the best feel / sound / ease, etc.

I’m glad your video got the professor to go comment. I feel like I’m on the right track and I think you are also. I have been involved in this for over a year and I am now getting a better understanding.
Since I passed the Largo stage, I do not ever think to close my eyes. I discovered I can focus and visualize (sounds like an oxymoron) what is happening with my eyes closed. I think I have gone through the Largo stage 4 times and this has been my second time to go through the Adagio and Andante stages. I will start the Moderato at the beginning of November.

Thank you again for posting your video; it was helpful to me. Also, glad to learn you are in TEXAS. I live in the Northeast part of the state, near a town called Mount Pleasant. I’ll put a post in the forum about doing a zoom meeting and see what kind of interest we can get. I am hoping to get John Elwood and you.

You’re not stealing Bill, you’re paying it forward by sharing your experience with others like you who are working on figuring things out as well.

The point of difference is tricky. It is very easy to fall back into old habits, especially at first, until you form new habits. In time, it seems to get better and it seems like it’s easier to spot when I start doing something wrong and catch myself and get back on track.

But at first, falling back into old habits and losing newfound abilities is extremely frustrating–worse than before my “coffee moment” as I had a taste of what could/should be, then worried that I lost it. Fortunately, with patience and focus on Process, I got back on track and found my way again and proceeded farther.

Our mouthpiece, regardless of how “big” or “small” of one we play, is in fact a very, very small space with which to work.

There are only so many variations of how we can place our lips into the mouthpiece. And while subtle, small changes can / do make a big difference, at the end of the day most of the various methods out there have more in common than they differ; I think their biggest difference is their approach.

Bottom line, in my opinion, is that it’s more important what we do with our lips/face muscles (Shape) and don’t do (clamp down, overtighten) than it is how we set the MP on our lips.

Changing Shape to form a smaller aperture as we ascend changes pitch.

What specific shape to form is different for each of us.

It doesn’t take more effort to form a smaller aperture than it does a larger aperture.

We must unlearn our instinct to tighten up and blow more air as we ascend.

If we release the same amount of air through a smaller aperture, the note will be higher. Ultimately, no note will speak and we’ll need to experiment with Shape and tongue arch to get it to speak, improve resonance, etc.

Once we get it to speak, we can work on passing more air through the aperture to increase volume.

I had a good day playing today. I’ve been reminded lately at how compact things are–I think one of my problems used to be trying to play the way I thought it should feel, rather than trying to move as little as possible. By moving as little as possible to change pitch, it’s helped me keep things tighter and be more efficient and play easier above the staff.

Another WindWorks member, I think it might have been Brian?, shared a visualization of holidng a coffee stirrer in their lips (aperture) as they’re above the staff. That has been helpful to me, as has experimenting with wreckless abandon–not giving a $%&$K# whether I hit the note or not, just observing casually/objectively and learning from the success or failure and adjusting.

Another key for me was to separate Air and Shape when changing pitch. I knew one of my bad habits was to use more air as I ascended. It took a long time experimenting with Passively released air and just playing and forming a better feel/understanding with how possible it is to play softly above the staff. Watching Jim Wilt’s YouTube videos have helped me–seeing him effortlessly play softly above the staff musically has been an inspiration to me and is something I sometimes think about as I’m playing up there.

It’s awesome to see you moving through this, I’m excited for you for what lies ahead!