Had a great day today playing, one of those “coffee moments”. I started off with the ahhhoooh embouchure and focused on the corners as I ascended.

Had an epiphany that I’ve always tightened the lips top to bottom rather than from the sides (corners).

Today, I had a great resonant sound, found myself effortlessly lip sluring up to higher harmonics to the point where I was skipping a harmonic and having to go back down.

High C felt as if it came easy and soon as I was ascending from low F# (below staff), as if High C was in the middle of my range…which it wasn’t. I may have gotten out a G, but think F was as high as I made it.

My endurance was good too.

I’ve been thinking about how whistling seems similar to playing trumpet. Is that true, or a good way to think or is that not a good idea to have?

I notice whistling goes higher when I arch my tongue, but the sound cuts off when I bring my top and bottom lip towards each other (pinching), but I ascend if I tighten the aperture corners.

Similarly, it doesn’t require more air to ascend.

One other epiphany I had today was that I think I was over thinking / over correcting and doing all sorts of weird inconsistent things, trying to figure out what the “trigger” is. When I relaxed and tried using minimal effort / active adjustment, things came easy.

But once I got to high C, it was increasingly difficult to ascend due to pressure and I felt like I needed to blow harder/faster and it was harder to hold the corners in…

Was just thinking that perhaps if instead of giving more air or tightening the corners, if I backed air off a bit it might reduce the pressure I was bumping into?

Thanks for any help you can offer. Hoping to keep the momentum.