{"id":483,"date":"2010-07-30T06:00:53","date_gmt":"2010-07-30T10:00:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wilktone.com\/?p=483"},"modified":"2023-03-27T09:03:03","modified_gmt":"2023-03-27T13:03:03","slug":"dennis-brain-and-the-upstream-horn-embouchure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/?p=483","title":{"rendered":"Dennis Brain and the Upstream Horn Embouchure"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">There&#8217;s an interesting <a href=\"http:\/\/hornworld.wordpress.com\/2010\/07\/27\/new-blog-and-dennis-brains-embouchure\/\">discussion<\/a> going on over at <a href=\"http:\/\/hornworld.wordpress.com\/\">James Boldin&#8217;s Horn World Blog<\/a> on Dennis Brain&#8217;s embouchure. &nbsp;If you&#8217;re a horn player you are no doubt already a <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Dennis_Brain\">Dennis Brain<\/a> fan. &nbsp;Whether or not you&#8217;re a horn player, if you&#8217;re a brass musician you should get to know his recordings of the Mozart horn concerti. &nbsp;Brain is still enormously influential to horn players, in spite of him having such a short career and living a relatively long time ago (1921-1957, he was killed in a car accident).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">One reason why I&#8217;m interested in Brain&#8217;s playing is he appears to have been a Low Placement (upstream) <a href=\"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/?p=92\">embouchure type<\/a>. &nbsp;Watch this video and look closely at Brain&#8217;s embouchure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Update 9\/24\/22<\/strong> &#8211; While going through my blog to fix broken images and links I noticed that the original video I posted was no longer available. I&#8217;ve posted a different video of Brain performing. I *think* it has the same video I was commenting on below, but none of the time s<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"656\" height=\"369\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/mlKJ9CjSv_U?version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-US&#038;autohide=2&#038;wmode=transparent\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Brain&#8217;s mouthpiece placement is quite low, even lower than most upstream players usually are. &nbsp;Boldin&#8217;s blog <a href=\"http:\/\/hornworld.wordpress.com\/2010\/07\/27\/new-blog-and-dennis-brains-embouchure\/\">article<\/a> has some still photos, I think from this video. &nbsp;I would like to point out in particular the moment from 2:39-2:46 in the video. &nbsp;You can not only see the placement looking like it&#8217;s right on the red of his upper lip, but also see his <a href=\"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/?p=41\">embouchure motion<\/a> (down to ascend, up to descend, for Very Low Placement embouchure types).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For some reason, horn players are very reluctant to consider this embouchure type as valid on horn. &nbsp;Horn books almost universally teach a mouthpiece placement with around 2\/3 upper lip inside. &nbsp;This works great, if you happen to have the anatomy that is suited to a downstream embouchure, but Brain&#8217;s embouchure is an excellent example that it&#8217;s quite possible to play horn extremely well on an upstream embouchure, provided that your anatomy is better suited for it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Now it is definitely true that most brass players have the physical characteristics that make a downstream embouchure work best. &nbsp;Upstream players are a minority of brass players on all instruments. &nbsp;But for some reason it is more rare to find upstream horn players. &nbsp;Boldin <a href=\"http:\/\/hornworld.wordpress.com\/2010\/07\/27\/new-blog-and-dennis-brains-embouchure\/\">speculates<\/a>:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">. . . I think in the case of the horn, the tolerances in terms of mouthpiece placement are much smaller due to the small size of the mouthpiece and the length of the instrument.&nbsp; It is true that the horn can be played \u2013 and played quite well \u2013 with more lower than upper lip in the mouthpiece, but I think for a majority of horn players (more so than the other brass instruments), more top lip in the mouthpiece is necessary.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If the smaller size of the mouthpiece was a factor, then perhaps we should expect that there should be fewer upstream trumpet players as well. &nbsp;However, the reverse seems to be true, I&#8217;ve found many more upstream trumpet players than on low brass. &nbsp;One possible reason for this is that the chin more easily gets in the way with the larger mouthpiece of a low brass embouchure (my trombone embouchure has the lower rim set right on my chin). &nbsp;Mouthpiece size does seem to affect embouchure type, usually because low brass players have less room on the lips to move the mouthpiece around. &nbsp;The smaller the mouthpiece, the easier it is to place the mouthpiece low enough to play upstream (or, for that matter, very high on the lips or further to one side, if that happens to be correct for the individual player).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">If the length of the instrument is a factor here, I don&#8217;t understand how. &nbsp;As best as I can tell from comparing different embouchures on all the brass instruments, the same basic principles apply regardless of instrument. &nbsp;There could be some acoustical principles involved that I&#8217;m not aware of or considering, though, so take that with a grain of salt. &nbsp;I&#8217;m not an expert on the physics of brass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">My own hypothesis is that the reason we don&#8217;t see more upstream horn players is because most horn teachers are very much against this embouchure. &nbsp;This is also why, I think, we see more upstream brass musicians playing jazz than classical. &nbsp;Jazz musicians are less likely to have formal music education and are less interested in traditional brass pedagogy. &nbsp;Brass students who are interested in classical playing are more likely to study from a teacher who follows the 2\/3 upper lip tradition. &nbsp;If you&#8217;re properly an upstream player and this is how you&#8217;re taught to play you are more likely to give up in frustration or struggle with technique. &nbsp;Upstream horn players get weeded out by instruction that selects for downstream players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As an anecdote for support of this idea, look at this <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=AfoeACB6bA4\">video<\/a> for the upstream horn player (beginning 2:30 into it). &nbsp;As a high school senior looking at colleges and majors, she was told by a horn professor that if she wanted to major in music she would need to change her embouchure. &nbsp;She happened to select a different degree track and kept happily playing with an upstream embouchure in student ensembles as a non-major up until her graduation. &nbsp;While she never got rid of her tendency to smile to ascend (a common issue with upstream embouchures for some reason), I saw no reason to believe that she couldn&#8217;t be quite successful as a performer with her current embouchure. &nbsp;Be sure to watch the end of that video clip to see an upstream trumpet player who got similar instruction and decided to make the embouchure change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">While you&#8217;re at it, be sure to go look through more of James Boldin&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/hornworld.wordpress.com\/\">blog<\/a>. \u00a0I haven&#8217;t had the chance to look through too deeply yet, but it looks like he&#8217;s got plenty for all brass musicians, and lots more if you&#8217;re a horn player.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There&#8217;s an interesting discussion going on over at James Boldin&#8217;s Horn World Blog on Dennis Brain&#8217;s embouchure. &nbsp;If you&#8217;re a horn player you are no doubt already a Dennis Brain fan. &nbsp;Whether or not you&#8217;re a horn player, if you&#8217;re a brass musician you should get to know his recordings of the Mozart horn concerti. &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/?p=483\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Dennis Brain and the Upstream Horn Embouchure<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15350306,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_crdt_document":"","advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1362,1369,1375,1379],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-brass","category-embouchure","category-horn","category-low-placement-type"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peFHCc-7N","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/15350306"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=483"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7703,"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483\/revisions\/7703"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wilktone.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}