Well Lara, you're not alone in this predicament. Manny pointed the same out to me in a lesson almost as just a passing thought:
"You must be rolling your bottom lip in..." That was it. He added nothing more and yet it spoke volumes to me about why I have troubles in the upper register. Truly a perceptive individual!
Anyway -- "Tooh" really does go a long way towards correcting it. Not completely, but it sure makes a huge difference. I've always felt I still needed a little something more to permanently remove the old bad habit (because it still creeps in waaaay too frequently).
Which brings me to your post, ML. You said to do what you told the other gentleman to do. Please forgive my ignorance, since my attendance on this forum has been limited since starting a new job, but I've searched and I assume you are referring to the following:
Quote:
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Go grab the Arban's and go to page 148. Instead of playing sixteenths, play as dotted rhythms, like dotted 16ths and 32nds. Play relatively slowly. Instead of breathing orally as we would normally do, hold the mouthiece in position and breathe as long as you can nasally. The exception is the very first breath which should be taken orally. Do the entire exercise after you're about 3/4 of the way warmed up. When you're done with the whole page go to 125 and do the whole page the same way.
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...to which you later suggested adding page 44 as well. Is this the correct excercise?
And if it is -- is breathing nasally critical to the exercise? Because I have never...NEVER been able to breathe through my nose. I'm just too chronically congested up there. (Even the doc, two days after I was given a strong steroid to help clear up the congestion, noted that he still could see a great deal of congestion....sigh....).
well...good post Lara -- I'm quite sure there are more than a few of us who suffer from trying to swallow their bottom lip up high. The question is, how many realize they're doing it?