trumpet520

I know pressure is bad and our directors mention it every once in a while during reahearsal. But i dont understand why we try to avoid it.And why its bad

adohanian

It's really excessive pressure that your teacher is telling you to avoid. You need some pressure to keep the horn on your face, but excessive pressure can harm your sound and flexibility, and you can actually bruise your lips in extreme cases. The best way to avoid excessive pressure is to play with a clear sound and use lots of air. hope this helps.

adam

Hardnut

In a battle between your arms and your lips, your arms will always win and it is a natural response to push on the lips harder for high notes.

The problem with this is that by using too much pressure, we actually cut off the blood supply to part of our lips, meaning that they get more tired far more quickly.

Hence, it is advisable to avoid pressure, in order that we can play with our lip at its best for hte longest period of time possible.

Hope this helps,

Chris.

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Haydn wrote a Trumpet Concerto?

Manny Laureano

Your lips have to vibrate, right?

How well can they vibrate if there's too much pressure on them?

Wouldn't that inhibit their ability to do so?

How well could you swing a baseball bat if someone where holding on to your arms or if you locked your elbows?

There's pressure and there's undue pressure. Think in terms of extremes. How well would sound if you tried to play with no pressure at all? Then ask the opposite. The answer is in the middle, somewhere.

ML

rowuk

Pressure is bad because:
1) it pushes the blood out of your lips - no blood=no oxygen=tissue damage
2) can loosen your front teeth
3) takes a lot longer to get good
4) give you a hickey (bruise) on your lip that hurts and is uncool

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Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.

Dave Converse

The reason we use pressure is that it WORKS. Now, all the bad things that come with it are listed in the good answers you got above. But, we need to know why it works, and ultimately what we can do to accomplish the same thing in a less harmful way.

Mouthpiece pressure helps keep the aperature small when the lip muscles aren't strong enough for the task. Too open a setting, or a less than efficient lip position will add to the need for pressure to compensate. Regular practice at ppp levels with lots of breath attacks can help find these smaller and more efficient aperature settings, and will help reduce the need for mpc pressure if not done to extreme.

Bugler

Manny is right on this one.

Solar Bell

Manny is right on on THIS one?

Oh boy, wait 'till he hears THAT!

-cw-

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Chuck Willard
The Willard of Oz

"Don't be afraid to see what you see."
Ronald Reagan

dow30

I have sat and watched Clark Terry buzz songs on his lips, obviously no pressure involved. I'm told, I takes no more pressure to play higher. The lips create the sound, that hunk of metal with valves just makes it a little easier.

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dow30
Courage doesn't always roar, sometimes it's that little voice at the end of the day that says. "I'll try again tomorrow."

Bugler

What's that supposed to mean?