Schuller: Articulation

from Gunther Schuller: Horn Technique

The position of the tongue can influence negatively or positively the actual quality of tone produced. After the attack the tongue pulls back into a relatively relaxed suspended position, arched slightly towards the roof of the mouth. For a high note the tongue must be arched high in the mouth, while for a low note the tongue can lie more along the bottom of the mouth. The tongue's position is directly related to the position of the jaw and lower teeth, since the base of the tongue is connected to the pharynx. It would therefore seem to be natural that, as the lower teeth and lip move up for a higher note, thus making the lip aperture smaller, the tongue would automatically follow correspondingly along. Yet I have had many a student who tried to produce high notes with the tongue straining towards the lower teeth, and vice versa. An idea of how much the tone and pitch are affected by the tongue position during a note can be gained by moving the tongue up and down during a long sustained tone.

The tongue's role in the attack of a note is somewhat controversial. I have encountered excellent players who believe that the tip of the tongue must never touch the teeth, but instead should hit the gums on the roof of the mouth. Others think of the tongue movement as a 'forward' motion; still others think of it as a 'snapping back' kind of movement. Strangely enough I have found that, given enough talent and practice, reasonably clean attacks can be attained with all these different methods.

I personally feel that the approach described below is the most direct and easiest to control. As in the case of tone production, the relative height or level of the tongue is again very important. For high notes the tip of the tongue, which should be pointed (not wide or flat), should produce the syllable 'tah' on the teeth. The higher the note, the higher the contact point on the teeth. High notes like high C, in fact, are attacked at the edge of the teeth and the gum line. By the same token, for low notes the tongue, now a little less pointed, may reach out as far as the inner curve of the upper lip. Between the lowest and highest notes the tongue will adopt correspondingly graded lower or higher positions, as the case may be. The tongue position at the moment of attack is critical, since it controls the direction of the airstream .

As for the direction of the tongue movement, I believe in a compromise of the 'forward' and 'backward' positions alluded to above. This seems realistic since the tongue, for any given attack, must move forward and back. The 'back' faction claims that the release of air occurs only when the tongue snaps back from the teeth or lip-which is true enough. The 'forward motion' faction counters with the equally true fact that the tongue could never snap back if it had not first moved forward. They feel that this forward movement actually controls the nature of the backward half of the total operation. Basically I consider both movements to be inseparable parts of one action. The player must learn to control not one or the other movement, but both for a perfect, relaxed, controlled attack.

In discussing which way the tongue should move, we must divide the question into two parts:

1) In relation to an initial attack (start of a phrase or an isolated note)
2) In relation to attacked notes within a phrase.

In respect to part 1, I am inclined slightly to the pulling away method, since it gives you greater security in attacking a note. However, I would caution against separating the forward and backward movements too much for the following reason. Once the tongue has reached the teeth or lip, it seals off the lip opening and thus prevents the taking in of air. If the tongue moves into 'attack' position much before the beginning of the note, it automatically means that breathing will have to take place before that, which will in turn lead to the dangerous separation between breathing and playing against which I warned earlier.

As for part 2, I suggest the 'forward' approach, if not actually physically, at least psychologically as a point of view. For the 'backward' method unfortunately tends to lead to the very bad habit of stopping a note just previous to a new attack with the forward movement of the tongue. The notes thus produced might be characterized syllabically as 'daht', rather than 'dah'. This occurs all too often with beginning students, and must be immediately corrected. For if this habit persists, it leads to a kind of stop-and-go manner of phrasing, which prevents a sustained, singing style of playing. At high speeds, of course, the question of forward or backward tongueing becomes academic since the time allotted for both movements is measured infinitesimal fractions of a second.

A subtle point often neglected in the study of attacks is that the air stream must follow immediately to sustain the tone. Even the slightest, physically almost imperceptible, delay will cause a 'poppy" attack, or one with a slight 'bubble' on it. The cleanest attacks will be those that have a full stream of air to back them up. This means that the air must be ready to go. As the water which is exerting pressure against a water tap is released when the spigot opens, so the air stream must be ready to flow immediately upon release of the seal between the tongue and teeth.