Why does my tone get fuzzy...

[cigmar]

...whenever I double or triple tongue? And what/how to correct it.

[robcat2075]

This is a situation where it would be highly useful to hear an example before diagnosing the problem.

Generally, when i hear players do "Flight of the Bumble Bee" or "Czardas" i feel like I'm hearing more tongue than note many times.

Logically, the tonguing has some minimum duration that can't get any shorter and still be tonguing, so there is some point where there's not enough time for normal note anymore.

But this is a situation where it would be highly useful to hear an example before diagnosing the problem.

[cigmar]

I mostly get tongue-tied after a group of four sixteenths. That also results in fuzzy tone somehow. I have practiced it very slowly, but when I speed it up to where it belongs it falls apart.

[FliPFloP]

Hi!

I had this issue for a while, and I think I may have some insight to share.

For me, a consistent, full tone while double and/or triple tonguing was challenging because it felt like a mental block I had to overcome. I single-tongued everything for the longest time because I could single tongue super fast, but when I started to double tongue, it was another thing for my brain to focus on while playing, which in turn resulted in a lackluster tone quality compared to what I was getting previously.

I think my best advice is to turn whatever exercise or excerpt your practicing into a long tone, and to practice slowly glissing through each note to make sure the tone quality is consistent and full on each note. Then, add double tonguing at a tempo that is slower than the marked tempo, and keep turning up the tempo as you work on making everything sound full and pretty.

Hope this helps!

[GGJazz]

Hi .

I think that the double/ triple tonguing is not a so "easy" technical skill ; you need to practice it a lot , before feel comfortable with .

The tongue have to be activated in a non so common way.

In this D. Yeo' video , a MRI show us what happen inside our oral cavity :


I suggest to practice it at a very comfortable speed ( slow / medium slow) , first on some single tones , in the medium range ( from the F on the staff to the F one octave up) .

Regards
Giancarlo

[Doug Elliott]

Correction:
That MRI show us what happens inside HIS oral cavity.
There are different ways to articulate that may work better for different people or circumstances.

[GGJazz]

Hi again.

Well , I have watched quite a few MRI videos about this technic , and they show pretty much the same tongue action .

Here is Sarah Willis on MRI : double tongue at 05:51


Both Douglas Yeo and Sarah Willis are musicians that I guess are playing in a general " correct" way .

For sure there will be different ways to performe this technics ; but , as in some Dave Wilken videos about embouchure ( for example "Lip vibration of brass embouchures , Leno , part 1 of 3" , in which we see the embouchure of B. Watrous , S . Dempster , G. Roberts , etc , ) , we usually start giving a look at how the lead players do it , as general references .

Regards
Giancarlo

[cigmar]

It appears in both videos that when fast double tonguing the front tip of the tongue remains forward almost, if not, in contact with the lower teeth. But when playing a sustained note the tongue recedes back well away from the teeth after the attack.

[Doug Elliott]

It appears in both videos that when fast double tonguing the front tip of the tongue remains forward almost, if not, in contact with the lower teeth. But when playing a sustained note the tongue recedes back well away from the teeth after the attack.

And that is what tends to make the sound less good when multiple tonguing.
If you listen carefully while watching both of those videos, you can clearly see and hear how much the tongue position affects the sound. Both of them focus the sound using tongue shape after the begininng of the note. Most obviously Sarah Willis does that - you can hear her sound constantly changing as she adjusts her tongue position while finding the focus.

[GabrielRice]

When I was young I had a very fast single tongue. Somehow, in college for a friend's recital and then again a few years later with a touring brass quintet, I played the tuba part of the Malcom Arnold brass quintet on bass trombone without double tonguing. If you don't know it, in the 3rd movement there's a very fast scalar passage of 16ths notes ranging from the low valve register into the middle register and back. What I was doing was probably pretty close to a doodle tongue. Now I play that with a loose, quasi-legato double tongue.

Anyway, when I finally decided I needed to really learn to multiple tongue well (after some fairly embarrassing struggles on gigs), I started with the triple tongue section of the Arban's book - which comes BEFORE the double tongue section, BTW - and played it painfully slow, relatively loud, with articulations as firm and pointed as I could get them, and with every note as looooong as possible with no spaces between them. The syllables I used were tu-tu-ku. NOT ta-ta-ka or to-to-ko. The U formation has less motion of the tongue and jaw after the articulation.

I realize this is not the way it's usually taught, but it was very helpful to me. I found that certain aspects of my basic tone production noticeably changed for the better. My observation of what was happening was that the my embouchure formation was changing to a shape that worked with the articulations. It did not close anything down - rather, the sound became both more focused and bigger.

In practice I use a much lighter, looser multiple tongue stroke in most circumstances now - du-gu-du-gu or even lu-ngu-lu-ngu - and legato double tongue is something I do often.

I guess what I'm suggesting is that, in order to get your multiple tonguing to sound better, you need to practice making the multiple tongue sound good and let that change the way you play when you're doing other articulations as well. I think you'll be better off in every way.

[cigmar]

I guess what I'm suggesting is that, in order to get your multiple tonguing to sound better, you need to practice making the multiple tongue sound good and let that change the way you play when you're doing other articulations as well. I think you'll be better off in every way.

You have confirmed my suspicions, Gabe, that perhaps my struggles with multiple tonguing are rooted in inefficient single articulations. I find that when I use the "ta" syllable it tends to broaden the tongue while when I use the "tu" syllable it narrows the tongue which may focus the air stream more as well as the embouchure. Yes?? I will certainly explore this. My other struggle is that I tend to get "tongue-tied" in prolonged multiple tonguing. It's like my tongue can't keep track of which syllable comes next. Thanks for confirming my suspected suspicions. Back to the practice room.

[Wilktone]

Sometimes when we start practicing something unfamiliar or uncomfortable we end up dropping something else. I suggest you check your breath support while multiple tonguing while you’re at it. You could be backing off on the air. Try practice the passage or exercise with no tongue at all (except perhaps initial attacks after a breath). Four 16th notes on the same pitch that would be double tongued would sound like a full value quarter note. Then repeat with the double tonguing and strive to keep the air flowing just the same.

[LetItSlide]

Keeping the airstream optimal while multiple tonguing is a pretty complex package of fine muscle control.

Some thinking I learned about from an unrelated discipline goes something like this: if we do a thing a lot and let the brain and everything else not needed to perform the thing relax, and focus on what we’re doing, our brains eventually figure out how to optimize things without us consciously analyzing every little detail of what’s going on.

For the brass player, the thing to focus on in my humble opinion is sounding musically good.

I’m not saying it’s wrong to use the analytical part of the brain to dissect what’s going on, just that we are capable of figuring things out on levels we aren’t consciously aware of.

Or, maybe “use the Force” applies.

[Doug Elliott]

Actually...
"Keeping the airstream optimal while multiple tonguing" is about as simple as it can be, there's nothing complex about it at all.

[LetItSlide]

To a player who has figured out how to do it, yes. To a beginner, no. They have no idea yet how to control the small muscles involved.

Now that I think about it, I'll include advanced players. Such players might be out there, but I don't know of any who can multiple tongue across their entire tonal range (lowest pedals up to octave 6) and keep a good airstream. Please prove me wrong and post videos of someone who can do that.

So I'm thinking: not so simple, Doug. I reject your reality and replace it with my own.

[tbdana]

Now that I think about it, I'll include advanced players. Such players might be out there, but I don't know of any who can multiple tongue across their entire tonal range (lowest pedals up to octave 6) and keep a good airstream. Please prove me wrong and post videos of someone who can do that.

I can do that. I practice multiple tonguing from the bottom of the horn to the top. I don’t have a video though.

[Doug Elliott]

Not too many beginners or advanced players with 6 octaves "across their entire tonal range" to worry about multiple tonguing all of it. Or beginners who multiple tongue at all. Or "advanced players" with that kind of range.

If players would practice toward a reasonable goal - maybe single and multiple tonguing in the midrange with a steady airstream - they'd get to "sounding musically good" pretty quickly.

[JTeagarden]

I think if you can get multiple tonguing to speak with a good tone, with a usable range, and from say p to FF, you have something you can expand up, down, and out.

Get this working properly, get it to speak the first time, and not the third time you play the lick, and it will have a nice knock-on effect on your embouchure efficiency.

I find that multiple tonguing viritually everything regardless of tempo is a great way to find where your embouchure should be, provided the placement allows you to speed up, and is not some disemblodied and useless slow setting, if it works multpile tonguing the same placement is great for single tonguing as well.

[EmrickJosh]

Have this fuzz problem too and there's been great information here about why its there/how to tackle it!

[cigmar]

Have this fuzz problem too and there's been great information here about why its there/how to tackle it!

See Gabe's response. I followed his method and also took it a step further by only articulating the "ku" syllables until it sounded exactly like the "tu". This not only cleared up my multiple tonguing, but like Gabe, it also repositioned my embouchure to be more responsive and efficient throughout. Hats off to Gabe.

[stevenvortigern]

if we do a thing a lot and let the brain and everything else not needed to perform the thing relax, and focus on what we’re doing, our brains eventually figure out how to optimize things without us consciously analyzing every little detail of what’s going on.

A practical way to do this is to first play a short exercise single-tongued, then follow it immediately double-tongued with the goal of having the double-tongued portion sound indistinguishable from the single-tongued. Doing this is primarily an aid to your memory and imagination. By hearing out loud the desired sound just before you perform it in a less than desirable way, it really helps your body, over time through repetition, to zero in on what it needs to do to reproduce the desired sound without your mind having to "consciously analyze every little detail of what's going on."

[Doug Elliott]

No one has ever suggested "consciously analyzing every little detail of what's going on." I get really tired of hearing that.

[LetItSlide]

Yes they have and do, and they write at length about their analyses, on this forum site and many others.

Saying “no one has ever” is pure nonsense.

[LeTromboniste]

Yes they have and do, and they write at length about their analyses, on this forum site and many others.

Saying “no one has ever” is pure nonsense.

I'm with Doug. No one is suggesting that, and it's really tiresome to read that.

Just because someone is very analytical and makes an analytical post, doesn't mean theyre suggesting everything must be analyzed in every detail, or that everyone should always think like they do. Or, for that matter, that it's the only way they think themselves, that they don't "focus on sounding musically good". Those are not mutually exclusive.

If being analytical doesn't help you personally, that's fine, you can just skip that stuff. Good for you if you don't need or benefit from that. But while it's not helpful to everyone, it can certainly be helpful to some. Are they allowed to find that helpful, or must they absolutely think the way you do?

[stevenvortigern]

Gentlemen,

The point of my post was to try and help the OP remove the fuzz from his double-tonguing by suggesting a practical exercise, one that involved both analysis and a focus on the sound. To say “analyze every little detail” is clearly hyperbole, but there still is a valuable idea here.

The point is to play something that sounds good- the single-tonguing, then immediately play something that sounds less than good but that you’re trying to improve-the fuzzy double tonguing. Compare the two, i.e. analyze the difference, and repeat several times.

As part of this process, inevitably, you will analyze what is going on with your body and consciously make adjustments. But, in my experience, if you choose to drop the single-tonguing as a repeated part of the exercise, so as to spend more time focusing on the adjustments, it will take you longer to get to the point where the double-tonguing proceeds without apprehension and sounds more like single-tonguing. Without the good reference sound being repeated over and over, it's really easy to get less precise about what we’re shooting for and have the learning process proceed more slowly than necessary, or worse, get hung up on hard to reconcile insecurities, often referred to as paralysis by analysis.

So, yes, analyze what your body is doing in the practice room. Often, this is absolutely necessary, but do it in such a way that you that you can eventually perform without having to. Don’t get satisfied only going halfway. Ideally, we would only need to focus on the sound during our performances, and of course, this is much easier said than done, but you’ll never approach that point unless you spend quality time in the practice room learning to perform without intellectualizing the process.

Many exercises are not feasible to do in the way I'm describing, but double-tonguing exercises are, so take advantage of having your end goal be there right from the start.

[tbdana]

I'm not an expert, or a teacher, or someone who has experienced that problem. But I will say that whenever I hear this problem from community players I play with, it always seems to have two common components: 1. not putting enough air through the horn and/or not a consistent air stream; and 2. the embouchure doesn't buzz freely but is kind of "clamped down" for lack of a better term.

Now, these may be ancillary commonalities that are shared in a "correlation does not equal causation" kind of thing. But it's something I notice with pretty much everyone who has this problem that I have seen.

[Savio]

As a teacher I have to analyze. Not on a high level maybe in my case. I think there is a time for everything. Performance is not right time for analysis, maybe after the concert. Practice is the time to do it, but maybe not all the time. What I think is difficult is to analyze my self. Even though I like to focus on musical aspects, I love to read about technical aspects. In hope to understand more myself. Both in teaching and also be better to play the trombone myself. Fuzzy tone when double tonguing I really dont know. But it's always better to have a good teacher to look at you.
Leif