Horn Matters | A French Horn and Brass Site and Resource | John Ericson and Bruce Hembd

Continuing our look at slurs, Berv and Reynolds have some important things to add on the topic.

Leverage and tongue arch

For Harry Berv in A Creative Approach to the French Horn the concept of “leverage” was essential to a good slur.

In making a slur on the horn, the airflow must be even so that the lips will be in a constant state of vibration. Should the airstream become uneven, the lips will not vibrate correctly and the upper note will pop out.

Think in terms of leverage when slurring. When executing a wide interval slur, a slight thrust of air should be applied to the first note, and this will assist in making the upper note speak easily. The only note that is attacked in any slur is the initial one. The last note is never attacked; it should be tied to the initial note by a gracefully executed arch. A slur in either direction is difficult to perfect. Control of lip and air must be practiced slowly and intelligently in order to achieve proper results.

Berv does recommend that the tongue arch up slightly in the upper range and be in a lower position in the low register as an aid to slurs. He thinks of it in terms of the tongue “changing the size of the channel in the mouth.” He describes a coordination of the embouchure, tongue, and air column with the key action of the valves. He continues

The next step will clarify what I referred to at the beginning of this chapter concerning leverage. The Bb horn is now brought into use. With its shorter tubing, and in combination with the F horn, it helps greatly in producing a beautiful, even slur.

In the exercise that follows he demonstrates that slurs may be made more easily through fingering choices by “cutting in” the Bb horn.

The topic of slurs as phrase markings, and making good musical choices

As a composer Verne Reynolds in The Horn Handbook takes on with slurring the larger, musical topic of slurs as phrase markings—some notes certainly should be tongued within slurred passages.

Musicians agree that a slur is a curved line placed under or over a group of notes to indicate that those notes should be played smoothly. The tongue is used to begin the first note and may be used within the slur somewhat in the same way a violinist changes the direction of the bow, providing its use does not violate the spirit of smoothness. In other slurred phrases the tongue is not used again after the first note. Within the curved line may be dots, dashes, accents, and even sforzando and forte piano, all of which require the use of the tongue. The same curved line can indicate phrase length and possible breathing places. A slur could be called a phrase boundary when it encloses many notes. Within the boundary there can be several tongued notes added to adorn the phrase and to give it shape and definition. Seldom are these articulations used to separate the smaller units within the phrase. A composer occasionally, and intentionally one hopes, includes silence within the phrase boundary, thus offering the player an opportunity to employ the elegance of tapered release and non-accented reentry. A brass player cannot succeed without being able to connect notes without using the tongue, or without a complete assortment of tongue strokes to articulate notes within a legato phrase.

Repetition produces results

As to playing slurs, the key for Reynolds was “continuity of lip vibrations.” He notes that in for example a two-octave slur

…the embouchure must know how the second note sounds and feels while it is producing the first note. Fast wide slurs are difficult because the embouchure has little time to predict the feel of the second note while we are playing the first note. Yes, we can think while we play. Not to think is to shoot at an unheard and unfelt target. Here is another case in which thoughtful repetition produces results.

Continue in Hornmasters Series

Continuing our series on the topic of the slur, air, and vowels, Milan Yancich has an interesting angle on the “wah-wah” problem in the form of an exercise in A Practical Guide to French Horn Playing. He calls it “Line in Tone Production.” What he is looking for is the perfect portamento between notes played very slowly to “break the habit of a clicking slur or a slur pushed by the breath.”

Introducing the “clicking slur”

Farkas and Schuller in the previous article were not fans of hearing a wah-wah. Yancich however expanded the topic a bit with the inclusion of the problem of the “clicking slur.” Clicks relate to how smooth your horn goes over the harmonics and how smoothly notes pass through valve changes. Different horns will be more “clicky” than others in this respect. This short article introduces the topic further. You certainly can hear (and feel!) these clicks, and they will be helped (smoothed out) the most by factors that relate to mouthpiece choice in relation to your instrument when you get down to it. Some instruments will have more clicking slurs than others even with an optimal setup.

Why this is the case is due to acoustic transients. As background, according to the Wikipedia “In acoustics and audio, a transient is a high amplitude, short-duration sound at the beginning of a waveform that occurs in phenomena such as musical sounds, noises or speech.” This is the underlying source of the click. In a recent (2016) article on his website horn maker Jacob Medlin explains that

The best horns navigate the transients using a complex series of dampening effects to smooth the bump between the notes. This allows the player to blow through note changes either with or without depressing valves. Playing a slurred passage should require no micromanagement of the air column, it should be smooth and effortless.

More on wah-wahing and clicks

Fred Fox in Essentials of Brass Playing is clearly thinking about that same general topic of clicks as well.  After noting that the valves must move quickly in slow slurs he has a warning, and a solution.

There is another factor in smooth slurring that is worth considering. I bring it up with a strong word of caution, since it can lead to “wah wahing” each note.

There tends to be a “bump” between two notes when slurred even if they are gotten with the same valve or slide position. Let us use the example of a slur requiring a valve change, for a moment. When the valve is pressed down there is an instant when the whole instrument is blocked off. If a steady flow of vibration is being produced, then, at the moment of the valve change, the instrument is blocked, and pressure builds up behind the valve. This bit of pressures causes a sort of bump in the legato on the next note, when the valve completes the change. Ideally we should ease off the flow of vibration at the moment of valve change to avoid the pressure buildup behind the valve. This is not too impossible to achieve. Though again, one must be careful not to get the “wa, wa, wa” type of playing.

Sing a series of slurred notes. Observe, does the air flow past the vocal chords at a steady rate? Or is the air held back unconsciously, or naturally, between each note of the slur? The air is held back momentarily between each note. Sing the notes again. This time use a glissando or slide effect between each note. Now there is no air held back between each note change….

To play a smooth slur, simply apply the air technique as used when singing. Avoid building up pressure behind the valve and the slur will be much smoother. The same principle applies when slurring notes that do not require a valve or slide change.

While undoubtedly this approach might help reduce the issue, in the big picture getting a better horn, as suggested by the Medlin quote earlier in this article, would be a better solution if clicks are a problem.

More thoughts on vowel changes

As to the topic of vowel sounds, it is one Fox addresses in a variety of contexts. In this example he applies the concept primarily to the high register.

We have discussed the fact that the tongue position goes gradually to the “eee” sound in the higher registers. However, when playing in the highest possible range of the instrument, that “eee” tongue position tends to stop getting smaller as it should.

Visualize the “eee” tongue position. The back part of the tongue (that is used to pronounce the “g” in the word “get”) is up near the roof of the mouth, but the tip on the tongue still rests directly down in back of the lower teeth. Sort of like a ski slope. The vowel position can be made still small by consciously lifting the tip of the tongue towards the roof of the mouth. This lifting action now has made the sound box still smaller.

Try singing a high note with the normal “eee” tongue position. As the note is sung, bring the tip of the tongue up towards the roof of the mouth. Notice that the sound now becomes even more pinpointed. The vowel sound has been made increasingly smaller by lifting up the tip of the tongue, a most important adjustment for the very highest notes of the instrument….

Lift the tip of the tongue towards the roof of the mouth and you will find the highest notes easier to play. They will sound better in focus and will continue to contain the importantly consistent ratio of highs and lows. Remember, throughout this whole small-vowel-sound approach the throat must remain open at all times.

Open throat?

What exactly he means by the throat being open all the time is a good question, but I put it in the category of things that are a bad suggestion.

The MRI studies have also shown that the glottis (voice box) closes in every articulation. But that jumps ahead a few topics in this series, as when we return we will have more on the topics of the slur, air, and vowels.

Continue in Hornmasters Series