Sensation of fatigue

[Gfactor]

Hi all! I’m a very low placement, upstream player with what seems to be an unusual embouchure. When I get tired, the muscles above my upper lip feel ‘used’, particularly just below my nostrils. The next area I feel it is on my chin very low down on the sides. My corners never feel tired. Is this normal? I’d be interested in hearing about other people’s sensations of fatigue!

[Redthunder]

Hi all! I’m a very low placement, upstream player with what seems to be an unusual embouchure. When I get tired, the muscles above my upper lip feel ‘used’, particularly just below my nostrils. The next area I feel it is on my chin very low down on the sides. My corners never feel tired. Is this normal? I’d be interested in hearing about other people’s sensations of fatigue!

I am also a very low placement and I also have experienced these sensations.

You might be using certain muscles more than your corners, and you might need to consciously practice using the corner muscles more.

You also might be playing too long continuously without a break.

Contact Doug Elliott and Dave Wilken (also an upstream player). They both helped me tremendously in making my embouchure work correctly.

[Doug Elliott]

Try to use the muscles down below your corners, where dimples are. That will take the burden off the places you're using, that you shouldn't be.

[Oslide]

Watch this closely.

This is from a gig I played last Thursday.

[Wilktone]

Contact Doug Elliott and Dave Wilken (also an upstream player).

Unless Gfactor is a different upstream player he already contacted me to ask. If not, that's a pretty remarkable coincidence.

As Redthunder mentioned, I too am an upstream player. Back about 20 years ago now I recall asking Doug in a lesson about this topic. I was still pretty new to playing with an upstream embouchure at the time and was feeling fatigue in the cheeks. Doug's advice was the same as he wrote above, work on the area just under the mouth corners. These days I don't feel the fatigue in the cheeks any longer.

I've posted about this article in the past here that studied the muscles that are worked by trumpet players while warming up and comparing experienced players with beginners. They found the area under the mouth corners and chin were most active with the experienced players.

https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... ermography

[Gfactor]

Thanks all - Wilktone is right - I have already contacted him. I’ve been getting some good results recently by setting for a higher « home » note and I’m not concerned, just curious about others’ experiences and how they might (or might not) relate to embouchure type. My embouchure journey has been long and in the process I’ve developed a fascination for all things embouchure!

[baileyman]

... I’ve been getting some good results recently by setting for a higher « home » note ...

I've recently re-set from middle C to the F above, and it seems there may be continuing benefits from that move.

[Gfactor]

Yes I now use D above the staff as my home note and that seems to set up my chops beautifully for both lower and higher notes. I’m interested that someone else has had a similar experience.

[norbie2018]

How do you reset your home note?

[Doug Elliott]

Start your day there, structure your warmup (or whatever you do) so that's your first note of the day and everything you do is centered around that being the middle of your range.

It's both a mindset and a physical reality.

[baileyman]

I notice a couple of things.

If I start the day on a lower note, it may be played with chop postures in several different ways. Some of those ways work really well lower, but poop out higher. I would find myself suddenly falling off the bike on some rising figures. I knew the feel of the chop posture that would play the higher notes, but feel alone became a bit unreliable to get to that position.

Les Benedict suggested starting on F. Imagining the F seemed to prompt that feel, and suddenly setting for that note became much more consistent. "Memory of feel" has been a problem for a long time. To have a note recall the exact feel is really terrific.

I'm now thinking of F as like a mini-max, the lowest note that prompts a chop set for the entire range.