How to choose a mouthpiece - what I wish someone had told me 15 years ago

[harrisonreed]

I have noticed that there are still a lot of questions about picking the right mouthpiece, and problems with mouthpieces. And the issues are usually not "I have no trouble in any register, but I need more XYZ in the sound". Usually the issue is something much more fundamental, like, "I can't play high. I have no endurance. I can't play low. I have no flexibility"

Now, on a recent thread or two, a highly seasoned pro has said correctly that a mouthpiece doesn't do anything. It only helps or hinders you to do certain things. I agree with this 100% and hopefully my guide here addresses this idea. This is what would have helped me, maybe even when I was 15, get to a better spot on the trombone a lot faster. Maybe some of it is wrong, but it certainly would have helped me if I had been told this:

1. We all have to start somewhere, and you are not going to have the correct mouthpiece right off the bat, especially if you are still young. There are some stock MPs that are much more general utility than others, so hopefully you get one of these as your first mouthpiece:

Small bore, student trombone: 6 1/2AL
Large bore tenor: Bach or Denis Wick equivalent 5G
Bass: 2G

Now, at age 15 you won't be able to really assess what a MP change does for you, so don't experiment yet unless your teacher (yes, a real live teacher!) says that one of the three MPs above is absolutely the wrong choice for your face.

2. You can make 100% progress straight away with a few core concepts. First, if your slide is in poor working condition, nothing you do will improve your playing more than sorting out your slide. 15 year old me, let me see your slide. Nope, a lot of the problems you're having with endurance and range stem from this sluggish slide, and you can't even start building on what I want to tell you about until you fix it.

Second, your teacher is focusing too much on music, and not enough on mechanics. There, I said it. Music is great. Everything we do should be musical. But 15 year old me, you are not there yet with slide technique, and basic control over the embouchure and air direction to worry about music at this point.

3. Figure out how to use the gear you've got. 15 year old me, you don't know if you're an upstream or downstream player, and you don't know what that means. Make an embouchure and blow like you're trying to ascend to a high note. Don't feel air going up your nose? Ok, that means you're like most trombonists, and a downstream player. Don't worry about it too much, but you need to know that when you are paying low notes, your jaw relaxes and the air goes straight into the mouthpiece. As you ascend, your jaw moves slightly back, and your tongue goes slightly higher in your mouth. The air goes more or less down at an angle and deflects off the cup.

Think about that while you work on the whole book of lip slurs by Brad Edwards, and if you hit a trouble spot, try to solve it with tiny adjustments with your jaw and your tongue position, and directing the air towards the two positions I told you about. Don't try to solve it by changing the physical position of the MP on your face.

Our goal is to not move the mouthpiece up or down much, if at all, on the lips. The lips might move up or down a bit over the teeth, however.

Once you've worked on these things for the day, then apply them to the music your teacher has you working on.

4. If you can, after a year or two, play all of the Brad Edwards book comfortably and without drastic shifts in the jaw, tongue, or MP position, then you've hit the jackpot and you probably are playing on the correctly sized MP for you. However, more likely than not you have to really pivot the jaw a lot to play pedal tones, and the upper register is thin, and you can't play up there without moving the MP around on your face. This is indicative of a MP cup width that is too small. You would know it if it was too big for your face. You don't know it when it's too small

So, 17 year old me, for the sake of this post we'll say you got your 5G and your new 88H, and you've really hit the wall after doing everything above and working specifically on this stuff with your teacher every week. And no matter how much everyone tells you to Skype with Doug Elliott and get a lesson, you insist on going it alone because you're stubborn. Well, I still have some advice for you.

You can buy only your second MP ever, for not too much money, and have your problem solved 90-100% for the rest of your playing career. Yes! You really can.

We're still going to go with Doug Elliott, and we're going to get an XT G cup with matching shank for our horn, and three rims. Get a 102, a 104, and a 106.

Then, starting with step 3, above, we're going to figure out how to use the gear we've got, working outwards from the 104. Apply what we know about us being a downstream player, and work through the Brad Edwards exercises.

It should be immediately apparent if more or less motion of the jaw, tongue, and MP is required, especially in the lower register. Work through the exercises on each rim, and be objective. The upper register may seem more difficult, but the difficulty will be different than before. Changing air speed, tongue position, and aperture will fix what could only be muscled through before.

It's important to do this assessment on the same cup. We're assessing the ideal cup width, not depth, that allows our lips and air to move freely. You will know which of the three is the one for you. Return the ones that aren't or sell em here on TC. If you're paranoid, you can buy the odd numbered rims around the one you settled on, and try those too. In the end, you'll have hopefully learned a lot more about how to use your aperture, tongue, and air efficiently through all registers. And it's time to return to step 3, and practice more.

5. There may come a time when you think maybe the MP can help you with getting a certain sound, or the concerto you're working on has 55 high Fs and two F#'s. At this point, you can try the whole process again, using the rim you've settled on, but trying deeper or shallower cups.

Maybe you can try MPs from other makers with the same cup width.

Be objective. Ask a friend.

[harrisonreed]

Also, this is the advice that would have really helped me. There are many other correct ways.

[BGuttman]

One comment: 15 year old you (and especially 15 year old me) doesn't want to practice extended sessions of Lip Slurs. I wanted to play tunes. The connection between the lip slurs and the ability to play the tunes was not apparent to me at the time.

I had one advantage (if you can call it that) at the time. Being of limited finances, I couldn't go around buying bushels of mouthpieces. My only outlet was a music store with a big box of used mouthpieces for a few dollars. So I got to try a Conn 3, a Bach 6.5 AL, and something without a marking on it. None of them made me an instant virtuoso, though. Eventually my teacher as a senior in High School got me on a Remington, which I played over all the others for years.

[harrisonreed]

You are right. 15 year old me definitely would have heeded a lot of the advice above, though I don't think Brad Edwards' book was available then. Likely most young people would not be as into the lip slurs book as I probably would have been.

15 year old me loved Bordogni etudes. I had trouble with clipped, choppy articulations and legato passages and didn't know how to fix it. I think I really would have loved the etudes in the back of the Edwards book, or ALL of the longer lip slur melodies book.

I think the key thing is to make sure that the student (or person trying to find a better mouthpiece) understands that musical output and the mechanics of playing are related, and they are related in a way that is MUCH more complex than the long tones and scale/articulation studies we get hammered with in high school and starting out in college. Those things do not teach you to control your jaw, air, and tongue, and actually can end up hindering you if you do them expecting results but not being aware that you should be controlling things with your tongue, jaw, and corners.

Students must be aware of these things and how to manipulate them to get results. If not, the rest of my post is moot, and they might as well just be throwing darts and seeing what sticks.

[PhilTrombone]

A well thought-out write-up! There are so many mpc threads here, many of which are so esoteric.

You basic advice on mastering basics first on these:

Small bore, student trombone: 6 1/2AL
Large bore tenor: Bach or Denis Wick equivalent 5G
Bass: 2G

would address so many problems perceived to be mouthpiece related.

Thanks!

[AtomicClock]

2. You can make 100% progress straight away with a few core concepts. First, if your slide is in poor working condition, nothing you do will improve your playing more than sorting out your slide. 15 year old me, let me see your slide. Nope, a lot of the problems you're having with endurance and range stem from this sluggish slide, and you can't even start building on what I want to tell you about until you fix it.

I wonder how many 15 year olds have access to a way to fix that poor slide. When I was growing up, the local music store would take my (parent's) money, and give me a slide back that was still terrible, so I stopped going. I never had a nice slide until after college, when I moved to a new area with a proper shop.

[Bach5G]

The name of the Brad Edward’s book you’re referring to?

[MrHCinDE]

A younger me would have benefited from playing some drones and with a tuner to really nail slide positions. Playing in the wrong place hampered my sound and endurance which wrongly thought were mouthpiece/instrument issues. Since I improved that and got the icing on the cake of some basic understanding of my embouchure from DE things, I have had a lot more clarity of thought about MPs.

[harrisonreed]

The name of the Brad Edward’s book you’re referring to?

Lip slurs!

[harrisonreed]

2. You can make 100% progress straight away with a few core concepts. First, if your slide is in poor working condition, nothing you do will improve your playing more than sorting out your slide. 15 year old me, let me see your slide. Nope, a lot of the problems you're having with endurance and range stem from this sluggish slide, and you can't even start building on what I want to tell you about until you fix it.

I wonder how many 15 year olds have access to a way to fix that poor slide. When I was growing up, the local music store would take my (parent's) money, and give me a slide back that was still terrible, so I stopped going. I never had a nice slide until after college, when I moved to a new area with a proper shop.

Not just that it needs to be fixed, but even just a slide that just needs to be cleaned and properly cared for.

[Bach5G]

The name of the Brad Edward’s book you’re referring to?

Lip slurs!

Great! And, it turns out, available at my LMS . Reasonable price too. Must be old stock.

I like how the exercises are progressively structured.