Question about wind instruments

[Alon Marcus]

Always wondered what "circular breathing" and "false fingerings" are and what they are good for? I'll be glad if someone could explain it and probably give examples of this happening on some musical pieces.

[EKE BBB]

You can find a lot of information about circular breathing on this thread:

Circular breathing

[Alon Marcus]

Thank you! I beleive Michael's explanation is more than enough

Even non-musicians can get the underlying concept - get a glass of water and a straw - blow bubbles, fill cheeks, squeeze out that air while inhaling through nose. Don't let the bubbles stop. I've had little kids who can do this.

Now, maintaining a playing embouchure and good tone, intonation, melodic ideas at the same time.......

Mike

Many examples there too.

How about false fingering?

More special techniques to look for?

Edited October 1, 2004 by ztrauq22

[Michael Fitzgerald]

False fingering generally involves playing a "non-standard" fingering to obtain a note. Could be taking advantage of the harmonic series (for example, playing a low note fingering but changing the air and embouchure to make it sound as the next note up in the harmonic series).

Mike

[Alon Marcus]

Thank you Michael!

Another interesting technique is "multiphonics". There is an example of Trane doing it on his 7105 prestige album at the end of "While my lady sleeps". The legend tells that it was actually Monk who taught him to do it.

I'll be glad to hear everything you guys know about it (more examples, the mechanics behind producing this effect etc.).

[doubleM]

Freddie Hubbard used ye' olde false fingerings to great effect on his solo in Stolen Moments (from Blues and the Abstract Truth), to execute some passages that would otherwise not be possible on the trumpet. I remember listening to it when I was just getting into jazz, and trumpet... and saying to my then-girlfriend, "God-Damnit, I don't see how that's possible!". Then I saw it written out in a John McNeil book which contains many great exercises w/ f.fingerings. Whew!

[Michael Fitzgerald]

True multiphonics are kind of related to false fingerings because of the harmonic series. The acoustical properties of a cylinder or cone (woodwind instruments) can allow for two, three, four, or more notes to be sounded simultaneously. You end up tricking the instrument by using an odd fingering that opens or closes a hole to create a secondary/tertiary/etc. wave along with the primary note. There are books detailing the fingerings for various woodwinds - just pages and pages of intervals and chords with the fingerings underneath. Some are much easier to produce than others. Usually the folks who are into multiphonics devote huge amounts of time to really mastering it. Contemporary classical pieces will call for these techniques.

This is not the same as the sing/hum-while-playing kind of thing. That's how brass players typically get multiphonic effects, but even with brass it's possible to do it (in a much more limited way, in my experience) without the singing/humming, just through embouchure.

Mike

[Alon Marcus]

Yes I know what you are talking about: sing/hum-while-playing kind of thing – like the Jethro Tull flutist does and like Ray Anderson does on trombone.

Once again thank you very much for explaining the physics of these effects.

Have anyone noticed Jackie McLean's humming on his solos in Destination out and ONE STEP BEYOND? What it's all about? My guess is that helps musically to arrange his thoughts.

[JSngry]

Another type of false-fingering involves using an open fingering (one that leaves a lot of keys unclosed) to produce a note that is ordinarily produced with a closed one, and vice versa. You can also use a standard fingering and open/close other keys (or just one key) that keeps the pitch just about the same but alters the timbre. A good example would be Yusef Lateef's using of the open left-hand palm keys (keys which are "supposed" to be used for the upper octave) w/o the octave key to get the same pitch an octave lower, whch produces a timbre that is marvelously suited for that "moaning" quality that he exploits to such a distinctive advantage.

These might best be considered as "alternate fingerings", though, since there's no real "tricking" of the instrument going on per se.

Also, as far as I know, the first person to really use them on a tenor (or maybe even a saxophone, period) in jazz was Lester Young. That alternating "oooh-aaah" sound he got from the same note is an example of alternating open and closed fingerings of the same note, or of keeping a standard fingering and adding/removing a key (or keys) that keeps the pitch but alters the timbre. But he did a lot of other things as well, not all of them immediately obvious. Getting the notes of his solos is just the beginning - he used so many different fingerings that in order to figure out what he really played, you gotta deal with the fingerings as well.

And don't even open up the fingering can of worms that is Lockjaw Davis. This guy actually corked some of his key shut so they wouldn't/couldn't work, and then he took it from there. I don't have the specifics (yet), but it's obvious that he kinda had his own "homemade" fingering system. That's the only way that you can get some of the sounds he got - "non-traditional" fingerings.

Edited October 1, 2004 by JSngry

[Free For All]

Yes I know what you are talking about: sing/hum-while-playing kind of thing – like the Jethro Tull flutist does and like Ray Anderson does on trombone.

IMHO the player who really nails this technique on trombone is Albert Mangelsdorff. I would recommend checking out some of his recordings if you're into this.

[Michael Fitzgerald]

Now THAT's interesting - please tell more about Lockjaw's alterations to his horn, if you can - and where did you learn that? That puts his playing in a different light. Fascinating!

Mike

[JSngry]

I never saw him live, but several locals did (notably Shelley Carroll & Roger Boykin), and they both commented on how he had some keys corked shut. Shelley said that he tried to get an "up close" look but wasn't able to, although he did think that he saw the right-hand side-C key altered in some way. I've tried to figure out how that alone could make any real difference, but with no luck. So I'm thinking there's more to it than that, has to be.

Then there's the Johnny Griffin interview on the Mel Martin site where Griff talks about this. Again, though, no specifics.

I've got the Storyville video that I haven't looked at yet. Maybe that will yield some insight.

But yeah, fascinating stuff indeed, and still a "mystery" of sorts. Maybe James Carter's got it scoped, but he's about the only one I can think of who would.

Edited October 1, 2004 by JSngry

[Alon Marcus]

Yes I know what you are talking about: sing/hum-while-playing kind of thing – like the Jethro Tull flutist does and like Ray Anderson does on trombone.

IMHO the player who really nails this technique on trombone is Albert Mangelsdorff. I would recommend checking out some of his recordings if you're into this.

Thanks, I will.

[couw]

Yes I know what you are talking about: sing/hum-while-playing kind of thing – like the Jethro Tull flutist does and like Ray Anderson does on trombone.

IMHO the player who really nails this technique on trombone is Albert Mangelsdorff. I would recommend checking out some of his recordings if you're into this.

Thanks, I will.

you'll want the later stuff. someone here will be able to fill you in on the best choices. there is some nice solo work out there too. I myself am quite partial to Hot Hut, an album he did with Elveeen and Dauner, but I doubt it is either easily available or the best there is.

[frank m]

I was at a concert at which Kenny Daverm was playing a solo in the upper register of his clarinet when I suddenly realized (being a clarinetist manque myself) that in order to resolve his solo he would have to hit a note above the upper range of the horn. To my utter astonishment he did just that.Even Dick Hyman, who was accompanying him on the piano, looked at him in astonishment while his eyebrows arched up on his forehead. I later heard him on a radio interview discussing how another clarinetist (I forget who) taught him the fingering for it. Basically the idea is siimple. You excite with the phony fingering the subharmonic of the note you want to hit and overblow it so that you end up with an octave above the subharmonic, ending up wiith the note you want. Simple,wot? Try it if you thiink so. I can't do it with my lip.

[JSngry]

It's not a lip thing as much as it is a throat thing.

[Alon Marcus]

False fingering: physically it is comparable with producing harmonics on a string of a guitar. You produce other notes from an open string (natural harmonics) when blocking slightly the string at an appropriate place: half string, quarter string, etc.

That way you make the other frequency components of the original pitch to be heard.

[danasgoodstuff]

Clarinets (cylinders) overblow not at the octave like saxes (cones) but at the 12th (next harmonic, right?). That's why their fingering changes from one register to the other making them more complicated than saxes but able to cover a greater range (again, I think that's right, I play sax and have only held a clarinet for a few minutes). One of the things that false or alternate fingerings can allow you to do on a wind instrument is to sidestep the tempered scale cunumdrum and play perfectly in tune in all keys, or however 'imperfectly' you chose at any given point...if your ear and your technique are good enuff. I'm far short on both counts. I use three fingerings for b flat on a regular basis, but v. rarely much else.