Bassoonjedi's Library

Most students cannot wait to tongue fast. It’s the first step to asserting yourself as a “Serious” bassoonist. Like revving the engine at a stop light. Most performers are initially measured by how fast they can play, and this could be used as a fair measuring stick, I’d prefer to measure a performer by how CLEANLY they perform.

But as the local bassoonist, it became clear to me at an early age that the studs of the band could play fast, and wield their tongues like Eddie Van Halen. I had a taste for heavy metal, and in my college years I decided to break down the barriers between my air-guitar fantasies, and my geeky-bassoon abilities. I decided I was going to play metal, and be the fastest tounguer anyone had ever heard. It didn’t take long in my higher education to learn that faster didn’t mean better, and clean always won competitions.

But where does one start? You can’t just jump into “Fight Fire With Fire”, you have to learn the essentials. Here’s how I sped up my tongue:

1) Start Slow. Sounds stupid right? You have to learn to walk before you can run, and with disciplined practice you can experience measured results quicker with discipline. Again, cleaner players are more valuable, and being able to perfectly tongue notes quickly puts you in the final rounds of the auditions. Play at the speed of perfection.

2) Assuming you already know how to start and stop notes with the tip of your tongue, take your reed with you. If you drive yourself to school or around town take your reed out, and tongue in small groups of 8-16 notes. Naturally, this is a solitary practice, and exposing others to speed drills can cause mass hysteria.

3) Pick your syllables. This was a final hurdle for me, and hopefully I have spared you. Most wind players swear by the “Ducka-ducka”, but I always found that my tongue would seal the air off completely, making a void in my mouth, and bring the music to a screeching halt. So try “tee-kee-tee-kee” It brings the tongue forward, and allows for faster movement.

Coming up: Part-two – Exercises and excuses

Tags: enbouchure, metallica method, practice techniques, tonguing

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010 at 9:33 pm and is filed under Bassoon & Performance. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.