You never want to tongue an instrument with the fat, middle portion of your tongue. Always tongue with the very tip of your tongue, and yes as said, try taking some of the mouthpiece out, you don't need to swallow the thing, especially the big fat bari sax mp. Best of luck to you.
Beginner Tonguing Question
Hi everyone,
Since I can't see into people's mouths, maybe somebody can explain to me a tonguing problem I'm having. [Before we get into it, my first lesson is in 3 weeks. Until then, I'm trying on my own to get as much basic stuff as I can to at least a beginner level.]
On my baritone sax, the mouthpiece is big and it gets pretty deep into my mouth. To tongue it at all, I'm been anchoring my tongue to my bottom teeth and arching up to catch the reed tip. This also catches the roof of my mouth, and I know that I have the air pressure behind that tongue wall. When I do this, I can get a (relatively) clean start on demand across the range of the baritone.
This seems to be a lot "more tongue" than people call for. It completely stalls the airflow behind my tongue, but that seems to work. Yet, when I read or listen, everyone says that you don't need to seal off the saxophone. If I don't seal off the sax, however, I'll get that "breathing into a saxophone noise" and the tone starts whenever it feels like it.
Should I continue to use this tonguing method, as I suspect I should, or is there something I'm missing here? Do you hold the air column back with your tongue as you enter a note, or is there a timing issue I need to perfect to coordinate the arrival of the air column and the removal of my tongue perfectly?
Since I can't see into people's mouths, maybe somebody can explain to me a tonguing problem I'm having. [Before we get into it, my first lesson is in 3 weeks. Until then, I'm trying on my own to get as much basic stuff as I can to at least a beginner level.]
On my baritone sax, the mouthpiece is big and it gets pretty deep into my mouth. To tongue it at all, I'm been anchoring my tongue to my bottom teeth and arching up to catch the reed tip. This also catches the roof of my mouth, and I know that I have the air pressure behind that tongue wall. When I do this, I can get a (relatively) clean start on demand across the range of the baritone.
This seems to be a lot "more tongue" than people call for. It completely stalls the airflow behind my tongue, but that seems to work. Yet, when I read or listen, everyone says that you don't need to seal off the saxophone. If I don't seal off the sax, however, I'll get that "breathing into a saxophone noise" and the tone starts whenever it feels like it.
Should I continue to use this tonguing method, as I suspect I should, or is there something I'm missing here? Do you hold the air column back with your tongue as you enter a note, or is there a timing issue I need to perfect to coordinate the arrival of the air column and the removal of my tongue perfectly?
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