[Dave Pollack]

Hey everyone! It's Friday 4pm EST that means it's time for a brand new video. I got inspiration from all of those saxophone stock photos with the mouthpieces upside down, so I wanted to try to see if I could play like that! I hope you enjoy it

 

[B Flat]

Seems all those picks on eBay did have the mouthpiece right after all.

 

[laurjohn]

I think there is a theory that historically, clarinets/chalumaeus were played like this.

 

[lydian]

Another comedic gem Dave. Loved it.

Also loved the Lee Konitz and Warne Marsh viewer comments. So true. I remember getting a Music Minus One record of Lee's when I was a kid and cringing when I played the first track. I guess he just had his mouthpiece upside down all along.

 

[bandmommy]

Sax and clarinet kids have tried playing their mouthpieces upside down for ever.
Shoot, I did it 48 years ago! 😂😂😂

 

[Hipparion]

So now you know how to sound like me (although you didn't mimic very well my lack of fluency)...

Next up : can you make an alto play like a baritone by adding a garden hose between the main body and the neck ? (and we would call that a giralfto)

 

[Dave Pollack]

So now you know how to sound like me (although you didn't mimic very well my lack of fluency)...

Next up : can you make an alto play like a baritone by adding a garden hose between the main body and the neck ? (and we would call that a giralfto)

Hahah, I tried an alto with a hose between the body and neck...it didn't work out too well! Time to try a bari.

 

[Dave Pollack]

Sax and clarinet kids have tried playing their mouthpieces upside down for ever.
Shoot, I did it 48 years ago! 😂😂😂

Hahahah yep! I hope some more see this and try it out

 

[lostcircuits]

Which tonguing technique did you use?

 

[B Flat]

I’d be interested in hearing your slap tongue on this set up.

 

[Dave Pollack]

I'd be interested in hearing your slap tongue on this set up.

I have no idea how to do that, hahah

 

[Dave Pollack]

Which tonguing technique did you use?

Uh...regular? Never thought about it to be honest.

 

[lostcircuits]

Uh...regular? Never thought about it to be honest.

I mean with the upside down LOL, I can see how you could still touch the tip of the reed but an anchor tongue - just the thought gives me brain spirals :evil:

 

[Dave Pollack]

I mean with the upside down LOL, I can see how you could still touch the tip of the reed but an anchor tongue - just the thought gives me brain spirals :evil:

No I meant regular tonguing- I didn't think about tonguing any differently than I usually do. I don't know what an "anchor tongue" is either!

 

[milandro]

Actually there is no comedy about this, the upside down mouthpiece was a rather well established way to play clarinet , as for the majority of things we have had threads on this

https://forum.saxontheweb.net/showthread.php?167262-Playing-With-Mouthpiece-Upside-Down

If you are interested READ this too

https://clarinetcorner.wordpress.com/2013/05/05/mouthpiece-puzzle/

"....Evidence of a "golden age" of reed-above playing can be found in 19th century Neapolitan players, including Ferdinando Sebastiani and Gaetano Labanchi. playing at the San Carlo Theater and the Conservatory of San Pietro. I know of the work of Labanchi as Cioffi had me work from one of his etude books. now, out of print except for the imprint found in this article, which clearly shows Labanchi playing with the reed on the top of the mouthpiece, rather than the presently accepted way. They both claimed that by employing the reed-above embouchure, one increased the types of colorings of articulation, whic gave the clarinet its beauty, and Labanchi stated tht this method allowed for a more precise staccato. In his own clarinet method, Ferdinando Busoni, father of the pianist and composer Ferrrucio Busoni(do you know his "Elegy"? I played it), Ferdinando remained convinced that the reed-abve embouchure assisted in obtaining a mellow timbre, pure intonation, flexibility and delicacy of nuance. Just as the position of the reed was not standardized, there are different opinions regarding the use of the throat, chest and tongued articulation as a means of reed-above articulation. Just a few years later, Klose regarded the reed-below embouchure as advantageous for three reasons. The tone was softer and more agreeable, the position of the tongue under the reed allowed the played to better articulate, and the overall appearance of the player was more graceful, allowing for greater powers of execution with much less effort...."

let me revive this thread with some added information.

Thanks to SOTW member Aldevis who mentioned this to me first,

https://clarinetcorner.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/labanchi-metodo.pdf

I have found this, the Labanchi Clarinet Method ( download it all if you want here but be advised that it is in Italian and also, old Italian, and written in a very old style indeed , so even if you are fluent in this language you may have problems in reading it ( It is my and Aldevis mother-tongue so we have no problems with it even despite its stylistic variations with the modern version of Italian)

You can clearly see in the illustration that he plays with the mouthpiece upside down. You may think it is a mistake of the draughtsman but this is NOT the case, in the description Mr. Gaetano Labanchi says that you can play clarinet in two ways.

With the reed under and the reed above (!!!!) By the way, he calls the reed " Linguetta" instead of the more common term " Ancia". The reed of a mouth-organ or harp or accordion is called " Linguetta" in modern Italian.

Anyway Gaetano Labanchi says that playing with the reed above is way preferable to playing with the reed under because: " the voice expands more, and you can thin the sound to the point that it resembles a distant echo"

Also he says, that you can " tongue" more precisely this way and that the instrument is more freeblowing.

Labanchi, in his preface, writes that the clarinet student has to have good physical condition, he has to be of some musical disposition as well the " Letters" (he means that one needs to be acquainted with reading and writing prose and poetry) and that he needs to have well formed lips, preferably with the lower or underlip slightly bigger than the top.

 

[Taragot]

I think there is a theory that historically, clarinets/chalumaeus were played like this.

If I remember correctly, they called it under- and overblowing.

 

[Taragot]

I wish, I could actually play Giant Steps like this ...

 

[milandro]

Again we have spoken, extensively about this in the thread that I recalled above.

It did exist also in the German world ( I remember that I found a reference in that thread).

It was a typical feature of the Neapolitan school of clarinet playing and this was brought to America by Cioffi.

 

[Dave Pollack]

Again we have spoken, extensively about this in the thread that I recalled above.

It did exist also in the German world ( I remember that I found a reference in that thread).

It was a typical feature of the Neapolitan school of clarinet playing and this was brought to America by Cioffi.

But this thread is about the video in the OP, and I'm not going to look into the history of it. I saw stock photos, I thought it would be funny if I turned my mouthpiece upside down and played Giant Steps, so I did. It's not too serious

 

[lydian]

Dave, surely you know by now, even the simplest post on SOTW ends up as a pages long thread full of dissertations.

Just to pile on, in 1927, "Weird Lips McGee" played the entire saxophone upside because he was born with his bottom lip on top and his top lip on bottom, and his right and left hands were swapped. In order to reach the keys, he attached a garden hose between the neck and body and used a shoe lace ligature because he couldn't afford a Rovner Platinum. He was a virtuoso on the upside down sax, the inverted sackbut and the inside-out contra-bass didgeridoo. So the very things you find amusing are quite main stream and even superior techniques. As MGee's great-great grandson and an upside down sax player, I'm frankly offended by your videos.