I have been buzzing using just the mpc for something like 25 for reasons that stretch from I was told to ( College) to it helps me monitor how well I am using my air (Current). One of the detriments I have heard some say about buzzing is that a player uses a different embouchure buzzing just the piece vs. piece and horn. I feel like I buzz the same way with or without the horn. Is this possible, or is my perception of what I am actually doing skewed?
I have based a good part of what I do as a brass player on making the way that I play the horn and the way that I:
1-M'pce buzz
2-Rim buzz (Using a cut-off rim)
and
3-Free buzz (just my lips, no rim or m'pce) as close to identical as it is possible for me to make them through every octave of every horn I play, from tuba and bass trombone right on up to small bore tenor. That is 6+ octaves, fairly well connected with all four approaches.
Of course it is possible.
There are those who claim that playing on the horn in some way changes what you are doing inside of the m'pce when you buzz, but if it does, I just don't care. The fact is that learning how to bring those buzzing techniques into playing the horn...and vice versa, so that all of them can be connected to each other w/out interrupting the ;buzz... strengthens how you play in innumerable ways, and that's more than enough for me.
You might want to read my article
BUZZ ON, BUZZ OFF. THEY BOTH WORK for a general overview of my approach, and I have a YouTube vid up...it's actually on another subject, coupling vocal overtone singing with the way that you play the horn...that has in its first minute or so a demonstration of this buzzing connection idea. (
Vocal Overtones + Brass Embouchure #1, Part 1 )
If any of this interests you check out my book,
Time, Balance & Connections: A Universal Theory of Brass Relativity (Trombone Edition). In its 265 pages there are easily 100+ that deal with ways to apply these techniques to a brass practice regimen.
Long story short...
you're not "skewed". It's the naysayers who are wrong.
Keep at it.
Later...
Sam Burtis
