Now, my mate Jem Hammond said "What do you want to learn to do that for? Just practice getting your finger articulation better." (I think there may have been an unspoken "first" on the end of that sentence.)
Anyway, as I said to him, "That's as may be, but I *want* to." (It is just possible that I may have stamped my foot at that point.)
My only trouble is that my tongue goes at a different speed from my fingers, and it doesn't always go fast enough ... My TWO troubles are that my tongue goes at a different speed from my fingers, it doesn't always go fast enough, and it tends to get very dry and stick ... My THREE troubles are that ...
... oh, and by the way, I don't expect the Spanish Inquisition here.
Er ... no ... but I *think* my fingers are OK until I start tonguing. Mind you, I suppose it still could be that, even if the fingers *are* OK without tonguing, the additional mental process makes my fingers go wrong rather than my tongue. Either way, fingers and tongue are not coordinating.
The reason I asked is that most advice on learning the whistle recommends not tonguing to start with because it can cover up sloppy fingering. And tongues were designed for articulating sounds, fingers were not.
Seems like the same problem I was having on quick passages on the fiddle when I tried to use saw strokes. The timing was just off. Slow up and practice, practice, practice and gradually increase your speed. I don't think there's a magic pill on this one.
I don't know if it's typically done in Irish music, but I believe a lot of wind-instrument players use a glottal instead of tongued beginning to the note -- that is, whisper "coo" instead of "too" into the instrument. And if you get that down, you can go from one to the other quite quickly, for example, getting triplets by whispering "tah-kah-tah, tah-kah-tah" into the instrument.
If you are concentrating very hard on the tonguing it won't be fast enough for your fingers.
Try slowing down the tempo. Eventually you won't have to think about your tongue.
Random_notes, I think you're probably right (again ). It's so-o-o frustrating though. Sometimes, I can pick up the whistle and they'll just work. Then I try to do it again, and it doesn't. Seems to happen even worse when I've just played 'em really crisply - the next ones are just rubbish.
ElaineP - but I WANT a magic pill!
And cuchulain54, I'm going to remember those for when I can get even *single* tonguing remotely clean and in time.
Bottle of wine, eh, jwvansteenwyk? You're not the first person to suggest that 'remedy' to me. It's interesting - I never would have thought this, but, for me at least, on whistle (but *not* on fiddle where it doesn't make all that much difference until I'm actually drunk) a glass or two does actually seem to help. Three glasses means I can't play the thing at all. You've got to be right about slowing things down, though.
Anyway, slow tonguing would be even better, eh, awildman2384?
Do you grunt while you do it, awildman2384? Serious question, as I've noticed recently that I've started to do this. Only when fiddling though, and it's usually only noticeable when I'm fiddling on my own.
Just occasionally, through some tough passages. And they're getting quieter and fewer as I get better. Recently I noticed that I make some weird faces in some of those difficult passages instead. Usually involving the corners of my mouth, for some reason. Oh well, maybe that'll go away as I get better. I hear some players always do the grunting/face-making thing, even after years, although I know of nobody personally.
Even as a kid I knew I made strange faces when learning the piano. Didn't stick with it long enough to work the kinks out.
single tonguing is "t". "Ta", "d" or "Da" said into the flute or whistle while playing a note. I think the tongue on whislte is not meant to touch the mouthpiece of the whistle. Mine doesn't and it certainly should not on flute.
Control in tonguing is far more important than speed. I use the following exercises:
1. Pick a note, e.g. B, and play it with excellent tone then start tonguing very slowly (e.g once per second?), speed up until you're as fast as you can and then slow back down. All under control and all without losing the quality of your tone. i.e. continue to provide adequate breath support throughout.
2. Pick a scale, e.g. G-Major, play each note first as well as you can then tongue it a predetermined number of times before moving onto the next note in the scale. e.g. with four repetitions it would be:
G---GGGGA----AAAAB---BBBBc...
3. Play a scale tonguing every note at precisely the same moment that your finger move.
Remember that a tonguing is not meant to last any significant time (except when playing staccato) but is just meant to be an interruption in the sound.
The reason for playing scales or exercises when doing this sort of thing (rather than using real tunes) is that one can seriously mess up one's enjoyment and execution of a tune if you over work it in this way.
Double tonguing is another matter and basically allows twice the speed by alternating the tip and back of the tongue - sayng "tktktktktktk" of "dgdgdgdgdg" etc. Controlling it is even harder than single tonguing. But that comes after you can single tongue. Triple tonguing is double tonguing applied to triplets, i.e. "tkt ktk tkt ktk..."
awildman, are you two different people? Perhaps I ought to be benhall.2 and even benhall.3 and benhall.4 ...
Anyway ...
Thank you for that, Crackpot. Amazingly (now, I know this isn't going to last, and it's going to take some hard work here) I tried your scale exercise as you described and my tonguing immediately improved! Just in two minutes - fab, eh?
Sadly, I have to go to work now ... wish I could take my whistle, but can't today ...
I don't quite agree with crackpot on this. I played clarinet
for 40 years or so before getting into fiddle so I know what I'm
talking about here.
When you are just starting to coordinate
fingers and tongue you should get your fingers set _before_ you
tongue the note. Initially the two actions should be quite separate.
Then gradually bring them closer, but you should always have the
feeling that your fingering is set before the tongue. If you try to do
it simultaneously, then sometimes you'll hit the note and sometimes
you'll be just a little bit off. You can get the 2 actions very close after
a while.
"You're not Australian are you, wildman?" (benhall)
Ben must have thought he had an Aussie friend there for a second. I know it's tongue in cheeck, but while we're on the topic, a wildman was benhall...or vice versa.
I am sorry, but knowing benhall is a fiddler, when I first saw this thread, all I could imagine was someone using their tongue on fiddle strings. Quite messy and counterproductive, I would think!
Thanks Hup. Your point about 1st getting the fingers set is spot on. I come up with exercises, from time to time, just to loosen loosen up my fingers & blowy bits. In the long run rhough exercises teach me how to do exercises. With that in mind invent some Random_exercise & go over it a bit. Then I try to think of a tune which has the things I want to (or need to) work on. Plenty of tunes which can help the tonguing. There is a jig I play which has lots of repeated A's & G's; like your example Crackpot. I alternate between articulations ~ finger & tongue.Etc. & so forth.
Just an aside. After you asked the question, ben1, I thought cuts & strikes got swept under the rug. I had some comments but I will just leave it with simply ~ try 'em all!
Cheers & enjoy.
I think we can "lick" this problem--despite the oral fixation of some of the members of this web site.
Random_notes, have you managed to untie your tongue yet?
Playing a fiddle with your tongue sounds almost as difficult, painful, and awkward as trying to play piano by ear. Since I can't detach my ears from my head, I have to turn my head to the side so I can hit the keys with my ear. Playing the piano like this will give you a headache.
Using your tongue and your fingers together can make it most enjoyable--but only if your mind is in the wrong gutter.
triple tonguing is normally done in jigs whereas double tonguing is done in reels. tktk gives a sharper attack on the note than dgdgdg. Control is importatnt and you can vary it throuout the tune i.e try single tonguing in one phrase and double tonguing in another
Personally, triple tonguing a jig and/or double tonguing a reel would be too much for my taste. Maybe the odd group of notes as contrast, but in this music, the default is slurred with articulations added to emphasize notes rhythmically.
How you articulate is also a matter of taste with cuts, strikes, tonguing, rolls, crans, tongued cuts (explained to me by Mary Bergin), glottal stops etc.
Thinking about Hup's comment about when my fingers move - for me my fingers move during the gap in the sound produced by the tongue. Definitely not after, but not detectably before either - and I'm talking about both simple system and Boehm flutes here. I do know that I have the picture in my head of what my fingers have to do before I send the signal which actually moves them. But I really do not think they move before my tongue. Maybe I'm deceiving myself?
For sorting out clean finger movements, you can't beat slurred scales and arpeggios. If you can hear something between the two notes that are meant to be being played then you're hitting a wrong note during the transition. Don't. (These would be "crossing noises" on the bagpipe...) Do it really slowly and have a clear picture in your mind of what fingers have to move and how - hold and cherish this image and then - at a point in time determined by you - move the fingers.
Because when you hammer an exercise to death you do not want it to be one of your favourite tunes - because it sure as hell wont be once you've overused it as a technical exercise...
Playing The Morning Dew over and over was how I finally got pedal bowing on fiddle really fluid. But it never felt like a grind. And the tune remains one of my all-time favorites.
As you say Will, there is more than one way... When working on a specific aspect of technique, I like not to be distraced by all the other things that go towards making a tune sound good. There is a later stage for me where I take the new technique and incorporate it into how I play the tunes. But there the tunes in their entirety are the priority, not the particular technique that I have just been working on.
And if I were to write an exercise for pedal notes then I wouldn't be surprised if it looked rather like the Morning Dew... Or the second part of the basic Mason's Apron, or... In fact, a little systematic writing out of all the common combinations of pedal note and <whatever the higher notes are called> sequences and you'd probably cover most of the tunes of this type... (With some tunes I wonder whether that _was_ how they were written!)
Tonguing - how do I do it?
Tonguing - how do I do it?
Now, my mate Jem Hammond said "What do you want to learn to do that for? Just practice getting your finger articulation better." (I think there may have been an unspoken "first" on the end of that sentence.)
Anyway, as I said to him, "That's as may be, but I *want* to." (It is just possible that I may have stamped my foot at that point.)
My only trouble is that my tongue goes at a different speed from my fingers, and it doesn't always go fast enough ... My TWO troubles are that my tongue goes at a different speed from my fingers, it doesn't always go fast enough, and it tends to get very dry and stick ... My THREE troubles are that ...
... oh, and by the way, I don't expect the Spanish Inquisition here.
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Rats! Now I've got dribble all over my computer keyboard ...
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Are you sure its your tongue that's wrong and not your fingers ?
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by David50
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Er ... no ... but I *think* my fingers are OK until I start tonguing. Mind you, I suppose it still could be that, even if the fingers *are* OK without tonguing, the additional mental process makes my fingers go wrong rather than my tongue. Either way, fingers and tongue are not coordinating.
The question is, though, how do I put it right?
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
The reason I asked is that most advice on learning the whistle recommends not tonguing to start with because it can cover up sloppy fingering. And tongues were designed for articulating sounds, fingers were not.
Dunno, sorry. (er, won't jemtheflute help ?)
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by David50
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Yeah ... but I think he would rather I got my fingers better *first*, and I want it NOW
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Become proficient in another language where they click or trill their tongues impossibly fast. What's Gaelic like in that respect?
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by nicholas
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Seems like the same problem I was having on quick passages on the fiddle when I tried to use saw strokes. The timing was just off. Slow up and practice, practice, practice and gradually increase your speed. I don't think there's a magic pill on this one.
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by ElaineP
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
I don't know if it's typically done in Irish music, but I believe a lot of wind-instrument players use a glottal instead of tongued beginning to the note -- that is, whisper "coo" instead of "too" into the instrument. And if you get that down, you can go from one to the other quite quickly, for example, getting triplets by whispering "tah-kah-tah, tah-kah-tah" into the instrument.
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by cuchulain54
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
I have played Saxophone and the whistle for 3 years so I am pretty good at it. Just say ta into the intstrument
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by Odog87
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
If you are concentrating very hard on the tonguing it won't be fast enough for your fingers.
Try slowing down the tempo. Eventually you won't have to think about your tongue.
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by Ben Steen
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Random_notes, I think you're probably right (again
). It's so-o-o frustrating though. Sometimes, I can pick up the whistle and they'll just work. Then I try to do it again, and it doesn't. Seems to happen even worse when I've just played 'em really crisply - the next ones are just rubbish.
ElaineP - but I WANT a magic pill!
And cuchulain54, I'm going to remember those for when I can get even *single* tonguing remotely clean and in time.
# Posted on September 1st 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
I've been trying to tongue my fiddle, but I just can't get it to work.
What am I doing wrong?
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by Hup
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
the tongue or your fiddle?
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by wyogal
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
I think it's the choc-flavoured tongue rosin - not grippy enough
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by Hup
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
After reading the initial post several times, I still cannot figure out what we're tonguing and fingering. Or whom.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by awildman2384
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
You're not Australian, are you, awildman2384?
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
If you're having trouble coordinating the timing between your tongue and fingers, you're probably going too fast.
Slow things down a bit. Take your time, and concentrate on a consistent technique. Repetition is the key.
Did you try a nice bottle of wine?
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by jwvansteenwyk
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
No. I'm American......unfortunately? fortunately? Why do you ask?
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by awildman2384
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Oh, just curious ...
Bottle of wine, eh, jwvansteenwyk? You're not the first person to suggest that 'remedy' to me. It's interesting - I never would have thought this, but, for me at least, on whistle (but *not* on fiddle where it doesn't make all that much difference until I'm actually drunk) a glass or two does actually seem to help. Three glasses means I can't play the thing at all. You've got to be right about slowing things down, though.
Anyway, slow tonguing would be even better, eh, awildman2384?
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
I'm sure fast tonguing has its place, too. But not on my instrument. I play fiddle so I prefer to stroke with one hand and finger with the other.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by awildman2384
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Do you grunt while you do it, awildman2384? Serious question, as I've noticed recently that I've started to do this. Only when fiddling though, and it's usually only noticeable when I'm fiddling on my own.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Just occasionally, through some tough passages. And they're getting quieter and fewer as I get better. Recently I noticed that I make some weird faces in some of those difficult passages instead. Usually involving the corners of my mouth, for some reason. Oh well, maybe that'll go away as I get better. I hear some players always do the grunting/face-making thing, even after years, although I know of nobody personally.
Even as a kid I knew I made strange faces when learning the piano. Didn't stick with it long enough to work the kinks out.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by awildman
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
single tonguing is "t". "Ta", "d" or "Da" said into the flute or whistle while playing a note. I think the tongue on whislte is not meant to touch the mouthpiece of the whistle. Mine doesn't and it certainly should not on flute.
Control in tonguing is far more important than speed. I use the following exercises:
1. Pick a note, e.g. B, and play it with excellent tone then start tonguing very slowly (e.g once per second?), speed up until you're as fast as you can and then slow back down. All under control and all without losing the quality of your tone. i.e. continue to provide adequate breath support throughout.
2. Pick a scale, e.g. G-Major, play each note first as well as you can then tongue it a predetermined number of times before moving onto the next note in the scale. e.g. with four repetitions it would be:
G---GGGGA----AAAAB---BBBBc...
3. Play a scale tonguing every note at precisely the same moment that your finger move.
Remember that a tonguing is not meant to last any significant time (except when playing staccato) but is just meant to be an interruption in the sound.
The reason for playing scales or exercises when doing this sort of thing (rather than using real tunes) is that one can seriously mess up one's enjoyment and execution of a tune if you over work it in this way.
Double tonguing is another matter and basically allows twice the speed by alternating the tip and back of the tongue - sayng "tktktktktktk" of "dgdgdgdgdg" etc. Controlling it is even harder than single tonguing. But that comes after you can single tongue. Triple tonguing is double tonguing applied to triplets, i.e. "tkt ktk tkt ktk..."
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by Crackpot
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
awildman, are you two different people? Perhaps I ought to be benhall.2 and even benhall.3 and benhall.4 ...
Anyway ...
Thank you for that, Crackpot. Amazingly (now, I know this isn't going to last, and it's going to take some hard work here) I tried your scale exercise as you described and my tonguing immediately improved! Just in two minutes - fab, eh?
Sadly, I have to go to work now ... wish I could take my whistle, but can't today ...
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Yes we are.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by awildman
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
[not a joke response this time]
I don't quite agree with crackpot on this. I played clarinet
for 40 years or so before getting into fiddle so I know what I'm
talking about here.
When you are just starting to coordinate
fingers and tongue you should get your fingers set _before_ you
tongue the note. Initially the two actions should be quite separate.
Then gradually bring them closer, but you should always have the
feeling that your fingering is set before the tongue. If you try to do
it simultaneously, then sometimes you'll hit the note and sometimes
you'll be just a little bit off. You can get the 2 actions very close after
a while.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by Hup
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
"You're not Australian are you, wildman?" (benhall)
Ben must have thought he had an Aussie friend there for a second. I know it's tongue in cheeck, but while we're on the topic, a wildman was benhall...or vice versa.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Hall
No relation?
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by Skull Duggeraigh Dubh
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
I am sorry, but knowing benhall is a fiddler, when I first saw this thread, all I could imagine was someone using their tongue on fiddle strings. Quite messy and counterproductive, I would think!
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by AlBrown
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Thanks Hup. Your point about 1st getting the fingers set is spot on. I come up with exercises, from time to time, just to loosen loosen up my fingers & blowy bits. In the long run rhough exercises teach me how to do exercises. With that in mind invent some Random_exercise & go over it a bit. Then I try to think of a tune which has the things I want to (or need to) work on. Plenty of tunes which can help the tonguing. There is a jig I play which has lots of repeated A's & G's; like your example Crackpot. I alternate between articulations ~ finger & tongue.Etc. & so forth.
Just an aside. After you asked the question, ben1, I thought cuts & strikes got swept under the rug. I had some comments but I will just leave it with simply ~ try 'em all!
Cheers & enjoy.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by Ben Steen
1 final comment
I know ~ my post is difficult to read & has typos. Guess I got tongue - tied
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by Ben Steen
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
I think we can "lick" this problem--despite the oral fixation of some of the members of this web site.
Random_notes, have you managed to untie your tongue yet?
Playing a fiddle with your tongue sounds almost as difficult, painful, and awkward as trying to play piano by ear. Since I can't detach my ears from my head, I have to turn my head to the side so I can hit the keys with my ear. Playing the piano like this will give you a headache.
Using your tongue and your fingers together can make it most enjoyable--but only if your mind is in the wrong gutter.
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by fauxcelt
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Random_notes, your post may have been difficult to read etc ... but you came up with a phrase I shall treasure always:
"just to loosen loosen up my fingers and blowy bits"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZ2iyFmywPE
# Posted on September 2nd 2008 by ethical blend
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
triple tonguing is normally done in jigs whereas double tonguing is done in reels. tktk gives a sharper attack on the note than dgdgdg. Control is importatnt and you can vary it throuout the tune i.e try single tonguing in one phrase and double tonguing in another
# Posted on September 4th 2008 by boconnell804
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Personally, triple tonguing a jig and/or double tonguing a reel would be too much for my taste. Maybe the odd group of notes as contrast, but in this music, the default is slurred with articulations added to emphasize notes rhythmically.
How you articulate is also a matter of taste with cuts, strikes, tonguing, rolls, crans, tongued cuts (explained to me by Mary Bergin), glottal stops etc.
Thinking about Hup's comment about when my fingers move - for me my fingers move during the gap in the sound produced by the tongue. Definitely not after, but not detectably before either - and I'm talking about both simple system and Boehm flutes here. I do know that I have the picture in my head of what my fingers have to do before I send the signal which actually moves them. But I really do not think they move before my tongue. Maybe I'm deceiving myself?
For sorting out clean finger movements, you can't beat slurred scales and arpeggios. If you can hear something between the two notes that are meant to be being played then you're hitting a wrong note during the transition. Don't. (These would be "crossing noises" on the bagpipe...) Do it really slowly and have a clear picture in your mind of what fingers have to move and how - hold and cherish this image and then - at a point in time determined by you - move the fingers.
# Posted on September 4th 2008 by Crackpot
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
''I tried your scale exercise as you described and my tonguing immediately improved! Just in two minutes - fab, eh?''
Huh? scales?! now why would you be wanting to play scales when you could be playing tunes?
# Posted on September 4th 2008 by hedgemumper
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
Because when you hammer an exercise to death you do not want it to be one of your favourite tunes - because it sure as hell wont be once you've overused it as a technical exercise...
# Posted on September 4th 2008 by Crackpot
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
"Hammer an exercise to death."
Now THAT'S how I want to make music!
Playing The Morning Dew over and over was how I finally got pedal bowing on fiddle really fluid. But it never felt like a grind. And the tune remains one of my all-time favorites.
# Posted on September 4th 2008 by Will Harmon
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
All I really mean here is there's more than one way (and one attitude) that leads to improvement and good musicianship.
# Posted on September 4th 2008 by Will Harmon
Re: Tonguing - how do I do it?
As you say Will, there is more than one way... When working on a specific aspect of technique, I like not to be distraced by all the other things that go towards making a tune sound good. There is a later stage for me where I take the new technique and incorporate it into how I play the tunes. But there the tunes in their entirety are the priority, not the particular technique that I have just been working on.
And if I were to write an exercise for pedal notes then I wouldn't be surprised if it looked rather like the Morning Dew... Or the second part of the basic Mason's Apron, or... In fact, a little systematic writing out of all the common combinations of pedal note and <whatever the higher notes are called> sequences and you'd probably cover most of the tunes of this type... (With some tunes I wonder whether that _was_ how they were written!)
# Posted on September 5th 2008 by Crackpot
More than 1 way to good musicianship
When ever I play a warm - up exercise or a dance tune (with repeats) my intention is to enjoy what I am doing while making it sound good.
# Posted on September 6th 2008 by Ben Steen