Tommy Thompson's Airstream Drill for Clarinet
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- čas přidán 27. 08. 2024
- Tommy Thompson retired from the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in 2016 after 50 years as Associate Principal Clarinet. I've never played with a more fundamentally correct clarinetist, and I learned a lot from him. This exercise is one that I use all the time (with proper attribution) and I started to make a video about it then thought, "Wait a minute . . ."
Tommy shares his home with an African Gray parrot, a Cockatiel, couple of other parrots. And he lives kinda near Pittsburgh International Airport. You understand.
Yep, not a Sean Evans-class interview, but you've got to start somewhere. My dad used to say, if you wait until everything is perfect to do something, you'll never do anything. I realize now, days later, that there wasn’t enough explanation of how the air is restricted and the hissing sound is created. It basically uses the tongue to palate contact point of “k” in English or “ch” in German. Ach! Nicht! You keep the tongue in that position; another way to think of it is using the back of your tongue to narrow and speed up the air like putting your thumb over the end of a hose to spray someone. May have to do a separate video about it. That would be thrilling.
If you feel like subscribing/liking, that would be cool. If you're interested in music at Duquesne University, you can contact me by going to www.duq.edu and searching my name.
I thoroughly enjoyed this. Thank you very much to you both for making it.
Had the pleasure of attending classes with Mr. Thompson between 2015-2017 even though he wasn't my main clarinet instructor. Very kind and helpful. Always gave the students at CMU a chance to play for each other during his studio classes and was fair with assigning parts across all ensembles. Helped introduce repertoire to us so that once we were on the job we could say "Hey! We read this once with Mr. Thompson so it isn't completely unfamiliar." Thank you, Mr. Thompson!
❤❤❤ wow Thank You So Much for sharing!
Thanks for appreciating. Tommy is a treasure.
This is an absolutely briliant explanation of tongue position. I grew up studying with Iggy Genussa, who to my ear was obviously doing this, but lacked the ability to explain exactly what he was doing. I eventually figured it out, and always thought my tongue was in a pretty high position. Then I watched this, and I did the exercise and my sound got even better and my double tongue speed got really fast and I was able to do it on higher notes. The idea of the air resistance is caused by the tongue and not the reed, mouthpiece or clarinet is a MAJOR pedagogical pillar. Once when I was 16-17 was up the farm having a lesson with Iggy and I had just read "wind song" by arnold Jacobs. I took my new knowlege up to Iggy with some "Breath builder" device. When I played using the open throat, lots of air technigue, He said that it was "exactly the opposite" of what he did. "I use the least amount of air I can use, and my set up is really light", He then joked about holding a clarinet up in a 5MPH wind and you should hear some notes. This video explains exactly why that style of playing works. When you play like this you don't need open mouthpieces and super hard reeds. Thanks I've already made some differences with a few of my students.
Awesome! That’s exactly the hoped for response.
It was so nice to see Mr. Thompson again. I was a student of his at Carnegie Mellon from 1993-95. I remember both of these drills! I'm excited to bring them back into my practice sessions. Very helpful video. Thank you!
I met Mr. Thompson in 1978 singing under Robert Shaw at Ambler Festival.. During the concert I stood directly behind him. Dur ing re hearsay’s we had interesting conversations about playing.
Re: playing with eyes wide open, eyebrows raised, à la Robt. Marcellus: as a student of Harold Wright, I can attest that Harold played exactly the same way, and no one had a more beautiful tone than Harold Wright-thanks for pointing that out.
I am SO delighted to come across this video! I was remembering Tommy just about week ago. (I’m now convinced that our devices can read our thoughts!) Growing up in Pittsburgh in the 70s, I always loved his tone when I heard him perform with the PSO. I remember it being really vibrant and alive with overtones, which I only later learned to comprehend in tone production. I never studied or even meet Tommy in person, but he has always been present in my clarinet psyche. Thank you, Jack, for posting this!
My pleasure! I’m planning a “story time with Tommy” video, his stories about Steinberg and Lou and the early tours are great. May have to be a series.
Bob, just had to come back and say thanks for taking time to write this, it really made my day and I’m sure it made Tommy’s. I showed it to my wife and she said, “That makes it worth doing CZcams right there.”
First, i'm so glad I came across this CZcams video. I grew up in Pittsburgh and probably attended every Pittsburgh Symphony major concert until I relocated to Phoenix Arizona in 2003. In fact, I was just in Pittsburgh this past Thanksgiving weekend (2023) visiting family. While there, I had the wonderful opportunity to attend the November 25, 2023 violins of hope program with Joshua Bell as soloist. Truly a magnificent program. A big shout out to the Clarinet section of the symphony and in particular, to you Jack Howell, @jackhowell8708 for your wonderful bass clarinet playing. Your solos in the Pigovat and Bloch pieces were beautiful. I was seated in one of the last rows on the first floor and your sound, was full, clear, balanced, and expressive in all registers of the instrument. Next, so glad to see this video with Tommy Thompson, who I truly admired for his Clarinet, Eb Clarinet, and Sax playing skills. As a Clarinet major at Carnegie Tech/Carnegie Mellon and Duquesne University, I never had an opportunity to study with Tommy, however I was fortunate to have him as a coach when I played in the Pittsburgh Youth Symphony for several years. I also had the privledge playing utility clarinet in the McKeesport Symphony, and Tommy would often join us to assist our conductor and his symphony colleague, Mihail Stolarevsky, in rounding out the section. As well, when I taught instrumental music in the Piitsburgh Schools, I remember the Symphony's Woodwind Quintet, in which Tommy played, performing for our students on a few occasions. Tommy, as the quintet's spokesperson, always had a way of communicating and engaging with the students so they would listen attentively, for the most part, to an art form unfamiliar to many of them. Thank you again, for this video and the great memories it brought back.
Thank you,@@davidsinger8085 , that’s lovely. The algorithm works in mysterious ways, and it has been heartwarming to see so many of the people Tommy has touched reconnect with him. Thanks again for taking the time to comment, I’ll make sure Tommy sees this.
Thank you for such a quick response @jackhowell8708. The Pittsburgh area is and was home to some remarkable clarinetists. Besides Tommy, you, and other current members of the orchestra’s clarinet section, I fondly remember, Louis Paul, Mordechai Applebaum, Dick Paige, Jerry Lavine, and my wonderful teachers, Nestor, Koval, and Bernie Cirelli.
Awesome! Thank you!
Sweet video thanks!🙏🙏🙏
I didn't quite catch the syllable that Mr Thompson spoke about us using in our blowing
Thanks, Bob, I realized later that the parrots were screaming right there. I should have asked him to clarify and I tried to elaborate in the video description. He says “hhhhs-ch, anything to get the sizzle in the sound.” It’s a little complicated because proprioception inside the mouth can be weird, but the syllable has to provide a controllable restriction between the roof of the mouth and the back of the tongue. I tell students to hiss like a cat, or feel the tongue contact of the consonant
K,” or say “nicht.” That last one, the German or Yiddish “ch” sound, is what linguists call a voiceless velar or uvular frictive, which is basically a backwards snore. Everyone is different, some students dig it one way, some another. Might do a video just on that topic, that would really segment the audience.
do you modify this when playing bass clarinet?
Personally, no, I play bass exactly like soprano, it just takes more air. Which makes focusing the air even more important for long phrases, and I find the bigger reed even less tolerant of biting if you need clean attacks and articulation (especially upper register) with no quack. I’m never not thinking airstream and oral cavity, and I’m always trying to make the bass clarinet sound like Mike Rusinek an octave lower. Now, I think my tongue position preoccupation is partly because the roof of my mouth is very deep and narrow, and I make everything sound dark and dull if I don’t focus the ever-living crap out of it. Everyone is different.
@@jackhowell8708 I think that the super compressed air makes the low notes on the bass respond really quickly and speeds up the articulation response. And it just sounds better.
I concur. And often neglected is the importance of pianissimo attacks. Anybody can play fortissimo attacks; making a pure tone, pianissimo, in tune, in any register, right at the point of the stick, that’s the trick. It can be done with an open mouthpiece and a biting embouchure, but that’s a young person’s game. Airstream focus works much better, and will work after the 20-something elasticity is gone.