Faster Tonguing in Two Weeks - with tonebase Coach and Clarinet Lead Heather Roche!

Faster Tonguing In Two Weeks!

In this first two-week intensive of 2025, we’re going to be looking at how to improve the speed of our tongue: something I know a lot of us want to improve! We’re going to use these two weeks to work on tongue placement, speed of air and - perhaps most importantly! - daily metronome work to see if we can increase our tongue speed in just two weeks. We’ll be using one of my favourite tonguing studies, from Reginald Kell’s Staccato Studies in order to track our progress over the next two weeks. And if you haven’t had time to participate in a two-week intensive so far, this will be the perfect one to get you started: all you need is 10-15 minutes a day to see results - so come and join us!

Course Period: January 20th - January 31st - NO SIGN-UP NEEDED!

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If you’re ready to truly elevate your skills, consider taking the next step with tonebase Coaching. Participants in our coaching program get the chance to work one-on-one with Heather over a transformative 90-day period, diving deeper into their technique and artistry. Don’t miss this opportunity to accelerate your progress!
 

11 replies

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    • Donald_Lurye
    • 2 mths ago
    • Reported - view

    Sounds like fun!  So if no sign up is needed, how do we engage with this intensive?

      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

       Hi Donald! It'll be pretty much exactly the same - I'll post the first video and activities on Monday and you'll get an e-mail reminder as well, and that post will also contain details about the Zoom check-in!

      • Donald_Lurye
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

       Great!  Are you back as clarinet lead at tonebase?

      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

      Yes sir :) 

      • Donald_Lurye
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

       as the English say, "Brilliant!"  Excellent news.

    • Donald_Lurye
    • 2 mths ago
    • Reported - view

    So I've tried the Kell study, and I can almost get four lines to a 110 beat.  However, the same thing happens that always happens - I get "tongue fatigue" and lose speed no matter how lightly I touch the reed.  Almost feels like a muscle cramp.  I know, it's a muscle (four muscles, actually).  In self-defense, I've gotten decent at double and triple tonguing, but that's kind of a workaround.  Thoughts, anyone?

      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

       Hi Donald - this happens to me too! It's an endurance issue - it's one of the reasons I wanted to encourage consistency over the next two weeks, that we try to build up the endurance and speed at the same time. But it's totally normal - lots of little breaks are good.

      But do you not have the same issue eventually with double tonguing? Is it only with the single tongue? 

      • Donald_Lurye
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

       It does happen with double and triple tonguing, but not as quickly.  Here is my theory (sorry to go all nerdy, but I'm a retired physician).  The tongue has four intrinsic muscles and attaches to four others.  My guess is that multiple tonguing spreads the work around more of the intrinsic muscles compared to single tonguing, so the latter is more challenging.  I'd rather single tongue, as the attack is more consistent, particularly once you cross into the clarion register.  We all know or know of players who appear to have a tongue like a snake (Stanley Drucker, more recently Martin Fröst) and others who don't (like me).  I believe the principal chair in the Pittsburgh Symphony is an expert double tongue person.  So is it solely a matter of practice and building endurance, or are some people born luckier than others?  One of my DuPage Symphony (Chicago area) colleagues is very fast at single tongue, and I don't think it is something she necessarily practices much.

      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

       I definitely think some people are naturally gifted - but that doesn't mean the rest of us can't get there with practice. I have a slower tongue than most (which is also why I learned to double tongue, although as you say, it's not as clean up high) - but if I'm practising it every day (and that's a big if, as life gets in the way even when my job is the clarinet) I notice a BIG difference. 

      I should definitely know my tongue anatomy better though, thanks for that... it's a very good theory as to why the multiple tonguing isn't as taxing. Makes sense! 

    • Donald_Lurye
    • 2 mths ago
    • Reported - view

    Here I present the first four lines of the Kell exercise @Heather gave us.  One is at quarter note = 115 and the other at 120.  I think they came out well, but I have a couple of things for which I'd appreciate getting feedback from all of you and from Heather.  I have a metronome coming into my earbuds, and I think I kept up pretty well, but it doesn't sound like staccato to me.  If I try to make the notes shorter, I rapidly get "tongue fatigue" and cant keep up.  I know there are a couple of schools of thought on this - one is to try for shorter notes, and the other is to "fool" the audience by going a bit faster with longer notes that will be percieved as staccato.  Bottom line - not that I'm likely ever to play the Corigliano Concerto, but I believe at one spot it has 128 fast staccato notes in a row.  How does any Earthling do that?  What are your thoughts?

      • Head of Clarinet
      • Heather
      • 2 mths ago
      • Reported - view

       Hi Donald, thanks for all your videos - I'm going to watch them in a minute but could you do me a big favor and copy all of this into the forum post for the 'week one' exercises? Everyone else is posting there, so there's more of a chance you'll get feedback from some of the other people taking this intensive! (And I'll put some feedback there once you do that too, and then more of a chance those people will see that feedback too, etc.)

      https://clarinet-community.tonebase.co/moderate/t/g9ylkbr/faster-tonguing-in-two-weeks-week-one

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