Tongue arch for pitch change

Changing pitch with tongue only

In lesson five of the “I want to trumpet” book, tongue action was described for changing pitch. You can try this by whistling or blowing air through your lips while raising and lowering your tongue.
Begin with your lips relaxed, then blow air through them. This is your starting pitch. Now raise your tongue with a slight forward motion, keeping the tip of your tip down, and the sides of the tongue curled up. Don’t try to raise the pitch too much, and try not to change your lip position. For now, you are just getting use to the feel of using your tongue for pitch change without using your lips.
Now lower your tongue back to your starting pitch, and repeat the process over and over again to get the feel of changing pitch with your tongue and nothing else. Keep your lips, cheeks, and face relaxed. Let you tongue do all the work.
Next, blow air through your lips at your starting pitch, and lower your tongue. Depress your tongue from the back like you would when saying ‘uhhhh’. Lower your tongue just enough to hear the pitch lower. Repeat the pitch change up and down with your tongue only. Leave your lips relaxed and uninvolved in changing the pitch.
Now begin at your starting pitch by blowing air through you lips, and then raise your pitch a couple of whole notes just until your lips feel like they want to compress. At this point, lower your pitch with your tongue until your jaw feels like it wants to drop and open. the goal is to practice changing the pitch with just your tongue as much as possible without using your lips. Repeat this exercise over and over again to get comfortable with changing the pitch using only your tongue.

Using vowels for tongue arch position

Try using vowel sounds to change your tongue arch position. For example, short U sound like ‘Uhhh” is for a lower pitch. Raise your tongue to transition through ‘o’ into ‘a’ sound. Then transition into ‘e’ for the higher pitch.
The goal is to help you identify tongue position for each pitch.

Mouthpiece and trumpet

Now repeat the steps above using your mouthpiece. Relax your lips, and blow into the mouthpiece.
Two positions are possible at this point. 1) Press the mouthpiece into your lips, blow, and let your lips curl to produce the buzz. 2) Hold the mouthpiece to your lips, lightly touching your lips, and let the air blow the center of your lips into the mouthpiece. The second position is your goal.
If you are struggling to feel the second position and to get a good, resonating buzz; begin with the lip curl buzz, then slowly push your lips forward with a slight emphasis on pushing out your lower lip. The goal here is to produce a strong, resonating buzz with little mouthpiece pressure. You may need to adjust mouth pressure, lip opening, and lip position as it pushes forward. Keep trying until you find the sweet spot for your buzz.
Once you find the sweet spot for your buzz, raise and lower your tongue. Don’t change your lips. Stay relaxed. Raise the pitch slightly until the lips cannot stay relaxed, then lower your pitch. Practice this repeatedly to get the feel of pitch change using only your tongue.
Now repeat this exercise with your trumpet. Your starting pitch will be around F or G. Your lips should be relaxed as the air flows into the trumpet. Feel the resonation of the buzz.
Raise and lower the pitch with your lips and key positions chromatically. Don’t go any higher or lower than your lips will allow you without changing. At this point, just practice the feel of changing pitch with your tongue only.

Blow from your lips

Blow from your lips not the back of your throat.
As the pitch rises, your tongue will moved up and forward.
Practice slurring slowly through notes with one finger position to train your tongue to position itself correctly to change the pitch.

A starting point

The goal is to eventually start your pitch at G above the staff. This will be your beginning lip position with your tongue in ‘neutral’ position. From here, raising and lowering your tongue will control your pitch without a change in lip position. You will discover relaxed playing from low F# to high C and higher.
Take it slow, and practice the exercises above to get the right feel. increase your range only as your lips will allow you to do so while relaxed and unchanging.

Troubleshooting

Air flow stops when raising tongue. In order to the keep the air flowing through your mouth over your tongue, curl the sides of the tongue up to form a groove down the middle of your tongue, and keep the tip of your tongue pointed down. The sides of your tongue will touch the roof of your mouth first as you raise your tongue and air will continue to flow over the middle of your tongue. This may feel like you are expanding your tongue rather than raising your tongue.
The pitch is barely changing. To maximize the pitch change while raising and lowering your tongue, raise and lower the back end of your tongue. Keep the tip of your tongue pointed down behind the bottom teeth to allow air to flow through your teeth. To get a good feel of lowering and raising your tongue, practice normal air flow then lower your tongue to the ‘Uhhhh’ position. Notice the lowering of you tongue. Now raise it back to normal position. Then expand your tongue as you raise the back end of your tongue. Keep practicing until you get the feel for it.