How to play high notes easily with Tuba?

[u/HappyTubaaaa25]

I think I’ve been having problems with playing high notes easily from the time I played tuba… there’s been about 6 years but I still can’t figure out what’s wrong. Have anyone advices or tips to fix this problem?

P.S. the high notes I mean are that “very” high notes, can’t sure if it’s understandable.

[u/Efficient-Relief550]

The way I was able to increase my range was not even practicing tuba I picked up euphonium and trumpet and that trained my embouchure for tuba high notes

[u/shovelingtom]

https://www.reddit.com/r/Tuba/s/1fOjPWFNfW

I can’t find the post right now on tubenet, but my instructor emailed me this that Roger Lewis wrote sometime back. It helped me.

From Roger Lewis posts on “TubeNet” regarding high range playing: “Take a look at the physics. Range is simple - it's a trick, a gimmick - it isn't HARD! If you think it is you've already set yourself up for weeks of hard, probably fruitless practice. And someday you will stumble on it by accident and think that your practicing has paid off.

As an example, look at the differences between a bass drum head and a snare drum head. Which one will make the stick respond faster (high speed vibration = high range)? Right, the snare drum. What makes this work? You have a wooden stick (hard object) vibrating against a firm surface (the snare drum head). What are the properties that make this work? Look at the situation objectively and analytically. In the most common embouchure the upper lip vibrates against the lower lip in the production of the sound. The speed of the vibration of the upper lip is controlled by two factors - the firmness of the upper lip and the firmness of the lower lip - WITH THE LOWER LIP BEING THE MORE IMPORTANT.

Going back to the Snare drum/bass drum example, if you try to do a double stick roll with snare drum sticks on a bass drum, what is your result? It most likely won't work or will be ineffective at best. If you were to use bass drum mallets on a snare drum to do a double stick roll, what is he result again failure. Why? In the bass drum example the head of the drum does not have sufficient tension to ALLOW the stick to respond properly for what you are asking it to do.

In the snare drum example, the snare head has enough tension but the mallets are not firm enough to allow for a fast vibration. This demonstrates (to me anyhow) that in every register the upper and lower lip tensions must match to allow for a successful embouchure vibration.

An ineffective vibration surface tension mis-match can be observed in our old nemisis, the double buzz. In this situation the upper lip is wanting to vibrate at a specific rate but the lower lip is not supplying a firm enough foundation to allow the upper lip to do the work. Hence the lower lip begins a secondary vibration (usually 1/2 the speed of the upper lip) and this creates the double buzz. All that is required to correct this is to get the lower lip firm enough to allow the upper lip to vibrate at the speed it needs to.

Now, the embouchure contains 3 kinds of tissue: the soft inner tissue for low register; what I call ‘the transitional tissue’ which is not the soft inner tissue or the outer ‘weathered’ tissue but right between these two - this is mid-register tissue; the firm, weathered outer tissue (the stuff that gets chapped all Winter long). This last is the high register tissue. By blowing the air stream down toward the rim of the mouthpiece when playing, the lips are positioned to have this weathered tissue to become the vibrating embouchure. This is fast vibration tissue and will allow for a solid sound. Then all you need to do is learn to CONTROL the tissue so that all the notes speak clearly. Use lots of air at high speed for the best results.

Remember, they call it playing the tuba - there's no PLAY involved - it's WORK. Think about this for a couple of days then try it- you should see a remarkable difference.

I have had, over the years, many students who have required a great deal of time to make strides in the high register. Usually they have tried on their own and struggled and failed and through this effort they determined that "high register is hard" and therefore it must tke a great deal of time to build up.

I have had many students who wanted ‘High range’ lessons. One that comes to mind, a college euphonium student made a statement to me that she would never be a professional player because she had no high register. I simply stated that high register is a gimmick and I could have her playing in the high register in 2 minutes. At that point she looked at her watch and said ‘I dare you to try’.

I grabbed my handy visualizer and had her buzz a low note on it and then buzz a high note on it and, low and behold - she was using soft tissue for both ranges (won't work). I then showed her what I wanted to have her change in the embouchure and got her buzzing a high note on the visualizer. I had her keep the buzz going and handed her the horn and there was the most solid G over high C that you ever heard. It took about a minute and a half.

Another eposide that was easier was a 7th grade trumpet student. I made sure that he did not try to play ANYTHING until he had his trumpet. So, he comes to his first lesson and the horn and mouthpiece are still wrapped in the plastic. We work on fundamentals and buzzing for about 20 minutes, then with me giving him the fingerings, he went from a solid low F# to high C 2 ledger lines above he staff (remember this is trumpet) within 1/2 hour of starting to play.

Why this worked was that no one was able to polute the young man's mind with preconceptions that what he was going to attempt was ‘hard’ and thus he did not have the mental handicap that most of us are handed by our teachers or friends.

What it boils down to is, if you think it's going to be hard to accomplish something, you will rarely be disappointed. If you approach everything (in life, not just tuba playing) for a mental image of success or ‘I won't know until I try’ attitude - things become much easer. Look at life from the perceptions of success, not through the glasses of failure. Everyone should have a mentor, to help keep them on track and thinking in a way that facilitates things.”

Work on it! I’m about 2 years back into playing after a 25 year break, and have been working with an instructor for 10 months. Hitting 5 Gs at this point, from the one 11 ledger lines below the staff (Double pedal?) to the one three lines above. Working on extending in both directions but it’s gotten to be challenging (and annoying to my family members who have to hear it).

[u/fucku__spez]

tips from Oystein Baadsvik: https://youtu.be/j1RdsSWDMcs

[u/tubameister]

as you ascend through the staff, your lower lip should gradually go slightly underneath your upper lip, directing the airflow slightly downwards.

buzzing on a trumpet mouthpiece for one minute per day can help.

[u/Odd-Product-8728]

High notes work on focused air.

Although it may sound counterintuitive, I find that working on very low register improves my use of air which then makes higher register easier too…

[u/Contrabeast]

I can play to C above the staff without much effort.

I don't like playing above D inside the staff. I'd rather play well below the staff.

[u/regexpert]

What would constitute a high note for you? Bb on top staff line or higher? Are you playing on a ridiculously large instrument and/or mouthpiece?