Step 9: Playing tips
The tootophone is a very intuitively played instrument. You can get the same notes with different lip and finger positions. It is like riding a horse, instead of driving a car.
Playing the tootophone is a lot like singing, only silently, without using the vocal cords. Think of how your Adam's apple goes up and down as you sing high or low notes. Also, the volume of air inside your mouth changes as your tongue moves.
Changing your lip position also affects things, and you have to clamp down tighter on the reed for the higher notes. Allow the whole reed to vibrate for the lowest notes. Shorten the length by moving toward the tip of the reed with your lip. You can get a range of high and low notes without even using your fingers.
When you get into fingering, it helps to be familiar with standard recorder fingering. "Singing" the note while fingering it at the same time sometimes produces a cleaner note than singing alone. Also, you can do rapid effects with the fingers that you can't do with mouth action alone.
I usually bleed a little air off to the side of the mouthpiece while playing. It helps me control my breathing so I don't get tired out from playing and helps me stabilize long held notes, also.
If you are careful to not damage the reed, you can occasionally bend it out a little and clean off saliva build-up with your fingers. Saliva can stick the reed down and kill the sound.
This link will take you to some recorder fingering information, which might give you some fingering hints. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recorder
Playing the tootophone is a lot like singing, only silently, without using the vocal cords. Think of how your Adam's apple goes up and down as you sing high or low notes. Also, the volume of air inside your mouth changes as your tongue moves.
Changing your lip position also affects things, and you have to clamp down tighter on the reed for the higher notes. Allow the whole reed to vibrate for the lowest notes. Shorten the length by moving toward the tip of the reed with your lip. You can get a range of high and low notes without even using your fingers.
When you get into fingering, it helps to be familiar with standard recorder fingering. "Singing" the note while fingering it at the same time sometimes produces a cleaner note than singing alone. Also, you can do rapid effects with the fingers that you can't do with mouth action alone.
I usually bleed a little air off to the side of the mouthpiece while playing. It helps me control my breathing so I don't get tired out from playing and helps me stabilize long held notes, also.
If you are careful to not damage the reed, you can occasionally bend it out a little and clean off saliva build-up with your fingers. Saliva can stick the reed down and kill the sound.
This link will take you to some recorder fingering information, which might give you some fingering hints. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recorder
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