Caruso's exercises explain that you need to set your embouchure and breath through your nose to keep your embouchure set. That's why he is breathing through his nose.
The idea behind Mr. Caruso's excercises is to get your facial muscles to behave more like a reed. Wooden reeds don't change shape as frequently as "muscle reeds" thus they are more consistent and don't crack or need to change shape too much to shift registers (unless it's chipped of course). Breathing though the nose trains your lips muscle memory to get them right where they need to be and behave they way they should immediately. Builds strength and stability on the "corners" as well as the rest of the orbicularis oris so you don't have to worry too much about it in actual performance.
Hi Katyrebel18. Ken is breathing through his nose instead of the corners of his mouth because that would disturb your embouchure. It is only intended for this exercise and not for normal playing where mouth breathing would be best. Hope that helps! Look up the Caruso exercises for brass instruments.
John P, I particularly like to breath through my nose at the beginning of my playing day when I'm trying to "wake up" my whole breathing apparatus. I feel like I can breath deeper and slower without involving any complications of the throat. He's also breathing through his nose in this exercise so he doesn't move his embouchure with the mouth breath. Hard and fast rules like, "my director told me not to" (katyrebel18) don't really apply when you are trying to experiment, grow, and practice away from the ensemble. I don't think Ken would ever recommend breathing through the nose in regular playing. I do find that in some situations - like having to play a long, soft phrase - it helps to start with the breath in the nose.
I really like you teaching as far as consistency and stamina goes, but shouldn't you teach your students to use proper posture. I don't mean to correct a fellow professional, but there are times when you fingers lay across the valves, and also you tend to "straddle" the pinky ring. Not that it effects your effortlessness in your sound, but students tend to have a hard time not thinking of it as a "range button".
"proper" posture really just depends on the style of music you play. Playing commercial music the rules for 'classical' music don't really apply...and in fact, hinder the expression of the music. However, good posture should be taught for the purpose of developing beneficial habits in general, but remember no one could tell Dizzy he was playing it wrong...
This is an exercise for its own sake, not an all-encompassing explanation of hand position and breathing. Obviously one can take in more air breathing by mouth and nose simultaneously. The nose breathing is preferred here in order to keep the lips in the same position for the purpose of the exercise, as I believe he explains.
Well, I recognize the Caruso exercice one I have pratice since 8 years, personaly I continue with the 2nd and 3rd exercices every day. It was the advise from my teacher at this time to have a good embouchure, better sound, better endurcance
He is probably breathing through his nose since breathing is not the focus right now, the embouchure is. Don't interrupt the embouchure by breathing through the mouth for this particular exercise, instead use the nose so the embouchure is consistent and in the right spot. That is my take on it. I did similar things when making some embouchure adjustments on trombone and was instructed to breath through the nose for those exercises, but mouth for normal playing.
katyrebel18 Breathing through the nose in this exercise allows the embouchure to stay still and not reset. This allows what he was talking about a more refined embouchure.
Mr. Larson, thanks much for the Six Note lesson. I'm going to practice it as soon as I get off the computer. Do you have another set of video lessons for Trumpet beginners? I know this was posted in 2012 so I'm a bit late. Ha!
The idea behind breathing through the nose during Carmine's exercises is to keep the embouchure consistent, not letting the horn move from where it is originally placed. Carmine did NOT teach to breathe through the nose for all playing, ONLY for his exercises. FYI ... there are many exercises that followed the magic six notes. All exercise sessions would begin with the six notes, followed by additional intervals and as you got more advanced, with different dynamics (all being played while breathing through the nose). In between exercises, the horn would be removed from the mouth and normal breathing would resume. Again, all other playing was to be played breathing through the mouth NOT the nose.
