Horn Hacks ep 4: "How TOOOOOOO" Breathe!

Horn Hacks: "How TOOOOOOO" Breathe! Hello and welcome to the latest edition of “Horn Hacks”. My name is Jena Gardner and I am the horn professor at Western Illinois University. Today I’ll be talking to you about air. Air is the most essential element of what we do on the horn! It is the fuel that drives our vehicle and just like a car performs better with higher quality gas, we play better with higher quality air! The first step to improving your air use on the horn is to maintain an upright but tension free posture – for more on this topic, see the previous video in this series “Horn Hacks: Should I play on or off the leg?”. Next, I practice saying the phrase “How To” with my air: inhale on “how” and exhale on “to” like this… Now use your hand to trace a loop gesture in the air – like a roller coaster – inhaling as the roller coaster goes up and exhaling as you arrive at the bottom of the loop. Like this … Then, I chose a note in a comfortable register – Let’s say Horn F (or concert Bb) and this time I think the phrase “how to” while allowing my lips to vibrate on the word “to”. This may take several attempts to coordinate. The goal is to have an immediate and tension free change of the air’s direction from inhaling to exhaling. This is a huge topic that I’m sure we will revisit in the future! If you are interested in diving deeper into this topic right away, I recommend “The Breathing Book for Horn” by David Nesmith and “The Breathing Gym” by Sam Pilafian and Patrick Sheridan. Thanks for watching and be sure to subscribe to the WIU Horn Studio YouTube channel and like our Facebook page (  / wiuhorn  ) for more videos in this series! For more information on the Western Illinois University Horn Studio visit http://www.wiu.edu/horn #HornHacks #WIUHorn #WIUSchoolofMusic #WIUOnline