Tonguing (was Re: harp mailinglist)

[Rajendra Singh <singh%cs.uiuc.edu@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>         How about more information on tongue blocking.  Sometimes
>         I use my tongue to stop the air flow altogether in a
>         certain rythym, is this tongue blocking?

I believe this is called "tongueing", a very basic technique used
to seperate notes.  By the way, what part of the tongue do people
use to seperate notes?  I am pretty sloppy about seperating notes
but I generally use the back of my tongue, and sometimes closer
to the front.

A neat little effect based on this is "trilling" (that's what I
call it anyway).  Make your tongue say "trrrrr" on a blow note
and you get a lot of short repeating notes.

Tongue blocking is one of the two basic techniques for playing
a note, the other being the Pucker method (again, that's what
I call it, I think it's commonly used).  Let the opening in
your mouth be over about 4 holes, the let your tongue block
off all but one hole on the side (or however many holes you
want to play).

My question about tongue blocking is (similar to my other question)
what part of tongue do use to block?  Do you use the top of your
tongue making contact with the harp, or the bottom, or do you
just mash it forwards?  I tried blocking, using to top of my
tongue, a while back and as I slid down to a lower note my
tongue got pinched in a gap between the cover and the comb(?),
which hurt quite a bit.  Do blockers just never use dented
harps?

peace,
 -raj