How I Became a One Mouthpiece Man

During this past summer I had the opportunity to try out multiple mouthpieces for an extended period of time through Houghton Horns. I was most interested in Houser mouthpieces and I quickly decided that I liked their San Francisco model cup. Along with the cup I tried multiple stainless steel rims. At first I tried out mouthpiece rims that I thought would work best for me, mainly those with a large inner diameter and a thin rim contour. However, I also picked up a mouthpiece rim that I would normally never consider, Houser's Bob Ward model. It has a medium thick rim and a much smaller inner diameter than I'm used to. Much to my surprise the Bob Ward rim worked much better than any of the other models I tried! Realizing that everything I thought I knew about the types mouthpiece rims that work for me was wrong, I decided to try out more rims that were closer to the Bob Ward model in their specifications. Through this entire process I realized that the only mouthpieces I had ever seriously considered in the past were mouthpieces with inner diameters much smaller or much larger than the mouthpieces I had. All of the rims I had on trial worked FAR better than anything I owned. I settled on a Jon Ring model rim. Multiple audition and other playing successes that I experienced shortly after making this choice confirmed that it was the correct decision to make.

I was using a silver-plated San Francisco cup and an uncoated stainless steel Jon Ring rim. Both were still on an extended trial. Once I decided that these were the models I wanted to stick with I decided to purchase a black H-Kote (titanium-ceramic composite) stainless steel rim and a stainless steel cup. I liked the fact that stainless steel rims didn't irritate my lips, in fact I'm sure that the lack of irritation and swelling in my lips helped my playing. However, I didn't like the cold hard feel of the rims when left uncoated. The black H-Kote was warm, smooth, and comfortable. I was able to enjoy the feel of it on the Bob Ward rim I mentioned earlier.

I purchased a stainless steel cup because I liked the fact that they don't show wear easily and looked better than silver-plated cups. However, I did not consider the fact that the change in material would produce a significantly different sound. The stainless steel mouthpiece cup produced a far brighter and more piercing sound than the silver-plated cup I used before. However, notes "slotted" much better on the stainless cup and thus excellent accuracy was easier to achieve. I tried the stainless steel cup for well over a month, however, I could not live with the sound (a fact affirmed to me by colleagues and mentors). I switched back the the silver-plated cup and I once again had the mouthpiece I originally fell in love with. (Luckily, I had to purchase the silver-plated cup when I purchased the stainless cup because I had done too much damage to the shank during my extended trial.)

I liked this mouthpiece so much that for the first time in my horn playing life I couldn't imagine, nor was I tempted to switch. I decided to make sure I couldn't hurt myself in the future with unfruitful mouthpiece trials by selling off my extensive collection (a major source of temptation). In September it reached an embarrassingly high number. Now it's almost completely gone and I hope to ultimately get it down to four. I'll keep Morse and European taper versions of the San Francisco mouthpiece cup I currently use and two custom mouthpieces that can't be easily sold. If you would like to see which mouthpieces I have left check out the classified ads section of the Horn Matters website and let me know if you're interested in any of them!

I believe I'll be much better off by being a one mouthpiece man. The Mouthpiece Wheel of Doom can be very determental to one's playing and can deprive one of truly "bonding" with their equipment. However, it is still important to know what's out there. If I've learned anything this year it's that trying a wide variety of mouthpieces is a good thing, as long as you know when to stop.