Choosing saxophone mouthpieces made easy with Jody Espina

Today on the Sax School Online Podcast we’re talking about mouthpieces.

Choosing saxophone mouthpieces can be a minefield. We all use a mouthpiece, and we’re all so tempted to try new ones too. But with so many mouthpieces on the market these days, it’s really easy to choose the wrong one. And that’s frustrating and frankly, expensive as well.

Introducing Jody Espina

So today I’m chatting with Jody Espina from Jody Jazz to see if we can simplify the whole process a little bit. and give you some guidelines that will help you make better mouthpiece choices.

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Nigel: So Jody, you’re an expert on mouthpieces. You know all about them, but I’ll bet there was a time back at the start when you didn’t know a thing. Just like I didn’t. I can remember back when I was younger, someone gave me this mouthpiece and said, “Hey, kid, this mouthpiece is going to be awesome for you. It’s a Berg Larson 80 over three.” 

I had no idea what that meant.  But the thing is, it wasn’t a good mouthpiece for me, and it didn’t suit me at all. And I didn’t understand why it didn’t suit me. Have you ever had an experience like that?  

The wrong mouthpiece

Jody: I had a really important experience like that. I got into college when I was 17, and I got a gig playing with a big band of all older men.

They had famous stars come through, Mel Torme and, and Patti Page and people like that. And I got the gig on baritone sax.

So I had been playing mostly alto and tenor and clarinet stuff. So I had to borrow a baritone, but I had to get a mouthpiece.

And I went to the local store in Tampa, Florida, and I saw a metal Berg Larson mouthpiece there. it seemed like the only professional mouthpiece.  So I I tried it and played it. And so I didn’t know anything better, so that’s the mouthpiece I played on these gigs.

I was on the edge of my seat for these gigs because we’d have a rehearsal in the afternoon, sight reading everything, and then do the gig that night. Sometimes it was a week-long engagement or maybe just a night. 

But sometimes it’d be like a low C or B or B flat.  or mezzo piano and I kind of wouldn’t cut it. You know, I wouldn’t be there. They’re looking for the baritone of the sax section to always be there and I wouldn’t quite make it. I almost got fired.

And the guy said “Are you going to be a professional musician? I was better than you when I was your age,” – all this stuff. And I kept working at it. 

Then so many years later, I was in New York City. Jody Jazz was already about five years old. One day I found my old shoe box of mouthpieces and I looked at that Berg Larson in there, that metal baritone 110/1,  and I got it out and I stuck it on my baritone.

And it was terrible. The mouthpiece doesn’t work. I’m surrounded by great mouthpieces by this time. And I didn’t know back then that this mouthpiece was sabotaging me. So it’s really important. Because a mouthpiece can totally sabotage you.  

N: Oh man, absolutely. And it’s so frustrating if you don’t understand what’s going on.

You’re thinking, is it me? What’s going wrong? Everyone else says this is a great mouthpiece. Why do I sound terrible on it? It’s a difficult thing. So I think understanding mouthpieces is important. And that’s why we love getting you to come and help us at Sax School.

We’ve got thousands of people learning in there and you’ve been really helpful with just giving them information and advice about choosing saxophone mouthpieces.

So, maybe today we can demystify this whole process of how you go about choosing a mouthpiece.  So when you go to a shop like sax.co in London, and there’s hundreds of choices there, you can narrow it down. Then you can make a more intelligent choice for a mouthpiece. 

Why upgrade your mouthpiece?

N: So perhaps to start this journey – why should people look at upgrading their mouthpiece first? Why should that be the first thing they do? 

J: Well, what if your mouthpiece is sabotaging you? You know, if it’s working wrong, what it means is it’s not having a seal. The seal comes from checking it with a pop test.

So this is one thing you can do. Put your hand on the end of the mouthpiece. Close it completely. Suck all the air out and take your mouth away.  You should hear a pop. Can you hear that?

J: So if your reed is warped, it might not seal also. When it doesn’t seal, you just keep sucking air out of it and it doesn’t ever stop.

But the mouthpiece can be malformed.

So what I want to say – back to those horror stories – is if you’re in the beginning, try and get your equipment played by a professional. And that means every part of it, the mouthpiece, the horn, the reed even. Then you’ll know it’s working. Because sometimes you don’t know if your horn is leaking or something. 

But the question is, what do you do when you get to the store to buy a mouthpiece? Is that it?

N: Yeah. Well, I guess I want to just explain or at least discuss why upgrading your mouthpiece is the first choice. We’ve got a lot of adults learning with us in Sax School who are just starting their journey on saxophone.  They’ll often either buy a used sax, or a less expensive saxophone. And it’ll come with a stock mouthpiece, which might be a copy of something – probably just a plastic one.

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And so we often suggest to people, if they are ready to start doing some upgrades, if they’re curious to expand your sound and they’ve already got some basic skills together, the first thing you should upgrade is not your saxophone. It should actually be your mouthpiece.

Because that’s the bit that you blow into, and that is the first thing that shapes the sound and it’s going to have the biggest impact. And it’s also potentially cheaper than upgrading your whole saxophone. So you can make a change here that will actually improve your sound. And it doesn’t mean changing your whole horn. Is that fair to say?

J: It really is. And from day one it’s important to make sure that part is working.  Because if it’s not, you’re just sabotaged from the beginning. And I’m so passionate about it with amateurs and especially kids too.

If they’ve got their musical start and their friend is getting all their notes and their low notes and then they’re not, they think it’s them. And their confidence is gone. So that’s the first thing.

What is a stock mouthpiece?

J: A stock mouthpiece means is it’s got no name on them, or it has the name of the horn. That means which means the manufacturer just hired somebody to make a mouthpiece. The manufacturer usually doesn’t spend more than $10 for that mouthpiece, often less. And sometimes it’s plastic moulded and it could be warped. And that’s the problem. At best, when they function well, they don’t sound great.

If you put on a much higher quality mouthpiece, all of a sudden your sound takes another leap. So it’s definitely worth the investment, to get a good start.  

N: And it doesn’t need to be expensive, right? I mean, we can talk later about some of the first-step mouthpieces that you sell through Jody Jazz. I know a lot of our Sax School members use them. And in fact, I, I’ve got some here too, which I love.

But we also talk to our Sax School members about even upgrading to something like a Yamaha 4C, which is not expensive, but it’s very standard. And if you’re coming from a generic, unbranded plastic mouthpiece, even that’s a step up. 

J: It is. And they’re quite consistent. We can’t say that with all brands,  even well-known brands sometimes. That’s just been my pet peeve, –  consistency. But I have confidence that if you buy a Yamaha 4C, it will seal and you’re getting a decent start. 

N: Definitely. So I want to get on to a little set of guidelines that I know that we’ve spoken about that you use, that will help people to choose a mouthpiece.

Common Mouthpiece Mistakes

N: But before we get to that, I thought it might be just interesting to have a quick chat about some of the mistakes that we see people making when they do choose mouthpieces. I’ve seen this amongst our members at Sax School that come to us.  You must see it with people who come to your shop and say, “Hey, Jody, I need a mouthpiece. I’ve got all these other mouthpieces. They’re just not working for me.” 

So what are the common things that you see people getting wrong when they choose saxophone mouthpieces? 

J: They might choose too big a tip opening. You have to have the muscles developed to play the bigger tip openings.

And if you don’t, after you’ve been playing for 10-15 minutes, It starts to just go like this [you can’t hold your embouchure]. It’s not going to help you.

So the guideline is go to those lower tip openings when you’re only playing less than four hours a week.

Another common mistake is choosing saxophone mouthpieces that are too bright.

N: Yeah, I see that a lot amongst adults. I used to see it a lot when I was younger in school or even as a band director. People come along with a mouthpiece that’s just way too bright for playing in a concert band setting, let alone an orchestra or something.

And actually, if you’re a pro player and you rock up to an orchestra with a really bright mouthpiece, you probably won’t get asked to come back. It’s like a big red flag. So yeah, those are definitely things that people can get wrong. 

J: One more –  the classic thing that they can get wrong is the reed strength. 

So maybe when they were playing a classical mouthpiece, they were recommending a three and a half classical reed. Now they’re playing popular music, they might be on a mouthpiece with a bigger tip opening. But they’re still on that hard classical reed. So every mouthpiece can really be optimized with the right reed strength.reed strength is also a classic mistake and generally, it’s too hard.  

 

N: Okay, that’s a great point. Yeah, I hadn’t thought about that. And if you’re new to the whole idea of changing mouthpieces, that could be really confusing, right? ‘Well, I know that I usually play on a size three reed, why doesn’t it work on this new mouthpiece’?

J: Right. And sometimes the opposite can be true. It could be too soft. Somebody could be on a classical mouthpiece, like a Selmer C Star, and they’re playing on a two or a one-and-a-half. They say, ‘my sound is too bright and plasticky’. Well, that reed is going to sound plasticky on that mouthpiece. 

So, the smaller the tip opening, the harder the reed. The bigger the tip opening, the softer the reed. That’s just a generalization. 

Anatomy of a mouthpiece

N:  That’s a great rule. Okay. So speaking of tip openings, then let’s have a quick chat about the anatomy of a mouthpiece. If anyone’s unsure about all this sort of terminology, could you give us a quick overview of the parts of a mouthpiece?

Tip opening

J: The number one part people want to know is what’s that number on the side of the mouthpiece – four, five, six, or C or C* or D. And that’s talking about the tip opening. That’s the distance between the tip of the reed, and the mouthpiece.

The mouthpiece curves away. And the more it curves away, that’s the bigger tip opening. It’s a larger gap. So, the reed has to travel further, and for it to travel further, it needs more energy put into it. That’s how much air, and how much muscle [strength] you use.

So,  people think that a bigger tip opening gives them automatically a much bigger, louder sound. Not really.  It’s what’s inside the mouthpiece, how shallow the chamber is inside. 

The closer that material is to the reed, that’s a shallower chamber,  and that’s a brighter, louder mouthpiece.  The deeper it goes, it’s a darker mouthpiece. 

Chamber size

N: Okay. So you’ve talked about tip opening there and also the chamber size. And from the perspective of somebody who’s new to this whole thing, would they go into a shop and see that specified? Or is that something that’s generally just mentioned in marketing for a mouthpiece brand or style?

J: You might need to get some guidance. I think you might have to look at it. And you can see that compared to one mouthpiece, the other one has material much higher, closer to the reed. You can also look through the shank of the mouthpiece.

N: Do for anyone who’s listening and not watching, we’re talking about looking at the back end of the mouthpiece, and looking at the shape inside.

This is the shank. And when you look through here, you can see how let’s see there’s a big area in there.

And then if I show you this one, which is an HR Star. It’s bigger inside. And then this DV HR,  it’s smaller inside. It’s going to be brighter. 

N: I love how simple that is. So basically pick up the mouthpiece and have a look in, and you’ll be able to see from the shape of it, whether it’s got a bigger chamber or a smaller chamber. So that’s, I guess those are the two main things, right? The tip opening and the chamber size. Is there anything else people need to be aware of? 

Facing curve length

J: Well, the other thing that plays a fairly significant role in it is the facing curve length.  So, when I talked about the reed and the mouthpiece curving away, it starts to curve away at some point, in relation to how far it is away from the tip. So you’ve got a table where the reed sits, that’s flat – let’s hope so. And then the mouthpiece starts to curve away.

When it begins to curve away, that’s called the break. The length of the facing curve is how far that curve is from the tip.

Now,  the reason this is important is first of all, it lets the reed vibrate. And, it affects how the mouthpiece blows and how much bottom is in the sound.

Ff it’s a shorter curve, altissimo is easier, but it doesn’t have as much of a big rounded sound and is not as free-blowing.

But the other important factor is how much mouthpiece does the player take in their mouth?

So, this chart shows the teeth coming up towards the reed. 

 

The lip is over, but the teeth are coming up. And where those teeth hit that reed is important in relation to the facing curve.

So, two people might love different mouthpieces, and maybe it’s just because of the amount of the mouthpiece that they take in their mouth. 

N: Can I just ask you, Jody, so is that dependent on the person’s physiology? Like one person might just have a different-shaped mouth to another person? 

J: It could be that. Or it could be their preference.  In general classical players take less mouthpiece than jazz players. And because jazz players are trying to get more vibration generally out of that reed –  more buzz  – and classical players want a warmer, controlled sound. 

So if you’re changing to a more popular mouthpiece, you might experiment a little bit with how much mouthpiece you take in. I did a YouTube video on how to get a jazzy sound. And it talks about changing your reed, changing your embouchure from a tight clarinet rolled over embouchure to a looser pillowy lower lip. Also it talks about talking about taking in more mouthpiece.

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Designing a mouthpiece

N: That’s interesting. So, when you’re designing a mouthpiece, am I understanding then that a classical mouthpiece has got a shorter facing curve, and a popular or jazzy style mouthpiece might have a longer one?

J: Not necessarily. Not necessarily. In our classical mouthpieces, we have a lot of different curves. Some are long, some are shorter. It’s the same in jazz. The curve is really the most important part of that mouthpiece. And that’s why mouthpieces are so inconsistent – because they don’t get the curve the same. And that’s what we try and do. 

That curve is amazing. And so we’ve used  30 or 40 different kinds of schedules. A curve has several radii in it, but, there’s all different kinds. So we experiment a lot with curves. And finally, when we hit that right curve, we know we’re getting somewhere.  

N: There’s so much design work and thinking and planning and skill that goes into the manufacture of mouthpieces. And that’s why mouthpieces are expensive, right? That’s also why I guess the cheap ones don’t always sound so good  – because they don’t have that attention to detail and design –  all that background in them. 

J: Yeah, people are fascinated when they come to the factory and see what we do and how much care we’re taking.

I think I’ve always felt like an advocate for the customer, because I was just a guy, you know, just a player. And then I fell into this mouthpiece-making, and it’s been very serious to me. Because I was always an educator too. I was really serious that when you’re selling something, especially with my name on it, it better be right. 

N: Yeah, absolutely.

Well, look, a testament to how well you’re doing is the fact that our members love using your mouthpieces. Loads of our members have got Jody Jazz pieces and, and they rave about the support that you give them too. That’s something we can talk about a bit later on actually, but let’s crack on and talk about these three guidelines. 

Guidelines for choosing saxophone mouthpieces

N: It’s a complicated process, choosing a mouthpiece. But I’d just love to find a way that we can make it a little bit simpler and give people at least some sort of framework they can use for choosing.

So if we had to break it down to just three points as a starting point to help people choosing saxophone mouthpieces, what do you think the first one would be?

How long have you been playing?

J: I guess, how long have you been playing?  And I almost break it down to – how many hours a week do you play? 

So, how long have you been playing?  If it’s six months or less,  or even a year or less – it depends –  then you don’t want to get too big a tip opening. You really want to stay in those lower tip openings.

If you’re practising four hours or less a week, you again still want to stay in those lower-tip openings, so you can play and not get too fatigued. 

N: So that’s a good guideline. So if  you’re relatively new to saxophone, or if you’re not playing very many hours per week, best to stay with a smaller tip opening. But if you’re playing for longer or you’re more experienced, then you could consider larger tip openings. Is that right?  

J: And if you’re getting more than four hours a week, we have these charts under Resources on jodyjazz. com and you can see they’re color-coded.

So the green colour in the middle is if you’re playing more than four hours a week. It’s the most popular tip opening, you can probably deal with those.

If you’re playing less, stay on to the left, in this pink colour.

The orange color is for really big tip openings and they’re not necessary. You’re not going to get a bigger sound. When we design mouthpieces, I try and make each tip opening its own program. So that it has the same sound, even though it’s a bigger tip opening. 

So you’ll get slightly more harmonics in the bigger tip openings, but it’s the bang for your buck  –  the most important thing is what’s the most comfortable for you. 

What size mouthpiece are you playing now?

N: Yeah. I love that. That’s a really good point. And do you think it’s also fair to say that the first guideline for choosing a mouthpiece should be “to not go too far away from the size you’re currently playing.” So obviously thinking about how long you’ve been playing for. But if you’re playing on a five now, it’s quite a big jump to go up to an eight or even a seven, right? So is that, is that a fair thing to suggest? 

J: That’s fair. Normally when people start, they are on about a four. Let’s say that Yamaha 4C or the stock mouthpieces are around a four.

So if they want to stay in the classical music sound,  you know, go to a good quality four. You don’t need to go up a tip opening. If you’re going to jazz, you can go to a five or a six. But like you said, it’s, there’s no reason to go up to a seven or eight.  You know, if you give me a five, I’ll play on any job and you won’t know that’s a five. But maybe I take more mouthpiece, so ultimately a six or seven feels better for me. 

N: Yeah, cool. I think it’s good to remember too. There are so many great legendary players that we listen to and love that played on small mouthpieces. So it’s not like everybody plays on a massive mouthpiece. 

But I met Ernie Watts once and he was telling me about his custom Otto Link, which was something stupid, like a size 11 or something. I don’t know.  But Cannonball Adderley didn’t play on a big mouthpiece like that. Loads of those great players from the fifties didn’t.

J: Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins were on smaller tenor mouthpieces. So, a lot of people start to think, ‘Oh, I’ve been playing four years, I better play on a number four reed by now. Or, especially high school players, each year they want to go up a half strength of reed. And that’s not true either.

So most of those guys you mentioned played about a two-and-a-half reed – not necessarily a hard reed. Coltrane and Bird played hard reeds, Stan Getz, but a lot of guys played [softer reeds] – Cannonball played like a two-and-a-half, you know. 

N: Amazing. It’s funny. You sent me over some small mouthpieces recently and I’ve actually been experimenting. So for a long time, I’ve played on a seven on my alto. I think I even had something bigger, a Yanagisawa mouthpiece I’ve played on for years, which is even bigger than that. But now I’ve been experimenting with coming down to a size five and finding the right reed combo with the mouthpiece right. And I’m starting to dial it in now, and it’s quite interesting to me how I’m finding I am able to get a sound I’m happy with, and I don’t have to work as hard. And it just means approaching it, from a different direction.

Okay, so that’s a brilliant first guideline. Think about how long you’re actually playing, and If you’re playing less, go for a smaller size mouthpiece.

If you’re playing for longer, then you could consider a larger one. But don’t think about going too many sizes away from where you are at the moment. 

Versatility

N: Okay, so what about the second guideline then? Should we talk about the versatility of a mouthpiece? 

J: That’s a good idea. We’re talking to our primarily kind of adult amateurs, right? That play a variety of music. But unless they’re in a heavy metal rock band, they shouldn’t probably go for the loudest, brightest mouthpiece, because it might put them in a kind of pigeonhole. A professional who’s practised all their life can take that bright mouthpiece and actually fool you and make it sound dark, but they’re working to do it.

Even if you like Stan Getz and Paul Desmond, you may not want to use the darkest mouthpiece because without being a really accomplished professional, you’re not going to be able to change the sound of that as easy as a great professional. So it’s going to put you in that really dark thing. And you may get in a big band or something, or a pop tune. So you want to go in the middle of the road.

If you get to try stuff, look at those middle-of-the-road mouthpieces – not too bright, not too dark. But if you get to try a bunch, Hey man, if you have the time, try everything.

N: Yeah. Versatility, I think is a massive thing. It’s a really important point that I think a lot of less experienced saxophone players overlook or get wrong. And I mentioned before about turning up to an orchestra with a really bright metal mouthpiece. But the same could be said for turning up to play in a community band with a really bright mouthpiece or going to do a pop gig with a really dark mouthpiece.

So, if you’ve got something that’s a bit more in the middle, you can get around it with your microphone and your set up  – all that sort of stuff. And actually, I have to say it’s one of the things I really love about your mouthpieces, Jody. I love the HR* and I love the DV HR, both for those reasons, because I can make them sound quite dark. I can make them sound quite bright, but they’re not too much in either direction.

J: And that’s a really good part of working on the design too. And always trying to bring in bottom lower harmonics, mid and lower. To a mouthpiece with power, even the Super Jet that we have, that’s our brightest, strongest mouthpiece has a lot of bottom. So I still haven’t made the super paint peeler with no bottom. One of these days it’ll come.  I was just in Costa Rica. That’s what they need. I went to a salsa gig and man, they’re playing bright, bright, bright. 

N: Is that right?  

J: They really want the brightest. 

N: Wow, that’s interesting. Are they, are they micing up the sax or is it all acoustic?

J: It’s mic’d to the moon. It’s loud. And it’s coming through altos brighter than you can imagine. 

N: Wow, that’s interesting. There you go. So it’s a stylistic thing, right? Depends on the sort of music that you play and what’s appropriate for you. All right. So the versatility thing is a brilliant second point.

Mouthpiece test

N: And so the third point then –  would you say really it’s about how you go about testing and trying mouthpieces? What could you advise people about that?

J: Try and test a few mouthpieces if you can. Even if you’re getting a few in the mail, but especially if you get to a store – get 5 or 6 mouthpieces in front of you to test. 

Number one – come to the store with a good variety of reeds. If you want to know that you have a reed that you love, that’s good. And you want something a little harder than that, something a little softer. And then you want to experiment.

The number one mistake I see people make is they play that first mouthpiece for 45 minutes.  And wow. – hopefully, it’s better than what you have. But maybe the third mouthpiece is even better than that first one.

So I like to get people to play a little bit on the first, with different reeds to get the best combination. Play it for a couple of minutes then go to the next one. Go through all the choices rather quickly, in about two minutes each. Because you’re going to waste your time on that first mouthpiece. I’ve seen it a million times. And you’ll never get to the fifth mouthpiece. You’ll run out of time or maybe the store is about to throw you out.

Choosing a mouthpiece is not dating. You don’t have to worry about hurting the feelings of the first mouthpiece or the second. You didn’t come to the dance with that mouthpiece, and you can leave without that mouthpiece. You know, people are really funny about this!

N: I love that though. It’s actually really good advice. I hadn’t thought about that, but you, you must see this all the time in your shop, people coming in and making the same mistake. So I guess the other thing too, is comparing it to your current mouthpiece, right? 

A B Testing

J: Sometimes I say, do A B comparison. You can’t know how good this mouthpiece is unless you compare it to something else. If somebody says, ‘how’s that horn?’ I’ll say, ‘well, let me play my horn and I’ll play it again. And then I’ll tell you how it compares to my horn’. You know what I mean? 

N: Yeah, absolutely. I’m the same, but it’s a really great third point there. So make sure if you get the opportunity test out a bunch of mouthpieces and don’t spend too long on them. A B test between your current mouthpiece and that one. And don’t forget, you won’t hurt the mouthpiece’s feelings if you leave in the shop.

J: I can always hear when when it’s the right one … I can be in the other room, on the phone, and they’re playing, and all of a sudden I hear a vibration, I hear the right resonance. And now they start playing new stuff or something, it just starts to gel. And I used to think, oh, that’s the right tip opening. But then I realized, actually, that’s the right-facing length for them.

So in traditional mouthpiece making, the more open the tip, the longer facing curve gets. Because we have this schedule that we use and it’s the same schedule, we just start it further away from the tip. So if you practice enough, you can play any tip opening. And then you’re just finding the one that just resonates with you. 

So in a perfect world, they get the model that they like – it’s in the sound zone that they like and it feels good. Then they’re able to fine-tune it with the tip openings. 

N: Yeah, I love that. I love that. One other thing I thought might be useful to add, and I’m interested to see if you agree with this.

Practice with your new mouthpiece

N: But I find with mouthpieces, whenever I’ve gone to a shop and tried a bunch of mouthpieces out, I’ve done my AB testing, not played too long on them, all that sort of stuff. I still find when I make that decision, and I bring a mouthpiece home, it’s still going to take me a month or so of practising to really settle into that mouthpiece.

And I think a lot of people make that mistake of thinking..they bring it home. They’re done now. They can just get used to that mouthpiece. Maybe some people adjust quicker than me, but for me, I’ve got to resign myself to the fact that it’s going to take a few weeks of practising to really get the most out of that mouthpiece, before I can form a proper opinion about it. Do you find that? 

J: I think if you have that luxury, you do want to play it for a couple of weeks. And if you’re out playing with people or in some kind of performance, that’s really the best. It tells you what’s really happening. Sometimes it’s different in your room with the wall right there. When we do big trade shows, there’s a giant high ceiling. And so the brighter, louder mouthpieces do well because you can’t hear yourself if you’re playing something darker. And then when you get home, you might think, ‘Oh, this is a little brighter than I thought it was so that that little period is very helpful.’ It’s what I do, you know when I’m prototyping. I take them on a gig, and it really is informative for me, to know how it’s going to perform out there.  

N: Try them out in the real world. Yeah, brilliant. Well, I really hope this has been helpful for everybody. And I know there’s going to be points where people get stuck and they’ve got more questions and need a bit more help.

Jody Jazz 6 Questions Service

N: One of the things I love that you do, Jody, that’s been super helpful to all of our members at Sax School, is your 6 questions service. Can you tell us quickly about how that works? 

J: Well, it is so confusing. I remember when I started this and I saw the tip openings and the different models and thought ‘golly, who could do this?’ Who could figure out what to try? So I started these six questions. And don’t have them in front of me, but it’s generally:

• what mouthpiece are you playing now?
• What is the make and model of your instrument?
• How many hours a week do you play? 
• What kind of playing do you do?
• What do you want to change about your mouthpiece?
• What kind of reed do you play?

The kind of playing you do is really important. Do you play in a concert band? Do you play in a rock band?

What do you want to change about your mouthpiece? What’s not happening for you?

And then I want to know what reed you play – the exact brand and the strength. Because the brand is very important and the model, because for example, blue box Vandoren are a half strength harder than a green box Vandoren. So it’s a one, two combination. I hate to admit it. I say the mouthpiece is the most important thing, but the reed is about just as important, to make that successful thing.

So it’s like when you get the mouthpiece of your dreams, it’s like you have the reed of your dreams. If you’ve ever had the greatest reed, and you’re like, ‘I love this reed’ -that’s what having the mouthpiece is like that every day.

And by the way, it’s humans answering. I’ve never made it an algorithm or anything. And so there’s always something like, ‘tell us any more you want us to know’. And that helps a lot because we’re just trying to figure out what to recommend you.

N: So that’s this free service that you do, Jody, isn’t it? Here’s a link. So if anyone needs that bit of extra help, they can go and check that out.

You know, we’ve covered so much stuff today, Jody, I think it’s really helpful for people. 

Best Jody Jazz Mouthpiece as starting point

N: Now, I love your mouthpieces and you’ve got a huge range of them. But if we had to narrow it down to just one choice as a starting point, that’s probably the mouthpiece in your range that’s suitable for most people, what would that be?

J: There is so much confusion and there’s so many choices… but if I had to just tell somebody, ‘okay, just get this,’  it’s going to be the HR*. Because I know how careful we are with it. I know how versatile it is. And know if they buy it, it’s going to be a good one.

So for alto, get a 5M if it’s your first mouthpiece. If you’ve been playing for a while, 6M – that’s the most popular.

For tenor, probably a 6* -you’re going to love it. Choose about a two and a half reed when you’re playing jazz. Maybe a 2H. D’Addario makes the 2H, it’s 2 Hard.

You really want to dial in your reed strength with these mouthpieces. But, the HR* on all the horns is, I think, one of the best buys in the business. It sounds commercial, but I believe it.  

N: Hey, thanks so much, Jody. It’s been really, really useful today. You can find out more about Jody Jazz over at JodyJazz.com. 

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