music Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspect ...

, the term ''slap tonguing'' refers to a

musician A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who wri ...

playing a

single-reed instrument A single-reed instrument is a woodwind instrument that uses only one reed to produce sound. The very earliest single-reed instruments were documented in ancient Egypt, as well as the Middle East, Greece, and the Roman Empire. The earliest types o ...

such as a

clarinet The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitches ...

or a

saxophone The saxophone (often referred to colloquially as the sax) is a type of single-reed woodwind instrument with a conical body, usually made of brass. As with all single-reed instruments, sound is produced when a reed on a mouthpiece vibrates to pr ...

employing a technique to produce a popping sound along with the note.

The technique

The sound is created as a result of the release of suction in the mouth and the popping sound that the

reed Reed or Reeds may refer to: Science, technology, biology, and medicine * Reed bird (disambiguation) * Reed pen, writing implement in use since ancient times * Reed (plant), one of several tall, grass-like wetland plants of the order Poales * Re ...

produces which amplifies as it travels through the horn. To create this effect, lay your tongue against a lot of the reed. Gently push upward so that the tip and rail of the reed is closed. Get rid of as much air in the oral cavity as you can and seal off the lip so that you have an airtight fit. The tongue is quickly released in a downward motion. When you release the tongue downward, you also drop your jaw and open your mouth in a "popping" motion. This is all done very quickly. Do not pull the tongue back towards your throat. It needs to pop downward away from the roof of the mouth to get the most volume, do not blow air through the horn and do not inhale when you release your tongue.

Players

The first recorded appearance was by

Stump Evans Paul "Stump" Evans (October 18, 1904 – August 29, 1928) was an American musician, who was one of the first jazz saxophonists. Evans experimented with several instruments: alto horn, trombone, and alto saxophone. In the 1920s, he played baritone ...

, the

C melody saxophone The C melody saxophone, also known as the C tenor saxophone, is a saxophone pitched in the key of C one whole tone above the common B-flat tenor saxophone. The C melody was part of the series of saxophones pitched in C and F intended by the ins ...

player in the

King Oliver Joseph Nathan "King" Oliver (December 19, 1881 – April 8/10, 1938) was an American jazz cornet player and bandleader. He was particularly recognized for his playing style and his pioneering use of Mute (music), mutes in jazz. Also a notable c ...

band. Other famous players who used the technique were

Rudy Wiedoeft Rudolph Cornelius Wiedoeft (January 3, 1893 – February 18, 1940) was an American saxophonist. Biography Born in Detroit, Michigan, the son of German immigrants, at a young age Wiedoeft started playing with his family orchestra, first using a v ...

Coleman Hawkins Coleman Randolph Hawkins (November 21, 1904 – May 19, 1969), nicknamed "Hawk" and sometimes "Bean", was an American jazz tenor saxophonist.Yanow, Scot"Coleman Hawkins: Artist Biography" AllMusic. Retrieved December 27, 2013. One of the first p ...

and

Fess Williams Fess Williams ''(né'' Stanley R. Williams; April 10, 1894 – December 17, 1975) was an American jazz musician.''Biography Index, A Cumulative Index to Biographical Material in Books and Magazines, Volume 10: September 1973 — August 1976'', Ne ...

. Contemporary exponents include

Sam Newsome Sam Newsome (born April 28, 1965) is an American jazz saxophonist, composer, and educator. His music combines straight-ahead jazz, world music (drawing influences from North Africa and East Asia) and experimental jazz, which uses extended techni ...

External links

A PDF with pictures explaining the techniqueVideo of Marco Mazzini explaining the slap tongue in the clarinet
{{Musical techniques Woodwind instruments