Reply To: Tube or mouthpiece?
Hi, agaragar. See if you notice the sensation of vibration from the melodica when you play with a short mouthpiece or, even better, directly into the instrument. For me, this more direct contact and feeling of the instrument is an important part of the aesthetics of playing the melodica, as I’m sure it is with other wind instruments. It goes the other way as well, as what you are doing with your mouth and lips is applied directly to the instrument. If you watch more videos of Hermeto Pascoal, you’ll see that this is obviously an important feature of his playing.
When I first took up the melodica, I determined to get away from my bad piano habit of depending on being able to see the keyboard. The tube encourages the bad habit.