Doodle Tonguing and Swing Feel

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"Duke Ellington famously wrote “It Don’t Mean a Thing, If It Ain’t Got That Swing,” but defining exactly what swing has rarely, if ever, been done well. 

Gunther Schuller claims that, while its definition may be the most elusive thing in all of jazz, swing is something all good jazz musicians recognize and do."

-- K.C. Tague

"Swing feel depends on a lot more than just the rhythm of your 8th notes. Subtle accents created through tonguing are an important part of the groove too. Articulation also helps lock in the time of your lines.

...... The way that most of the great saxophonists of the past accomplished this was to use a doodle tongue to ghosted or mute the note. Essentially, doodle tonguing is when you gently put your tongue slightly off-center on the reed, letting the note still sound. That creates a muted sound, and when you take your tongue off the reed it creates an articulation or even an accent. I use this technique for articulating the peaks that fall on the beat, and you can hear guys like Bird, Cannonball, Rollins, Trane, and Potter doing the same thing. 

Despite all of this tonguing, there should be a generally legato or connected feel." 

-- Ben Britton, saxophonist

Types of Jazz Articulations

There are five basic types of jazz articulations used when playing jazz swing music. They are back-accent, hard, slurring, half tonguing, and doodle tonguing. 

These articulations can be used separately but are most commonly played in combination with each other to provide the most authentic jazz articulation style. The most common mistakes performers make when incorrectly articulating jazz swing music are tonguing every note when performing tunes at slower tempi, slurring every note at faster tempi, and randomly tonguing or slurring notes when improvising solos. These common errors impede a player’s musical performance and also result in a performance that is not an authentic representation of the jazz swing idiom. 

-- Tracy Heavner, JAZZ PEDAGOGY: INCORPORATING AUTHENTIC JAZZARTICULATIONS INTO SOLO AND JAZZ ENSEMBLE PERFORMANCE/ FLUTE PERFORMANCE

"Doodle tonguing is merely a way to help vocal improvisers sing eighth note bebop lines with more style and articulation. " -- Hollingsworth, Kathleen L. Strategies to Facilitate Voice/Hand Coordination for Jazz Improvisation by the Jazz Singer/Pianist