What is the proper mental attitude toward study and practice?
The proper mental attitude toward study and practice consists of the student's sincere belief in his capacity for hard work and unfaltering concentration, a full awareness that any genuine progress requires time and a justified faith in the ability and integrity of the instructor. The student must, as the saying goes, 'keep his eye on the main chance." That is sometimes a difficult task, particularly where the study material seems exeedingly difficult or exceptionally remote from the type of music the student expects to encounter during his playing career. But it is absolutely necessary that the student bear constantly in mind that the purpose of striving toward mastery of very difficult material is to make all other material seem easier, and that the purpose of striving toward mastery of a wide variety of material is to assure the development of a well-rounded thorough musicianship.

What is the improper mental attitude toward study and practice?
The improper mental attitude toward study and practice consists of a general misconception on the part of the student of the entire purpose of study and practice. This attitude embodies erroneous impressions and undesirable personal traits, either singly or in combination. In the opinion of the student with this trialady, the instructor is always guilty until proven innocent. Such a student may come to take a lesson simply to see what the instructor has "on the ball." He may have been forewarned that the teacher would "try to change his embouchure" and his visit may be a combination of fear and general mistrust. Or he may have visited so many teachers previously, with negligible results, that the new instructor has three strikes against him before the lesson even begins. Or the student may have such tremendous conceit that he is completely unreceptive to any suggestions from anyone; his definition of a splendid instructor is one who will compliment him, not criticize him. Or he may be the type who imagines that somewhere there is a "magic method" whereby he may acquire overnight the relaxed perfection while playing for which he yearns. Or he may have formed the habit of absorbing the remarks of many different players without considering the source or the validity of the information. Or he may be the type who experiments continually with different model mouthpieces, instruments of various bores, makes and models, lip exercising gadgets, and embouchure formations, to name just a few of the devices employed by the escapist. Such closed-minded specimens should realize that logic, concentration, hard work, and sweat are essential factors for study and practice; otherwise they should save their instruction money. (Page 3 - 4)
 

What are the three primary playing factors?
The three primary playing factors are: first, the embouchureformation (the lips, the mouthcorners, the cheeks and the entire facial area involved while playing); second, the tongue and its manipulation (the tongue-arch, the tongue-level, and the length of the tongue backstroke): and third, the breathing (the diaphragm and abdominal regions, the ribs, the shoulder blades, the lungs, and the throat).

Which one of the three primary playing factors is considered the most important?
All three primary playing factors (the embouchure formation, the tongue manipulation, and the breathing) vary in relative importance at different stages throughout the student's career. Therefore, no one factor may be considered the most important except in relation to the student's degree of development.
Most of our finest present-day performers agree that they consider correct breathing the most important physical playing factor. This statement is quite true but only after the player has arrived at his final stages of playing perfection. Some of these fine artists have had the good fortune of playing correctly for such a long period of time that they are inclined to forget some of the difficulties that they too had encountered before they reached their present high playing level. Much like riding a bicycle, you may have been riding for so many years that you have completely forgotten the difficulties encountered and the number of times that you fell off before your sense of equilibrium took hold and made you a rider.
If a very fine oboist selects an excellent instrument but uses a defective reed, the results will suffer regardless of whether his breathing is correct or incorrect. The same holds true in brass playing! It is logical to assume that the embouchure formation (the lips, the mouthcorners, the cheeks, and the entire facial area involved while playing) and the tongue manipulation (the tongue-arch, the tongue-level, and the length of the tongue backstroke) must not only be functioning properly as separate and independent factors, but must definitely be synchronized with the breathing factor (the diaphragm, the abdominal regions, the ribs, the shoulder blades, the lungs, and the throat) before any relaxed playing perfection can possibly take place. For example: if a performers playing difficulty is analyzed and traced to a faulty embouchure formation, the error must certainly be corrected and the tongue and breathing factors be given ample time to compensate themselves the the new and slightly different blowing resistance of the "adjusted embouchure" before coordination of the primary playing factors can be obtained. (Page 4)