The *Oxford English Dictionary* borrows its definition of "embouchure"
(which has also been spelled in English "embouchier" and even, wonderfully,
"ambusheer"[!]) from Grove: "The disposition of the lips, tongue and other
organs necessary for producing a musical tone." (I like the use of
"disposition" here in its older sense of having been put in a certain
arrangement or place, as opposed to the now usual and narrower sense of an
inclination or tendency.)
The *OED* also asserts that the word is from the French "emboucher" (in
turn from "en", in, plus "bouche", mouth), meaning to put in, or to, the mouth.
Windsor Viney
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
(rank beginner at the shakuhachi and, alas, sometime scholarly book editor)
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