Taming the Beast

12 Sunday Nov 2017

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in embouchure, intonation, piccolo, tuning

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Intonation on Piccolo

Over the last few weeks, students have been asking me for help with piccolo. For such a diminutive instrument, pitch awareness and placement is a huge issue. It might even be the biggest issue because so much of what we know about playing the flute translates directly to piccolo. Here are a few tips to help your students play better in tune on piccolo:

Make sure the piccolo the student is playing is in good repair. In my experience, school piccolos are notorious for being in the worst condition of any instruments in the storage locker. They have shredded pads, bent keys, plating flaking off the keys…you name it. They rarely see the inside of a repair shop and often are unplayable.
Check the headjoint cork placement. This is probably the #1 problem with student flute players playing piccolo out of tune. Make sure to use a piccolo cleaning rod for the correct measurement. The line should be in the middle of the blow hole.

Have the cork replaced if it moves easily. A leaking cork will cause a lot of pitch problems.
Be sure that your piccolo players have the most stable and developed embouchure in your ensemble. They need to know how to correct pitch and use their air properly on flute to know how to begin to explore piccolo without causing more problems than they solve.
You need to put the piccolo a little higher on your lip than the flute. Because of the small size, issues of placement are magnified. In other words, smaller adjustments will mean larger changes in pitch and tone quality
Playing octaves will teach the student what in tune means on the piccolo. The pitch tendencies are a bit different than flute. This is especially noticeable in the notes just above the staff like Bb, B, C, C# and D. This can also be the case with long notes on the staff like D, Eb and E. Another way to practice pitch is by using a tone generator and playing intervals like perfect 4ths and 5ths against the drone.
Make sure to make adjustments by moving your lips independently. Rolling your bottom lip out will raise the pitch, using your top lip to angle the air down will lower the pitch just as on flute. The movements are more subtle and require you listen carefully.
If rolling the instrument to adjust pitch is a bad idea on flute, it is an even worse idea on piccolo. Remember, everything, both good and bad, is magnified on the piccolo. You could even say, “less is more”. A smaller change makes a bigger difference.

As always, if you find these entries useful, please subscribe, share with your colleagues and come back regularly. Feel free to comment. If you have a topic you would like to see explored more fully, you can contact me via IM/Messenger on Facebook or email me at dr_cate@sbcglobal.net. For information about clinics, workshops and performances, click here.

You Wouldn’t Think it Makes Much Difference But……..

14 Sunday May 2017

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in dynamics, Flute pedagogy for band instructors, Flute posture, intonation, technique, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

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dynamics, embouchure, flute pedagogy, flute posture

There are a number of seemingly insignificant habits your flute students can get into that make a bigger difference than you might imagine to intonation, tone quality and technique. Some of these are more visibly obvious than others. All of them can negatively impact your flute players, both individually and as a section. Keep an eye and ear out for these things in your flute students for a better sounding section.

Pressing the flute too hard against the chin – This makes a big difference. If you can’t move your bottom lip, you are pressing too hard. When the flute is resting on your lip, make sure you can move your lip to be able to say a “W”. If you can’t make the “W” shape, back off on the pressure against your lip. If you can’t move your bottom lip, controlling dynamics and play high notes will be too difficult.
Flute too high on the chin – Affects both tone quality and pitch. Sound will be small and probably sharp. If you have to pull the headjoint out more than 5/8″ (1 cm), the flute is probably too high on the bottom lip.
Covering too much of the blow hole – There shouldn’t be any more than a 1/3 of the hole covered by the bottom lip. Any more than that and the tone will be dull and likely flat
Angle of the lower end of the flute in relation to your head – This means that you get the best sound from your instrument when you can see the lower end of the instrument in your peripheral vision. If you have the end of the flute in line with your right ear, you won’t be able to get maximum resonance from your instrument
Balance of the flute in your hands – Position the headjoint on the body so the weight of the rods is more on top. That way your fingers are free to move and you won’t be having to “hold” the flute to prevent it from rotating backwards.
Resting right knuckles against the rods – Just bad for the flute and for technique. Bad for the flute because sweat and body oils can work into the mechanism causing binding and even rust. Bad for technique because you can move your fingers much more quickly from the joints at the base of the fingers than from the second joints.
Thumb position on right hand – For best technique and hand position, thumb should be under and behind the flute, more or less under the F key. Thumb should never be in front of the flute (check the headjoint alignment and balance) or up under the F# or G key.
Thumb position on left hand – For best technique, left thumb should be open in relation to the rest of the hand, straight and relaxed. Let the thumb fall on the key wherever. This can be anywhere from the thumb knuckle to the the tip, depending on size and length of the thumb. Top joint should not be bent. The Bb key arm is intentionally recessed around the B key on flutes to accommodate different size and shape thumbs.

Playing Softly Without Pinching

26 Sunday Feb 2017

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in dynamics, embouchure, tuning

≈ 4 Comments

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breath control, dynamics, embouchure, flute intonation, flute pedagogy

Once you have confidence that your students know how to blow with a steady air stream in at least two or more octaves of the flute, it’s time to help them develop a dynamic palette from piano to forte, so they can begin to practice and understand balance and style. How many of you have tried teaching your students to play more quietly only to have a host of weird compensating behaviors magically appear, not to mention having the pitch go haywire? Things like:

Pinched aperture, shrill tone and sharp pitch
Rolling in/covering to much of the blow hole, dull tone and flat pitch
Clenched teeth, tight sound lacking resonance, probably sharp
Tight throat, strangled, dull tone and probably flat
Slow air resulting in flat pitch, trouble placing and controlling high notes, thin, bleating tone

Ok, so the problem with all of these “solutions” is they miss the point that makes the difference and you wind up with all kinds of compensations that just make a poor situation worse. The point is to understand that there is a difference between the quantity of air and the speed of the air. Youngsters and anyone who doesn’t really ‘get’ flute have trouble conceptualizing the difference between air quantity and air speed. In fact, for kids speed and quantity are the same thing. The way I explain it is that until you understand better, air speed and air quantity function like a bad marriage, needy and codependent. One cannot exist without the other, but to the detriment of the both partners.

In order for a player to be able to control dynamics and pitch, air speed and air quantity need to get a divorce and be able to operate as separate entities. The speed of the air stream has to be maintained (supported) while the quantity of air determines the relative volume of the sound. You need to maintain the air speed/pressure using the abdominal muscles while decreasing the quantity of air you are blowing. Here are a couple other concepts to incorporate into the mix to get good dynamic and pitch control:

Maintain the oval shape of the aperture without flattening it out
Maintain the position of the flute on your lip without rolling in or out
The less air you blow, the more you need to raise the blowing angle towards more straight across the blow hole to maintain pitch
Keep back teeth apart and mouth cavity open
Keep a relaxed and open throat. Think of how your throat feels right on the edge of yawning
Keep the speed of the air, just less air

Finding the Sweet Spot

22 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in embouchure, Flute pedagogy for band instructors, instruments

≈ 5 Comments

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blowing, embouchure, flute pedagogy, flute tone

We all know that sports equipment often has a sweet spot. A baseball bat, tennis racket or skis are good examples of sports equipment with a sweet spot. If you make efficient use of the sweet spot, you maximize the response of the equipment. When you hit a baseball or softball with the sweet spot of the bat, the ball travels much farther than if the ball makes contact with another part of the bat. You have more control over the placement, velocity and spin of a tennis ball using the sweet spot of a tennis racket.

The sweet spot of downhill skis are probably most like the blow hole of a flute headjoint than any other sweet spot in sports. Skis for beginner and intermediate skiers generally have a larger sweet spot and therefore are more forgiving of a skier’s technical weaknesses, but you also sacrifice something in terms of finesse and control on the hill with the larger sweet spot. On the other hand, advanced skis have a narrow sweet spot that gives a lot of control in turns and with speed. However, you need to understand how your center of gravity works in tandem with the skis to benefit from the precise response.

Yes, flute headjoints most definitely have a sweet spot. And like skis, beginning flute headjoints are more forgiving of inexperienced players. Professional headjoints tend to require more precise air direction and placement to maximize the response. If your students have windy tone and/or pitch problems, they simply haven’t learned how to direct the air to maximize the response of the headjoint’s sweet spot.

We blow down at about a 45 degree angle at the blowing edge, not really across the blow hole at all, as is so commonly believed.
Most flute players are directing the air slightly to their right at the blowing edge. Headjoints are cut in such a way to allow for this. The exception to this is someone with a teardrop top lip who plays off to the right of the teardrop, rather than the more common left of the teardrop.
How do you know if someone has hit the sweet spot? The sound is focused, full, round, in tune, has depth and resonance.

Every flute player has to discover their own best blowing angle. There really is no One Size Fits All solution, only general guidelines:

Rest the inner edge of the blow hole approximately where chin skin and lip skin meet.
Allow no more than 1/4 to 1/3 of the blow hole be covered by the bottom lip.
Reach over slightly with the top lip to angle the air down at the blowing edge.
Shape lips as if to say the letter “W”
Blow through the resulting aperture
Experiment, experiment, experiment with all of the above until you discover the best combination for you
Practice to make it reproducible, so you can do it every time you put the flute on your face

Troubleshooting Tone and Pitch Issues

15 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in beginners, embouchure, Flute pedagogy for band instructors, intermediate skills, intonation

≈ 1 Comment

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beginning flute, embouchure, flute embouchure, flute pedagogy, flute tone

Because there are so many variables involved in flute embouchure, there are an infinite number of problems that students can manifest in their tone quality and intonation. And as instructors it might seem we have to virtually be psychic to deduce the problem and offer solutions to our students. This is because so much is affected by things going on in the body that aren’t obvious from looking at a kid. Over the years I’ve been collecting a laundry list, so to speak, of tone/intonation problems and their solutions. Here are some common ones for beginner to intermediate students.

Problem: Windy, airy tone that is sharp

Solution: The aperture is too large and the blowing angle is too shallow. Blow through a smaller aperture and angle the air down more. You can achieve a steeper blowing angle by putting the flute lower on the bottom lip and reaching over with the top lip more, while maintaining the smaller aperture. The Legend of Kiss and Roll, Independence for Lips!

Problem: Dull tone quality, flat pitch

Solution: There is too much bottom lip covering the blow hole, and the flute is probably too high on the bottom lip. Move the flute lower on the bottom lip and roll out. There shouldn’t be more than 1/3 of the blow hole covered by the bottom lip. Also check alignment of the headjoint and balance of the flute. That alone can cause a student roll in and cover too much of the blow hole. It’s All About Balance

Problem: Strangled or pinched tone, can be flat or sharp depending how high or low the flute is on the bottom lip

Solution: This requires some sleuthing on your part because you have to identify the source of the constriction. There are at least four places I can think of that cause a pinched sound: 1) The lips themselves with a flattened and pinched aperture, 2) clenching the jaw with teeth too close together (common with kids who have braces, especially with rubber bands), 3) the back of the tongue is too high, constricting the airway, and finally, 4) the kid can actually be closing off the throat itself, as in activating the gag reflex. It takes some practice and discernment on your part to tell the difference which of these four constriction points are causing the problem. I can tell you that each one has a distinct quality that identifies it from the others, but it does take carefully listening and practice to recognize each one. Getting the Cart Before the Horse

Problem: Trouble producing third octave notes even with the correct fingerings

Solution: Third octave notes seem scary to kids. To them it seems like the natural thing that in order to control the third octave, they should roll in and pinch. After all, who wants to hear screeching high notes? This is precisely why they are having trouble. The solution, paradoxically, is to open up the blow hole a bit, support the air column more from the body core, and relax the grip of the aperture slightly. The speed of the air column itself will ensure the high note speak with ease. Warm Air, Cold Air

Flute Go Juice

08 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in embouchure, Flute pedagogy for band instructors, technique, vibrato

≈ 1 Comment

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articulation, dynamics, embouchure, flute pedagogy, vibrato

We have spent a great deal of virtual ink on this blog exploring flute embouchure, articulation, intonation, technique, dynamics and vibrato. While all of these things are essential to good flute playing, we’re overlooking the elephant in the room, namely blowing. Indeed, if you don’t have good mastery of blowing, you aren’t going to be able to articulate well, play in tune, control dynamics or play with vibrato. All the blah, blah about embouchure is meaningless if you are not moving air through the embouchure into the flute. Technique is worthless without the air behind the fingers.

A few thoughts about blowing as it relates to teaching kids, in no particular order:

Beginners – give me a kid with an enthusiastically windy sound any day over a kid that is timidly tweeting little peeps. It is much easier to help the first kid refine their sound and become more precise with how they direct their air than to get that shy kid who is barely making any sound to actually put some air into the instrument.
Students who come to the flute from a piano background often have to be cajoled into blowing more. My conjecture about this is that they are used to thinking of the sound being generated by their finger technique. You need to help them understand their fingers make very little sound , but that their go juice on flute is the air stream.
Hold off on teaching/expecting dynamics until you are sure the student has sufficient mastery of steady blowing to be able to understand the difference between air speed and air quantity. Getting to this point can take up to a couple years, depending on how much they play in band/practice on their own.
Encourage your students to blow freely and refrain from using what my teacher, Tom Nyfenger, called the nay-palm, shushing your young flute players in the front row to hear the brass line behind them. The flutes are not impacting the balance of the ensemble they way you think they are. The reason they sound loud to you is they are sitting right under your baton. This is so incredibly damaging to developing young flute players. The truth is, a flute will never be able to compete in terms of volume of sound with most any other instrument in your ensemble, not a trumpet, a saxophone or even a clarinet. By shushing them and not instructing your flute players how to play more quietly, the kids develop all kinds of negative compensating behaviors such as pinching the aperture, squeezing in the throat, clenching their teeth and just not blowing. The consequence is that the flutes sound terrible and have horrendous intonation problems. These problems are then compounded if you then tell them to roll in or out to fix the pitch. All of these problems with evaporate if you encourage your students to blow in the first place.
If your students know how to blow well, learning to play with vibrato, developing lively articulation and meaningful technique is part of a natural progression of acquiring skills. Good blowing and a steady, supported air column facilitate all these skills. You have to have the go juice first.

Shaping a Flute Aperture

18 Sunday Dec 2016

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in beginners, embouchure, Flute pedagogy for band instructors, intermediate skills, tuning

≈ 3 Comments

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beginning flute, embouchure, flute pedagogy, flute tone

It seems to me that understanding how to shape a flute aperture with your lips is likely the biggest mystery for non-flutists who teach beginning flute players. Surprisingly, this is one of the simplest concepts to grasp if you know the trick. The trick is to shape your lips as if you are saying the sound of the letter “W”, as in “what” or “wonderful”. Notice a few things when you do this:

Your awareness is focused on the middle of your lips, almost as if you are gripping a drinking straw
The corners take care of themselves and seal themselves. No attention needed
Your lips naturally form an elliptical opening
The perimeter of the resulting aperture is actually rather firm

For yourself and your students, try starting out without a flute headjoint. Put an index finger under your lip and say, “what” or “water” a number of times. Then shorten it and say “waaaa”. Then just shape your lips for the “W” sound and blow through the resulting opening. Voila! Flute aperture 101.The next step is to shape your lips and tongue behind the teeth where gum and teeth meet on the top while blowing through the aperture, “too, too, too……”, keeping a steady air stream. Finally, go through the above process with a flute headjoint on your chin.

Of course there is more to getting a characteristic sound than just shaping the aperture. And there are seemingly more variables than specific immutable features to making a good sound. Pretty much the headjoint itself is the only constant. People, their lips, size of their teeth and oral cavity are unique to themselves. Remember to:

Bring the flute up to the bottom lip from below to rest where the chin and lip meet. Adjust up a little for a very full bottom lip, adjust down for a thin bottom lip. Avoid the so-called kiss and roll because this puts the flute too high on the bottom lip for everyone. It’s a one size fits all solution that fits no one. The sound will be thin, light and probably sharp.
Keep the blow hole open approximately two thirds. This is easier to do if the flute is a little lower on the chin than higher for most people. Having any more of the bottom lip in the blow hole than 1/3 will make a stuffy, dull and flat sound.
The corners will take care of themselves, provided your lips are shaped as if to make the “W” sound. Really! Try for yourself.
Roll your bottom lip (not the flute!) out a little to go up the octave or raise the pitch. Reach over a little with your top lip to play low notes or lower the pitch.

Stepping Out of Your Comfort Zone

04 Sunday Dec 2016

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in embouchure, Flute pedagogy for band instructors

≈ 2 Comments

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embouchure, flute pedagogy, flute tone

The number one observation I hear from band directors about teaching flute is, “Flute is my weakest instrument.” This isn’t surprising because the major difference between other winds/brass and the flute is there isn’t a mouthpiece on the flute. It’s just a hole we relate to. There are seemly an infinite number of variables to learn to define relating to placement on the chin, blowing angle, blowing speed, shape of the lips, use of the lips and facial muscles. If all this is bewildering for you, the band instructor, to conceptualize, how much harder it becomes for you to try to explain flute embouchure to a kid.

So let’s distill flute embouchure down to its basic elements. Come to the flute with an open mind, without preconception, if at all possible. Let go of whatever you know about embouchure on any other instrument, brass or reeds. To make a successful flute embouchure, you have to take it for itself, on its own terms.

Bring the flute up to your chin from below. Let the inside edge of the blow hole rest where chin and lip meet. Adjust up for a fuller bottom lip or down for a thinner bottom lip. Experiment to find the place that gives the fullest sound. There simply isn’t a one size fits all solution to this one, just a general guideline.
Shape the aperture with the middle of your lips. Imagine how your lips would wrap around a small straw or an oboe reed. It isn’t necessary to think about the corners at all. They will seal themselves. Pay attention to the size and shape of aperture you make with your lips.
Direct the air up and down by rolling your bottom lip out a little to go higher, reaching over a little with your top lip to aim the air lower.
Maintain the size and shape of the aperture regardless of register or dynamic. How you angle the air as described above determines register and controls pitch. You can control color and dynamics by adjusting the firmness of the edge of the aperture.

Here are a few things you may tell your students about flute embouchure based on your reference as a brass or reed play that don’t work well: Kiss ‘n Roll, Tighter Higher-Looser Lower, Tight Corners, Warm Air/Cold Air, To Roll or Not to Roll. This is why it is so important to take flute for itself rather than trying to relate it to any other embouchure. All of these issues are a result of trying to fabricate a relationship between brass or reed embouchures and a flute embouchure. Remember, Our Lips are our Mouthpiece. The lips of a flutist have to do for us what everyone else’s mouthpieces do for them.

If you find these entries useful, please subscribe, share with your colleagues and come back regularly. Feel free to comment. If you have a topic you would like to see explored more fully, you can contact me via IM/Messenger on Facebook or email me at dr_cate@sbcglobal.net. For information about clinics, workshops and performances, click here.

A Flexible Embouchure

06 Sunday Nov 2016

Posted by Dr. Cate Hummel in embouchure, Flute pedagogy for band instructors

≈ 4 Comments

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embouchure, flute pedagogy, flute tone

Having strength and flexibility in the lips are the most necessary requirements for a good flute embouchure. If you have these, you can generate the necessary resistance to make a strong, characteristic tone. You can shape and direct the air to change register, correct pitch, and shade and color the tone.

In most cases, a having a tear drop top lip will not prevent a student from developing a directed air stream. It’s just a matter of helping the student to learn to shape the aperture to one side or the other of the tear drop, though to the left (toward the crown) is generally more desirable. I have known students who have done either way successfully. However, occasionally there are sometimes cases with the shape or flexibility of the lips where it might be better to steer a student away from the flute because there is some physical limitation. Here’s an example from a parent’s comment left on the post “What do you do with your corners?“.

My daughter is 12 and just learning the flute in band 7. She is having the toughest time getting the flute to make any noise. She has been told not to pucker her lips but isn’t puckering the shape you describe by sucking on a straw? She can only get a tone when puckering but having to blow really hard. She was also born with a cleft palate and after the repair as a baby her palate is shaped differently then a typical palate with a lot of bumps and creases. She also has a overbite. Would any of these issues be making it difficult to make her flute play? She has been trying for about a month with little improvement. Should we keep trying or switch instruments?

And here is my response:

You ask some really good questions. It is going to be difficult to diagnose and make recommendations for your daughter based on a written description. My guess is that because of her cleft palate repair, your daughter might have less flexibility in her top lip than is typical. This might be the cause of her having trouble shaping an aperture with her lips. Having an overbite shouldn’t be an issue. I have an overbite. In fact, I think an overbite might be an advantage to some degree.

It’s hard to say for sure what is going on for this child, though, as I said in my reply, my best guess is that the cleft palate repair has left the girl with less than normal flexibility in her top lip. In this case, it might be a better choice to steer her toward another instrument, even a non-wind instrument. Having said that though, you will occasionally encounter a kid that is so determined to play flute, they will work at developing an embouchure with breathtaking perseverance despite what seems like an insurmountable physical obstacle. In that case I say let them work at it (with proper guidance) and decide for themselves whether they want to persist until they succeed or decide try another instrument.

Dr. Cate's Flute Tips

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Tag Archives: embouchure

Taming the Beast

Intonation on Piccolo

You Wouldn’t Think it Makes Much Difference But……..

Playing Softly Without Pinching

Finding the Sweet Spot

Troubleshooting Tone and Pitch Issues

Flute Go Juice

Top 10 Posts of 2016 on Dr. Cate’s Flute Tips

Shaping a Flute Aperture

Stepping Out of Your Comfort Zone

A Flexible Embouchure