Seeking advices to improve my tone

[Istamid]

Hello,

I would like some advices on how to improve my tone. I started to play when I was in high school. I played intensively in the school band for four years (2 years as a 1st flute). When I left high school, I was forced to reduce my play time (student apartments are not the best place to practice flute). I am willing to come back to it and maybe join a band in September if I can find one in my area.

To do that, I have a lot of work though, because my tone is not exactly good right now. Of course I just started playing more seriously so I could probably get a part of my old tone back, but I learned by myself back in high school so I fear I will develop wrong habits if I do it without some advices from someone more knowledgeable than me.

Here's some videos of me playing. The quality is not great as it was taking by my laptop webcam, but it's still good. These are parts of "Pilatus : Mountain of Dragon" (1st C flute) by Steven Reneike, a song we played with the school band during my 3rd year.

http://s1084.photobucket.com/albums/j41 ... 20Dragons/

Thanks a lot for your advices.

Ista

[lianeandflute]

Your tone is not bad! You made it sound as if you were a beginner again but you don't sound like that at all.

What is your practicing like at the moment? It's always good to spend a decent amount of time on long notes (long tones) at the beginning of every practice session to work on tone.

I heard that you're having some trouble with the higher register. I would recommend trying on open your throat and use lots of abdominal support. It looks like your flute is turned in quite a bit (hard to tell from video) so maybe you can try turning outwards. This helps for a more open sound and also provides a lot more flexibility.

Do you do use any tone exercises? I like using Moyse's de la Sonorite. It's about evenness of sound through out the range and I've been using it for years and years and can always find something that I can fix with this book.

you can actually download it for free from here:
http://www.4shared.com/get/1x2yQhU5/FLA ... oyse_.html
as a pdf.

other ideas for working on tone that i use myself and also get my students to use:
- crescendo and diminuendo over 10 beats (metronome on 60) or more on every note. going from ppp to fff to ppp and staying IN TUNE (check with a piano or a tuner to track intonation)
- each note (or a selection of notes from an arpeggio or whatever) for as long as possible at ppp. this stretches breath capacity and also helps you strengthen muscles in your embouchure
- play B - C# - D# very slowly, trying to get a clean a sound as possible. these are the most unstable notes on the flute so getting these notes to sound good helps with all the other notes
- harmonics. this requires lots of embouchure control and really helps with getting high notes

also.. the trevor wye book on tone is supposed to be very good.

http://www.jennifercluff.com/tone.htm
that's a link to a section on tone by jen cluff. all her articles are very good actually so worth checking out.

good luck

[Istamid]

Thanks for your answer !

I worked a lot on my tone in high school and I was really please with it at the time. I lost most of it and can't sustain long notes with satisfaction now. That makes me feel like a beginner again !

Right now, I try to practice from 30 minutes to an hour every week day. I do some scales (for the first time in my life) to get more comfortable with them because I remember having a hard time playing in anything else then major F, Bb and Eb as all our parts were in those scales (well most of them anyway).

After that, I try working on either a solo or reviewing parts I learned years ago. I also do some exercises from the third book of Standard of excellence (the green one : http://i.ebayimg.com/24/!BbNO,dwBmk~$(KGrHqYH-D!Eqv(VDE8IBKu6k9rEeQ~~_35.JPG ). Back in the time, I wasn't that concerned about technique and I didn't work with that book very much, trying to avoid the exercises in class as much as I could (which proved useful to practice some harder parts with the other flute of the bad, but still hehe).

I used to do a lot of long lasting notes to work on my tone. I tried to do them again, but I tend to be out of breath really fast now. It should be back by practicing though, like everything !

For the high register, I will try your advices, thanks. I know my flute needs some check up too, probably doesn't help. I am getting better though on my first day back, I could hardly play high then C6. Getting up to F6 most of the time is not too bad, but it's clearly something I have to work on.

I wish I could afford practicing 2 hours / day like I used to. I doubt my neighbor would like that though

[PsykoNova]

Very good choice for the " Marcel Moyse "'s book.
For a nice sound there is no secret, only long tones ( C-C#-C ,C#-D-C# ) and
Octaves ( C-C C#-C# )


and a video from james galway about embouchure
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQg0vScnQ8E

Rudolph.

[Zevang]

Very good choice for the " Marcel Moyse "'s book.
For a nice sound there is no secret, only long tones ( C-C#-C ,C#-D-C# ) and
Octaves ( C-C C#-C# )

... and lots of patience and hard, persistent daily work. It's good if you have a teacher observing your evolution.

[Istamid]

Unfortunately I don't have a teacher. I can't really afford taking classes right now.

[lianeandflute]

Well, if you have a hard time with breath I would highly recommend doing what I said in the point about playing each note chromatically for as long as possible. If you put the metronome on 60 and write down every day how many seconds you get on each note, you can track your progress and watch your improvement. You have to play ppp and this, along with playing for as long as you can, will help with muscle control and stamina in your embouchure as well as figuring out how to control the air stream and how much air you use and in that way learn how to last a lot longer. Even if you just do a few of these every day you can see improvement quickly and then you'll also have time to do some other (more fun) tone exercises.

You can also try some breathing exercises. There is another recent thread about that on this forum somewhere.

So after this, it's just patience and perseverance. Give yourself some time to improve and get used to the flute again.

Also, it's really good that you're doing scales again as scales teach us so much. If you get bored with them you can try playing them with varying dynamics (e.g. crescencdo over whole scale, diminuendo over whole scale, crescendo and diminuendo over whole scale, four notes fff - four notes ppp, etc) and of course with different articulations (tongued, slurred, 2 tongued 2 slurred, swap it round, slurred in pairs, 3 slurred 1 tongue, swap it round, four slurred, tongue each note twice, double tonguing and triple tonguing, etc).

That band book you have been using is probably not fantastic as my experience of method books and band books shows that they are inconsistent and sometimes misleading. You can probably download scales for free from many websites.

This site has one octave scales and also 2 octave scales & arpeggios for download. Major and Minor:
major: http://www.flutetunes.com/scales/major-scales.php
minor: http://www.flutetunes.com/scales/minor-scales.php

again, just for your interest, Jennifer Cluff has a really great website with lots of information on tone, technique and pieces that could suit you:
http://www.jennifercluff.com/beginn.htm

Hope you go well

[Istamid]

Thanks everyone for your answers!

Hopefully I'll feel comfortable enough in September to join a local band.. if I can find one.

If not, well, I'll have a good time playing again anyway.

[PsykoNova]

good luck

[JazzGirl301]

You have a pretty good tone. I think I understand what you mean though. When I have skipped about a week of practicing, I have noticed that I don't have as much control causing me to have a worse tone. For me it just takes a little more practicing in the next couple days to get my tone back. I would practice holding out long steady notes, and over time that should help your tone and it may also help you with breathing. You sound really good! Keep it up!

[Istamid]

Oh, thanks

I've been playing once every six months or so for the past 6-7 years. I lost the control I had a long time ago. That's probably a better phrasing, thanks

I'm glad I didn't lost more though over the time

[Istamid]

Hi, it's me again.

I am working on my tone, trying the exercises you suggested.

I can hold long notes better now (24 seconds on pp approximatly).

I am trying to find a tuner, but I have a hard time understanding the only one I found online : http://www.seventhstring.com/tuner/tuner.html

When it says I'm in -30 for exemple, am I playing too high, or too low ? I can't figure it out and I have a HARD time getting to 0 no matter how I try to tune my flute / move the embouchure, blow in a different way, etc. I'm really confused.

[pied_piper]

-30 means that your pitch is flat or too low. + means it is sharp or too high. Many new flutists do not use enough air support and that will cause the pitch to be flat or too low. Breathe deeply and move the air more quickly when you blow. That should help you to get the pitch up to 0.