Good tone recognition?

[evrmre]

I'm trying to redevelop my tone, and wondered just how you can recognize, from a player's perspective, when you are producing 'good' tone? Since there are so many players with different tones, what are the common factors? Lack of breathiness? Resonance? Or something more?

I've been playing for quite some time, but in a very 'casual' manner, and have decided to actually go back and get it 'right', so any thoughts happily accepted...

[dogster]

I listen to other players Famous or not and then I develop my own style . It's called ear training

Doug

[Zevang]

Ear trainning, agreed completely.

Also, if you have any way of recording your playing, then later hearing what you did is helpful. If you record in video, you also will take a good look at your posture and other things that can change and improve enormously your playing over the time (and patience...)

[evrmre]

Thanks for the replies

The idea of recording is one I hadn't really considered (which is funny, as I'm a sound engineer... lol). Easy enough to set up, and have an old camera that should work.

As for ear training, I have a reasonable ear, but lack the specifics to focus that ear appropriately. Have started listening to others more (definitely a good point), but was finding so much variation that I wasn't quite sure what to focus on.

Have also started lessons again, so that should help somewhat...

[evrmre]

Okay... quick update:

Recording was highly worthwhile. It seems I become more critical in my analysis (listen from an engineers viewpoint) when I am just listening, as opposed to playing. Sadly, I didn't sound much like some of the really good people I've been listening too (Not surprising), but was working with a tone that was quite mellow and lacked edge.

I've noticed that most of the flutists I enjoyed had a very open vibrato in their tone, one that sounded fairly natural rather than forced. Is it something to do with basic tone management, or is it something extra that can be learnt (ie: a technique)? Since my playing seems to lack that quality mostly, I've become curious...

[MissyHPhoenix]

Vibrato seems to be a very personal matter. See what your teacher thinks and recommends for you. From my experiences, there are a couple of different viewpoints on vibrato production and of course opinions vary and can be very foceful. My teacher prefers a broad vibrato produced from the diaphragm via air column versus throat vibrato (broad but not obtrusive). It's harder to do than a throat vibrato, but can be much more expressive if done correctly. Heh, of course I'm still not doing it correctly ... it's hard! But still working on it. A good example of this type is Robertello.

Good luck.

[evrmre]

Thanks for that. Seems like much the same as voice training, where the diaphragm shapes and supports the resonance and basic tone, with the throat open and relaxed. Reckon I might play around with that a bit more, and see what comes of it...