Breathing

[piccolo1991]

Here is a great site for breathing...devices and advice. I own the breath builder and an air bag and find them both very useful. Brass players pretty much consider Arnold Jacobs a god! Amazing tuba player. Check out this site...look in the breathing devices catagory and it has demos.

http://www.windsongpress.com/index.htm

Best of luck!!!

[Sentinel]

Ok, shivering is starting to go away, that's a good thing.
But my tone is just awful:)
I mean, it's not improving. Of course, I'm playing for only a month now.
The tone is breathy and thin, and I can't seem to find the "sweet spot" on the flute.
And we are talking about the easiest notes (G, A, H, upper C).

When I'm practicing my tone, sometimes it sounds right, but when I play a "song" for example, I can maintain that tone only for a couple of notes.
Surely the problem lies within my embouchure.

Do you have any thoughts on how to improve my tone? Or maybe I am too impatient and all I have to do is practice, practice, practice...

Thank you

[flutepicc06]

Do you have any thoughts on how to improve my tone? Or maybe I am too impatient and all I have to do is practice, practice, practice... Smile

I think you just hit the nail on the head. Tone is something that even players with a quarter century of experience (or more) work on on a daily basis. A good tone is not something that's easy to develop or maintain, and it does take a lot of work. The best way to help improve your playing is to get a teacher if you don't already have one. They'll help you find exercises that are suited to your playing level and be sure you don't develop any bad habits (which take much longer to unlearn down the road than it takes to learn properly the first time around). The muscles you need to develop to have a firm (but not tense) and flexible embouchure take a while to get in shape, and can easily fall out of practice if they're not used regularly, and after only a month, it's very unlikely that you're to the point where you could reasonably expect a good tone 100% of the time.

[Muckdogzen]

For both topics in this thread nobody mentions emptying the lungs of stale air. Whenever I get the chance I completly empty the air out of my lungs. It gets the stale air out and replenishes the lungs with fresh air and oxygen. This both relaxes and strengthens.

[foxxyflutegirl]

Actually what I did & REALLY worked for me (and it just kept developing over the years I played as well) was when I was practicing for All Region tryouts, I would challenge myself to play each piece in one or two breaths. What I did was, each time I would play the piece, I would take a deep breath as much air as I could possibly hold & play til I had to take a breath so each time, I would add a measure to try & reach that measure before I had to take a breath & eventually I got to the point where I could play a page in two breaths & even in college, I kept working at it & I could actually play 8-10 whole notes in one breath (it was 3:4 time but still, I did it). The director could certainly count on me to sustain a note to cover the holes left when the others would take a breath. Try it & see if it works for you as well! As far as tone goes, do you have a student model or a pro model flute? The quality does make a big difference in toneality in addition to the right tone hole & headjoint. As I previously mentioned in another thread, my student model has a square hole to blow across & I got great results from it. When I bought a pro model the sound was absoultely night & day. The sound was so crisp & clear but the tone hole was oval which made me lose air on the sides & makes me spit more & lose tone quality. I seem to have air leakage on the sides. With the CY cut headjoint that came w/the flute I can't play certain upper register notes at all A natural sounds great but A flat, well I might as well not even attempt that one--for example. I never knew anything about such things that make a difference but apparantly it does. Anyway, Good luck with everything, I'm sure you'll do great!

[etgohomeok]

I was taught a trick that is supposed to extend your breathing. Cut off the top of a plastic bottle so you have a funnel-like shape, and breathe through it. Carry it around and use it whenever you can. It forces you to take deep breathes or something like that.

[flute_dogs_561]

I have asthma so some days I used to have a problem playing very long phrases. But I have found that if you look online, there are a lot of web sites that give good advice on exercises for breathing -- especially if you look at the saxophone web sites. Just type into the search engine "breathing exercises for flute" or "...for saxophone players."

Keep working on it and you will eventually be able to play longer phrases.

[flute_dogs_561]

I found a couple of good web sites about breathing for flautists.

1. jennifercluff.com/breathe/htm
2. BreathingExercise.info
3. vsinc.com/flute

And Hi, guys, I just joined this site.

I play:
flute
piccolo
piano
soprano, alto and tenor saxophone
a little electric guitar