student with off center embouchure

beedle · Post by **beedle** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 5:45 pm

hi all , I am not teaching all that long , just doing a bit part time ,so have not run into this situation before :
and adult woman , has played off and on over the years and has a decent if not perfect tone , all good except her embouchure is a little to the left of centre and it is not looking too well shaped!
as I say she has good tone and we have tried to center it and she loses her tone.
she says she cannot play with a centered embouchure and is happy to leave it so.
maybe her muscles / lips are built his way!?
should we worry about this at all , i suppose i wonder if her imperfect embouchure will prevent her from getting a better tone.

any help much appreciated.

etgohomeok · Post by **etgohomeok** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 6:03 pm

I play like that too. My old flute teacher told me to stop doing it.

I'm not taking lessons from her anymore.

flutegeek1992 · Post by **flutegeek1992** » Sun Feb 08, 2009 7:10 pm

check out this video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZM4CsQdMtsQ

not everyone has a centered embouchure

fluteguy18 · Post by **fluteguy18** » Mon Feb 09, 2009 7:05 am

If she gets a good tone, and her flexibility is good, I wouldn't worry about it too much.

I myself play with a slightly off-center embouchure. A lot of time when people play with off-center embouchures, it is because their lips are not perfectly symmetrical. I know that when I noticed mine was off center, I examined my lips in the mirror for over an hour [from every different angle]. With mine, one side is slightly fuller than the other on the top lip, and the opposite is true on the lower lip [opposite side is fuller]. It is very minimal and you wouldn't notice unless you REALLY took a CLOSE look. What I end up doing is that I ultimately bring the fullest parts closer together, and even things out.

So, if she gets a good tone, and is flexible, I wouldn't worry about it. Have her take a good look at her lips, and see if it is something like miniscule differences in proportion of the lips.

jb · Post by jb » Mon Feb 09, 2009 2:43 pm

thanks all , we had a look today , her lips are regular , but teeth not, possibly one side of upper teeth pushing upper lip out. and we have decided to leave all as is!