I need little bitty help

fluteforever · Post by **fluteforever** » Sun Nov 16, 2003 5:34 pm

hi all! i haven''t been playing the flute that long.
i just have some questions. how do you play a vibrato really good? and when do
you use a vibrato? [:p] [:)] [;)]

embum79 · Post by **embum79** » Wed Dec 17, 2003 8:21 pm

Vibrato is just slight increases and decreases in the
tone of the note. You can initially practice it by using a metronome and sort of
making "waves" with each note. Slowly increase the setting on the metronome. It
really just takes practice.. years and years of practice even to get it right.
I've been playing for 15 years and I still work on vibrato. When to use
vibrato: experiment. Everyone uses it slightly different. Just make sure you
don't do the same thing all the time. Sometimes it will be slow, sometimes
fast, sometimes not at all. It completely depends on the style of the music and
your own personal interpretation.

angel_of_music · Post by **angel_of_music** » Mon Dec 22, 2003 6:35 pm

im really good at explaining it if i can demonstrate it
with my flute....but i'll try basically, you're just saying "HA", using your
diaphragm to accent it. first, start off with whole notes. say "HA" at the first
beat, sorta like: "HA" 2 3 4 "HA" 2 3 4 then go to half notes..."HA" 2 "HA" 4..
quarter notes..."HA" "HA" "HA" "HA" eighth notes..."HAHA" "HAHA" "HAHA" "HAHA"
triplets(3/1)..."HAHAHA" "HAHAHA" "HAHAHA" "HAHAHA" sixteenth notes....you get
the idea practice doing it with all rhythms, at all tempos. it took me a few
days to get it, so dont get discouraged if it doesnt sound quite right at first.
good luck!!

damjan · Post by **damjan** » Tue Dec 23, 2003 2:07 am

When playing vibrato, you push with your diaphragm in
and out. You should try to relax as much as possible but as far as achieving
control - set you metronome to a steady pace of ~60 bmp (beats per minute) and
start with one quiver per minute (one diaphragm push), then two, three, four,
five and six. Ultimately you can practice seven but that vibrato is too fast
many and nobody really uses it. In any case, going up with the number of quivers
per beat is good to reach control of the vibrato. As far as when to use it -
this is a stilistic matter. It is different with different types of music so it
is hard to tell. Aside from respecting a particular style, I use it when it
"feels" good - for embelishing long notes, note endings, and similar. You would
not use it in faster passages.

lhampton · Post by **lhampton** » Tue Dec 23, 2003 1:04 pm

hum... I don't know much about vibrato. I play with it
but it just came to me. um, you might want to try singing with vibrato and hear
what it sounds like. Vibrato comes. Also listen how professionals use their
vibrato. It will come. Just really tune your ears into listening what you sound
like. Itz not that hard once you get the hang of it. Mine came naturally to me.
You also might want to play around and hear what soounds best to you. But really
just practice it and it'll come. Good Luck! Leanne

Cleartone · Post by **Cleartone** » Tue Dec 23, 2003 3:30 pm

I don't know if I agree with the moderator on this
one. sure you can achieve vibrato by pulsating the air from the diaphragm, but
this tends to leave people with slow and a very wide vibrato. You know, like the
old lady singers with those appalling vibratos. That is how they make their
vibrato. Strictly from the diaphragm. A good controlled vibrato comes from being
able to control the volume of air in a vibration while keeping the diaphragm
steady. Vibrato = Vibration. Practice long tones as loud as you play them and as
softly as you can play them while keeping the diaphragm steady. Learn how to
have control over the air stream. I think the source of your vibrato should be
the throat area. Learning to control the muscles in the throat that control the
air from the diaphragm. You should eventually get better control of these
muscles the more you play. Listen to professional flute recordings. Your ear can
pick up in slight ways how the professional flautist is making his/her vibrato.
Watch other flutists who have vibrato. There should not be a lot of shaking or
pulsating of the body as in a diaphragm created vibrato. Ultimately getting a
vibrato early can impress those around you, but being able to play well without
a vibrato is much more impressive. Vibrato can lead to intonation problems that
can go un-noticed. If I were you my friend, I would stick with your practice
routine without spending much time on the vibrato. In a little while after you
gained more control of your air production, you might find you have a
controllable vibrato already. Dr. T

Penny · Post by **Penny** » Wed Dec 24, 2003 10:20 am

Technically the diaphragm is involuntary so sorry MR.
Moderator you can't "you push with your diaphragm in and out" You can push with
abdominal muscles and this is a common misconception that has spread through the
music community so I dont blame the moderator for not knowing. The movement of
the abdominal muscles and lungs that move the diaphragm has come in general
terms to move the diaphragm. If you read Trevor Wye's instruction books, Book 4
Intonation and Vibrato, explains the 4 ways to get vibrato. As I recall larynx
vibration, tongue movement, opening the throat and breathing changes using the
aforementioned muscles to change air flow. It is a very informative read.

damjan · Post by **damjan** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 4:34 pm

Here is a second opinion, coming from Bolarka Kiss, the
teacher of video lessons on Fluteland.com and a really oustanding classical
flutist: ----------------- Oh, vibrato. There are 7 speeds of it, the slow ones
you CAN INDEED create with the diaphragm. It is a muscle one CAN control. The
faster speeds come from a combo of diaphragm and throat (it's tricky to
describe how not to close the throat up while doing this). Some people mess
around with their cheeks and tongues, too. The TRUE trick to vibrato is to not
make it sound mechanical, so one has to learn flexibility in its speed and
amplitude. Out of the 7 speeds, the really slow and really fast ones are not
usable for music (in my opinion). Amplitude depends on taste and of course,
which era the music came from (compare Baroque to Romantic, for example).
Listening and watching singers helps a lot, too (yeah, you can see that tongue
wiggle). ----------------- I hope this helps. Vibrato is a very personal effect,
and different people approach it in different ways, some having a very natural
vibrato without having to think much about it at all, while others need to spend
time learning it. In any case, it is essential to know how to change it and
control it to be able to adapt it to different kinds of music - for this reason,
the exercises I mentioned before and the comment from Boglarka are very
useful.

Penny · Post by **Penny** » Thu Dec 25, 2003 9:54 pm

Involuntary muscles, such as the heart, diaphragm and
intestines From the medical dictionary Just as you can't decide to make your
heart beat faster you can't make your diaphrgm move by decision. You can make
your heart beat faster by running or slower by resting. You can make your
diaphragm move by breathing more air into the lungs or moving abdominal muscles.
No offense to Miss Kiss, As far the 7 speeds of vibrato? Interesting number. Why
7 instead of 8 or 6? Or why not 80 or 1? Vibrato of course is not a small finite
number. There maybe about 7 speeds of vibrato that one player finds practical
because they differ enough for them to quatify. But like beats on the metronome
and speeds you can play, vibrato is not a finite 7 possible choices. I would
love to read what caused Miss Kiss to conclude there are only 7 speeds of
vibrato. Is this number unique to her teaching? I don't mean to dispute the
authority here, I am sure they mean well. Maybe they are putting things in a
simplistic way they feel is practical. But if you want to be accurate, 7 is a
number of significance to that one player and anyone that has studied physiology
will tell you the diaphragm is an involuntary muscle or you could look it up.
But you are correct in saying The TRUE trick to vibrato is to not make it sound
mechanical They say the truth will set you free but I get the feeling around
here it will get you into nothing but trouble when it doesn't agree with common
misconception. Sorry to be a stickler for accuracy, my apologies to Miss Kiss.

flutietootie4lyfe · Post by **flutietootie4lyfe** » Fri Dec 26, 2003 4:03 pm

You give advice then say there is no point so why do
you do it just leave the lasdt sentence or so out of all of your posts, it would
make me happy!