Doctor Flute Blog
Musings on the Flute
Getting Your Tone Back in Shape
I've just come off the holidays as it's been Christmas vacation. It's been so massively busy that I haven't gotten much good solid practice. I feel like even when I've played a lot of flute for various Christmas gigs, I still can get out of shape if I'm not working on...
Using Reichert Number 3 to Help You Get Back in Shape
I have been on holiday because it's been Christmas vacation and there's been so many activities in the entire month of December that I have felt like I have not gotten enough practice time. I've played flute with gigs. But we know that practicing and playing are two...
Making Your Embouchure Be Flexible While You’re Playing
Is your embouchure flexible?Does it adjust to the octave in which you are playing? The embouchure is an amazingthing. It has the ability to move and adjust to help us get the best tone. Theproblem comes when we don’t move the embouchure but leave it static. The...
Bending Your Pitch UP
Have you ever practiced pitch bends? This is an extended technique that is utilized in contemporary music. Composers put pitch bends in their music for a particular effect. Pitch bends aren't necessarily difficult to execute although bending up is trickier then...
Practicing with Reichert’s Seven Daily Exercises
If you don't have the practice book Seven Daily Exercises Op 5 by M.A. Reichert, you need to go out and purchase it. Mine has this nice yellow cover. True to its title, it contains 7 scale exercises – and they are great exercises. If you're getting a little bit bored...
Adding Vibrancy to Your Tone
Do you have vibrancy in your tone? Do you know what it is? Vibrancy is something that I discovered when I was in college and I was listening a graduate student. I remember thinking that there was something different about their tone that I didn't have. I kept...
Taking a Quick Breath Quietly with Relaxed Throat & Jaw
Taking a quick quiet breath is not as easy as it seems. Sure, we all know how to take fast breaths when we exercise. But when you’re playing through a fast passage, and you need to breathe while in tempo, you’ve got to learn how to do it quickly AND quietly. Here’s a...
Getting Better Low Notes with Taffanel & Gaubert Number 8
Have you ever played a staccato passage in your low register and found that the only thing that came out were puffs of air? You are not alone. We can all have trouble getting our low register notes to come out. But with a bit of specific practice, your low notes can...
I Can’t Relax My Embouchure
Do you know that a tight embouchure is not what will give you the best tone? I think most of us know that is not the way to play. But I have experienced that students don't know what a tight embouchure actually means and have no idea how to loosen that embouchure....