There is an art to effective practice. Accomplishing goals will be assured with good planning. A good teacher needs to help students learn how to practice at an age/skill appropriate level. For beginners, this may mean helping them remember to practice 5 times a week by keeping a practice chart. I like to require beginners to discuss their progress each week. It does not take long for students to see that the weeks where they make the most progress are the weeks where they were being the most consistent with their practice. Time management strategies are helpful for busy college students often juggling the demands of work and student life. Blocking out 4 separate one hour practices is as effective if not MORE so, than a single 4 hour practice room marathon session. Adult amateurs often face roadblocks to practice time because of the demands of their busy lives, or often a fear of failure, so helping them learn to love the creative time of practice is key. Progress = Practice! For each level, and for each student, there is a key to help them unlock their creative potential.
Be a teachable student! Come to all your lessons prepared and with a willingness to explore and learn. I'm always amazed by the number of students whose main contribution to lessons are excuses as to why they have not completed their preparation. It is easier than EVER to prepare: there are free downloads of scores, youtube offers free videos of almost any performance worldwide and you can bring your music with you on your ipod , tablet or smartphone to study wherever you go! Digital downloads are almost instantaneous. I remember going to the library to get scores and purchasing CD's, which were quite a luxury on a college student's budget. Becoming the musician you desire to be starts NOW and with everything you do. Bring questions to your lesson, and bring opinions too. After all, lively discussions can only happen if each person brings something to the table. Be excited to learn and keep that fire through all your practice sessions. Work, grow, explore, improve and create.....becoming an artist means being a good apprentice first.
It seems quite ironic that we always need to spend a good amount of time playing slowly and carefully in order to build up to breathtaking speeds in technical passages. Remember that you need to establish muscle memory and starting slowly is the sure pathway to success. But, play mindfully so that you are fully engaged. ALWAYS play smaller sections and try playing them in different octaves (for example if it's a low register passage, try playing in the middle register since the fingerings are mostly the same), Try playing the passage from right to left: all these tools can help 'wake up' the brain and fingers and lead you to success. When going for the final push of fast tempos, I try the 'add a note' method: play two notes in the passage at tempo, repeat several times, then three notes, repeat, until you have a full beat's worth of notes. Then add on the next beat's worth in similar fashion. And if you make an error, really analyze WHY it happened: until you figure out what went wrong, you might be frustrated and keep repeating the error. Building reliable and sparkling technique is the result of careful and deliberate work!
We have completed 4 out of 5 performances of Shostakovich's 10th Symphony this week, and the piccolo part is one of the most rewarding and demanding in the repertory. Not only is the part full of lightening fast technical passages where the piccolo is the top of the tutti woodwind ladder, there are many exposed piano level solos. Make sure to use a smaller aperture, but do not press the top lip down towards the bottom: instead bring jaw, tongue, and lips slightly forward. Make sure to use steady support and alternate fingerings become my primary choice for many of the notes. See next month's Flute Talk for an expanded version of these tips... Let's Talk Picc article is called SShh...Time to Play Softly!
If you have never used whistle tones as part of your warm up, give it a try! I find it incredibly useful to relax my embouchure after piccolo playing, and to further increase embouchure sensitivity overall. One must be VERY relaxed to produce these tiny sounds: if you get a lot of air instead of the pure sound, you are blowing too hard. I use the "Chimes of London" tune, from Peter Lukas Graf's Flute Tune Up book. It is a challenge to hold these tones perfectly stable: feel steady air pressure behind the notes and a stable support under the air column. Happy New Year... and happy whistle tones!
In the words of a pop song I've heard on the radio, you gotta keep your head up,...and for the best resonance, intonation and projection, these words could not ring more true. Make sure that your neck is not bent too low (don't connect chin to chest) and that you are balancing your head freely on the top of your spine.. I like to imagine keeping a bit of space between my neck and my skull, lifting the crown of my head. Keep the collarbone open and lifted as well and shoulders open as much as possible. Thinking of the shoulder blades pulling down, as the neck lifts up, can give your posture a gentle vertical lift. These small 'tweaks' to posture can really aid in your projection and you will also look much more confident as well.
Expression in music is a combination of a number of factors: tonal color/shading, dynamics, articulation and nuance, vibrato: the list goes on and on. Rubato is another device that creates an expressive line. Literally, rubato is 'robbed time', meaning if you linger in a spot, then you need to move forward again to 'compensate'. Sometimes students who start playing more expressively only slow down: this is only a rallentando, not rubato. Make sure to tape record your practice so you can really listen to your ideas and make sure that you are creating an elastic phrase, with supple contours, rather than just a slower moment.
Trills for Beginners
I have noticed that trilling is usually a skill that is introduced to players at a more intermediate level. If you choose to start beginners with this skill (flutists in their first year of private study) you will notice not only an improvement in finger dexterity, but improved balance of the instrument itself. It is important that the finger move only from the knuckle to the tip, (the hand does not move) and that the flute does not move while the finger is trilling. Check to make sure the flute stays stable on the lower lip. Improved balance is a plus in all areas for beginners. And, when executing a trill that involves more than one finger moving at a time check your mirror to make sure no extra motion is happening... a tip for flutists at all levels. Happy Trills to you! Learning Contemporary Effects When you are working on any new sound, such as singing and playing at the same time, it helps to listen to many examples of players performing the desired effect. Notice the octave the voice is in: it will be different depending on whether you are a female or male (most males will not be able to sing in the same octave as high flute playing for example). Isolate the effect on one note: if that works, link it to other notes. Build your phrase this way. I think it is wise to learn one special effect every few days to reinforce the work you just did. Most contemporary notation is quite approximate for the effect (isn't all musical notation somewhat approximate after all), so try to work more on the auditory result and rely less on the visual notation in front of you. Vibrato
It is always interesting to notice the different qualities of vibrato possible on the flute. When you are working on tone studies, carefully observe the speed, amplitude, and quality of the vibrato you are using. As a piccolo player, our vibrato naturally has to be smaller since the overall tone tends to be more lean in general. If you play piccolo, try doing your piccolo vibrato studies first and then switching back to flute: many flutists use too wide a vibrato and this simple change of perspective might be just the trick! |
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