Tortoiseshell Music Home of composer Nathan Curtis

Lately, I've gotten a little dissatisfied with my flute playing -- I have never intended for the flute to be my primary instrument, but I do perform several of my own compositions on flute, and occasionally other people's compositions as well. But recently, when hearing a much better flutist play a piece I didn't much care for, I realized that their tone quality was significantly better than mine. Their sound was clearer and more penetrating, and they had a much greater range of dynamics in all registers. It was like comparing a powerful laser to a cheap flashlight with dying batteries. I didn't care if my fingers couldn't keep up with theirs, but I sure wouldn't mind improving my sound.

After consulting with one of my flautist friends -- who now specializes in the baroque flute but still knows a thing or two about these newfangled metal monstrosities -- I acquired Trevor Wye's practice books for flute (I'm not linking to Wye's own site because he renders most of his text as images. So inaccessible it hurts!) and have started working my way through Book 1(Tone). This is actually the first time I've received any significant instruction -- written or oral -- on playing the flute. When I first decided to try my hand at my dad's old flute, he showed me where to put my fingers, but didn't remember much about the fingerings. I worked out fingerings (not always the ideal ones, it turns out) for the first couple octaves on my own, and just started playing around. A couple of times I have asked other flutists for help fingering a particular note, but aside from that I am completely self-taught on the flute. I am still going through Wye's exercises on my own, but just having those exercises in front of me is more guidance than I've ever had in the past.

So far, I think those exercises have been a great boon. I haven't been practicing a whole heck of a lot -- maybe an hour and a half per session, two or three times per week for the last couple weeks -- but already I'm hearing an improvement. My sound has a lot more presence in the lower and middle register, though the very bottom of my register is lagging. I also think I'm getting more of a consistent sound between different parts of my range. I haven't worked on the upper register just yet, and once my tone in the lower register is solid throughout I'd also like to start working on technique. Keeping my own music in mind, I have a few particular goals:

1. Work up my tone to make "Morningsong" (from Three Blues Moods and Doina sound more polished. These pieces are not technically challenging for me, but in light of that I want to get a really good sound. I'd also like a better sound on "Moanin' Low" (also from Three Blues Moods), but the multiphonics respond much differently than ordinary flute playing, so I don't know if Wye can help me on that. But I think I'll be quite happy with how I sound on "Morningsong" and Doina in another week or two.
2. Work up my technique to nail the two or three runs I always stumble over in "Mr. Monk," the third Blues Mood. I've never performed Three Blues Moods by myself because of the 5% (if that) of "Mr. Monk" that I can't quite hit. I've played "Moanin' Low" in concert since the flutists I've worked with couldn't play the multiphonics, but have usually left "Morningsong" and "Mr. Monk" in more technically competent hands. Which is also problematic, since most flutists can't swing to save their life, and step all over "Mr. Monk" as a result. Also, if I can get to this level of technical competence, then I could play some more interesting ornaments and elaborations in Doina. I don't know how quickly my technique will improve, but this goal is only just out of reach of my current abilities, so I hope it would only take a few weeks after I hit the first goal.
3. Get my technique, upper register, and stamina up to the point where I can play Triple Point. While less than 5% of "Mr. Monk" is beyond my current abilities, and that 5% is only just beyond those abilities, more like 15-20% of Triple Point gives me problems, and I'm much further from surmounting those problems. This is not surprising, as "Mr. Monk" (along with the other Blues Moods) was written with my own flute-playing abilities in mind, while I did not want to limit myself so in Triple Point. There are more runs, and they are faster (but usually not in strict time, which ameliorates things somewhat). Triple Point spends much more time in the upper register; I would guess that 10-15% of Triple Point is higher than 98% of "Mr. Monk." And one of the highest of those notes -- a third-octave G# that is difficult for me to sustain at mezzo-forte when I am properly warmed up at the beginning of a session -- occurs 12 times, piannissimo, in the last 2 minutes of a 12-minute piece that has already been stretching my limits over the previous 10 minutes. I can fumble my way through those first 10 minutes and at least leave you with a good idea of what it would ideally sound like, but I can't come close to a credible rendition of those last 2 minutes. Given the magnitude of these challenges, I have no idea how long it would take me to reach this point, if ever. My optimistic guess would be 3-4 times as long as it takes for me to reach the second goal.

So I've got a lot of practice sessions on the flute ahead of me. And I need to keep practicing the bass trombone as well. I think two instruments concurrently is about my limit for serious practice, but I long ago accepted that the clarinet would take a back seat to the flute, which in turn would take a back seat to the trombone. But I'm making progress. So far, it's been due to actually doing long-tone exercises. I never really had the patience to practice long tones on the flute, and I probably wouldn't have gone about it in an intelligent manner without having some written exercises in front of me. It's probably obvious to anyone who has seriously practiced a wind instrument that long tones would help improve my tone quality, but I was always more interesting in noodling and composing on the flute than playing boring exercises. Now that I'm sufficiently motivated to play the boring stuff before I have fun, I'm seeing some improvement.

Additionally, these long-tone exercises are having an unexpected side effect. Playing long tones seems to make me hungry. Really hungry. I'll practice for 45 minutes or so and my stomach will increasingly voice its dissatisfaction while my blood sugar starts to drop. Then I say to myself, "Oh, it's the middle of the day; I should go have lunch." (Apparently I am fond of semicolons even when talking to myself; this is not too terribly surprising.) So I'll go and have lunch. And because I'm feeling so hungry, I'll usually have a pretty substantial lunch, like I did today: a thick slice of lasagna, a glass of milk, yogurt, and some trail mix. Then I'll go back to practicing. In another 45 minutes, I'll be hungry again. I'm not sure what's going on here. Sure, practicing takes physical effort, but I've never gotten this consistently hungry practicing the bass trombone, working on long tones or anything else. My best guess is that my body is upping its metabolic rate in response to the increased intake of oxygen, but this still doesn't explain why it doesn't happen when I practice the bass trombone, as the two instruments actually make quite similar demands on one's lungs. But if I keep practicing like this, I may wind up eating myself out of house and home. Let's hope I can make it through the winter.