We've been talking about ways to get the hard, dark Irish flute tone in a few discussions lately. It bothers me that such information doesn't seem readily available. I finally got around to putting a piece on my web page about it. Hopefully it will be of value to someone!
Nice Terry, thanks for sharing that.
If I may add, I also find that along with aiming the air lower as explained in your article, widening the stream of air (I like to visualize a sort of "fanning out" of the air) helps to produce the dark tone, while keeping the air stream narrow produces that crisper, classical-sounding tone. Actually that may go hand-in-hand (or mouth-in-mouth?) with the frowning and smiling explanation, with frowning widening the air stream and smiling narrowing it.
There has also been attribution given to the shape of the embochure, a more rounded one, more of a kiss or frown, giving that darker tone, as opposed to an elongated one, pulled out to the sides as for a smile or grimace, favouring the higher overtones, a brighter tone...
Yes Terry there there has been little defining of achieving the reedy tone. I can relate to ceolachan's rounded embochure but rather than "more of a kiss" I think instead of bitter lemon-I know it's less romantic.
Relax your neck muscles and your shoulders.
It's a pain in the neck though if you don't have a decent flute!
When I started playing Irish flute in the 70's (having no classical background) I took a few lessons from a couple different respected classical teachers, and did some reading on the matter of tone.
One teacher- a somewhat whacky old hippie-like woman, took me out on her back patio. Her home was on a hill and the back patio was 20 feet or so off the ground. There was a tree there, and she gave me some rice and told me to practice spitting the rice at a certain knot in the tree down below our level. "That's the low register" she said.
Then I had to practice spitting rice at a knot only a little below us... "that's the middle register". (What Irish fluteplayers sometimes call the high or upper register, but it's the middle register for classical flutists.)
Then she had me spit rice up at a knot a bit above us. "That's the upper register".
Bottom line is, "classical" fluteplayers do blow down into their flutes, for the low register. They're trained to adjust their blowing angle for the three registers they use.
They draw back their jaw, the "horse face" as some call it, to make the air angled downward.
Another thing at that time: I found a book called something like "developing tone on the flute" and the entire book consisted of essentially the same exercise over and over on various notes.
The exercise consisted of blowing a note as softly as possible, then steadily increasing the air/volume until the note is as loud as possible, then decrease steadily back to the softest possible. The critical thing is to keep the pitch of the note exactly the same throughout.
I spent a lot of time doing this exercise and it helped to get a big fat strong sound on the low notes. Ever after, my standard warmup was to do that exercise on Bottom D.
Another great exercise is to play octaves, Bottom D middle D, low E high E, and so forth up the scale, making the octave switch smoothly with no tongueing.
Neither of these are specific to the hard tone, but they both increase the flexibility and control over your embouchure and help overal tone.
My method is to do more of an exhale than a blow. When I approach it that way, there are some reflexive changes to the embouchure that take place that also contribute to the desired tone quality. Breathing this way takes practice and endurance as it is more physically taxing to get the needed quantity of air with an exhale rather than a blow, but if you try it to see how it works, you should get an immediate result. You'll find that the lips tend to open laterally a bit wider and that the corners of the mouth are a bit tighter. Since an exhale is warmer air, you also need to adjust to the airflow needed for the upper octave.
Getting the hard dark flute tone...
Getting the hard dark flute tone...
We've been talking about ways to get the hard, dark Irish flute tone in a few discussions lately. It bothers me that such information doesn't seem readily available. I finally got around to putting a piece on my web page about it. Hopefully it will be of value to someone!
http://www.mcgee-flutes.com/Getting_the_hard_dark_tone.htm
Terry
# Posted on February 22nd 2010 by Terry McGee
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
Spot on, Terry, and clearly explained. I'm looking forward to to hearing the sound clips and more in-depth descriptions of how this all works.
I'm not much of a flute player, but I wouldn't play at all if it weren't for that dark, reedy tone.
# Posted on February 22nd 2010 by Will Harmon
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
Nice Terry, thanks for sharing that.
If I may add, I also find that along with aiming the air lower as explained in your article, widening the stream of air (I like to visualize a sort of "fanning out" of the air) helps to produce the dark tone, while keeping the air stream narrow produces that crisper, classical-sounding tone. Actually that may go hand-in-hand (or mouth-in-mouth?) with the frowning and smiling explanation, with frowning widening the air stream and smiling narrowing it.
# Posted on February 22nd 2010 by Glass of Beer
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
Many thanks, Terry - as a beginning flute player, this is the information I have been looking for.
# Posted on February 22nd 2010 by will morgan
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
There has also been attribution given to the shape of the embochure, a more rounded one, more of a kiss or frown, giving that darker tone, as opposed to an elongated one, pulled out to the sides as for a smile or grimace, favouring the higher overtones, a brighter tone...
# Posted on February 22nd 2010 by ceolachan
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
Yes Terry there there has been little defining of achieving the reedy tone. I can relate to ceolachan's rounded embochure but rather than "more of a kiss" I think instead of bitter lemon-I know it's less romantic.
Relax your neck muscles and your shoulders.
It's a pain in the neck though if you don't have a decent flute!
# Posted on February 23rd 2010 by sheepdip
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
See also a parallel thread on Chiff and Fipple.
# Posted on February 24th 2010 by Hup
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
When I started playing Irish flute in the 70's (having no classical background) I took a few lessons from a couple different respected classical teachers, and did some reading on the matter of tone.
One teacher- a somewhat whacky old hippie-like woman, took me out on her back patio. Her home was on a hill and the back patio was 20 feet or so off the ground. There was a tree there, and she gave me some rice and told me to practice spitting the rice at a certain knot in the tree down below our level. "That's the low register" she said.
Then I had to practice spitting rice at a knot only a little below us... "that's the middle register". (What Irish fluteplayers sometimes call the high or upper register, but it's the middle register for classical flutists.)
Then she had me spit rice up at a knot a bit above us. "That's the upper register".
Bottom line is, "classical" fluteplayers do blow down into their flutes, for the low register. They're trained to adjust their blowing angle for the three registers they use.
They draw back their jaw, the "horse face" as some call it, to make the air angled downward.
Another thing at that time: I found a book called something like "developing tone on the flute" and the entire book consisted of essentially the same exercise over and over on various notes.
The exercise consisted of blowing a note as softly as possible, then steadily increasing the air/volume until the note is as loud as possible, then decrease steadily back to the softest possible. The critical thing is to keep the pitch of the note exactly the same throughout.
I spent a lot of time doing this exercise and it helped to get a big fat strong sound on the low notes. Ever after, my standard warmup was to do that exercise on Bottom D.
Another great exercise is to play octaves, Bottom D middle D, low E high E, and so forth up the scale, making the octave switch smoothly with no tongueing.
Neither of these are specific to the hard tone, but they both increase the flexibility and control over your embouchure and help overal tone.
# Posted on February 24th 2010 by Richard D Cook
Re: Getting the hard dark flute tone...
My method is to do more of an exhale than a blow. When I approach it that way, there are some reflexive changes to the embouchure that take place that also contribute to the desired tone quality. Breathing this way takes practice and endurance as it is more physically taxing to get the needed quantity of air with an exhale rather than a blow, but if you try it to see how it works, you should get an immediate result. You'll find that the lips tend to open laterally a bit wider and that the corners of the mouth are a bit tighter. Since an exhale is warmer air, you also need to adjust to the airflow needed for the upper octave.
# Posted on February 24th 2010 by Ailin