 The Clarinet BBoard
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Author: Lisa
Date: 2003-11-14 01:49
Hi, all! I'm a first time poster!
Anyway, over the years, I've built up pretty good flute chops when needed for shows, clarinet being my primary instrument.
I just found out that I have 2 weeks to find my long-lost flute chops again, since I agreed to this gig yesterday! That doesn't give me much time at all.
Do you have some advice on how to get my flute playing back up to proficiency (tonewise) pretty quickly? And how should I incorporate my clarinet into my practicing, since I'll have to double for the gig, too? Which do you prefer to practice first before you switch over?
Many thanks,
Lisa
PS My favorite flute song to play in a show is Be Like the Bluebird in Anything Goes!
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Author: Hank Lehrer
Date: 2003-11-14 02:10
Hi,
Long tones, tonguing exercises, arpeggios, and scales. Then finally, some literature. Don't rush at first. Pick up speed later. You'll get the chops back pretty quickly. Clarinet at the end of your practice session.
I have recently done the same thing to get my own flute chops back after a long layoff.
HRL
Post Edited (2003-11-14 11:29)
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Author: diz
Date: 2003-11-14 03:35
Hank's said it all ... forget playing pieces, just bore yourself to tears with technical exercises
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Author: obtuse
Date: 2003-11-14 04:04
When my flute teacher found out I was doubling on clarinet (as my primary), she suggested that I start at the beginning of the day on flute. She said that it would set my flute emboucher for the day and keep it more resilient against the clarinet emboucher messing it up. I'm not sure how much water that holds, but it couldn't hurt to start on flute first, then work on your clarinet facility.
I think you should probably be working on your flute tone for after you've been playing clarinet too to better help you with the switch. That is, if during your doubling gig, you do some switching from clarinet to flute at all. So you should probably work on your post-clarinet tone as well.
So I'd suggest dividing up your practice sessions so that you're starting off with flute to set a good fundamental tone for your flute, then practicing your clarinet, then practicing flute again to get yourself used to the change.
Hope I helped. Break a leg/reed on your gig!
.st
Post Edited (2003-11-14 04:06)
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2003-11-14 11:58
When I am rusty I don't bore myself with the long notes etc.
I just go through the album practising what I am going to perform. That also practises the instrument changes appropriately for the gig. First time through it will take forever, and progressively, going through the album gets faster.
At lest that is how I have done it for the last 150 productions. I seldom play at all between them, except the 30 second test after servicing instruments.
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Author: Pam H.
Date: 2003-11-14 12:11
I also tend to practice flute first if flute chops are a little underexercised.
Once they are stronger do some switching back and forth in practice session.
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Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2003-11-14 14:29
If you have to get your flute chops back in a hurry, there's no time for fun. Get "De la Sonorité" by Moyse, which has some very medicinal but effective exercises.
Sue Ann Kahn, a wonderful player, taught me a great exercise. Start on third-space C, at the top of the low register. Play it forte but not fortissimo, with the most color and power you can get, hold it for one second and slur down to B, carring the resonance down and holding for three or four seconds. Then do the same from B to Bb, from Bb to A, and so on.
She also told me this, which she said she learned from Kincaid. You don't have to fill the flute up with air. It's already full. All you have to do is set the air vibrating. You "ring it like a bell."
Also, don't think about blowing through the flute. You blow only from one side of the embouchure hole to the other -- less than 1/4 inch.
Do this experiment. Turn on the water in a sink so you get the thinnest possible coherent stream. Then, put your fingertip in the water, several inches below the tap, and slowly move it up. When you get to about an inch below the tap, the water stream will start to wiggle and eventually stabilize into a "string of beads" resonant shape.
On flute, it's possible to do the same thing -- focus the air stream so you can feel the rebound from the far edge of the embouchure hole. This gives you both resonance and control.
Best regards.
Ken Shaw
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Author: eddiec ★2017
Date: 2003-11-14 19:04
I just bought a fife so I can try something flute-like without the possible embarrasment of buying an instrument I can't produce a sound on.
So far its going pretty well, I sound ok, and can play about halfway into the 2nd octave on the fife. However, my neighbors aren't doing so well...
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Author: Lisa
Date: 2003-11-14 22:44
Thank you all for your suggestions and replies!
I had braces for 4 years as a kid, and still occasionally wear 2 retainers at night. (and I'm over 30 now) I've found that when I haven't worn my retainers for a while, my flute (not clarinet) tone goes out the window, I guess because my embouchure expects my teeth to be in a certain place??? Anyway, I've been practicing flute with my retainers in, and take them out for clarinet. I'm hoping to be able to get to the point where I can play flute with no oral assistance at my upcoming gigs.
Orthodonic comments, anyone?
General board question: Three of the above replies have "Post Edited" at the bottom. Can people edit their own posts after they write them, or do moderators delete content?
Lisa
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Author: Pam H.
Date: 2003-11-14 22:56
You can edit your own posts later and Mark Charette and GBK have the power to edit/delete on anyones posts as they feel appropriate. They can also close a thread if they choose to.
Ken Shaw - I'll have to try what you suggest myself. Sounds interesting.
Not much time this morning, hope the show goes well!
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Author: Mark Charette
Date: 2003-11-14 23:07
Pam H. wrote:
> You can edit your own posts later and Mark Charette and GBK
> have the power to edit/delete on anyones posts as they feel
> appropriate. They can also close a thread if they choose to.
To amplify - everyone has the ability to edit theor own posts - there's a link in the window of your posts that says "Edit my post" and a marker will show up after you do ("Post Edited").
GBK and myself have edit/delete rights on all posts; we normally mark posts by including our comments on the rationale for editing between brackets [ ... ].
Deleted posts, of course, don't show up so you won't know they've been deleted ... very few (probably < 50) posts have been deleted "for cause". However, old posts are being combed through by GBK and are being "thinned" out - since we have more than 120,000 posts and not all of them are really worth searching through for information.
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Author: allencole
Date: 2003-11-17 06:09
The long-tone exercise described by Ken Shaw is the best way I know to get flute tone online. I would recommend doing them daily, since seldom-exercised flute chops can have very low endurance.
I can pick up the flute and put it down all night long, but 30 minutes of continuous play and my chops are feeling taxed.
As for retainers, etc., your resonating space has a lot to do with your flute sound. I once saw a kid with a jaw spreader produce so much turbulence that his folks thought the flute was broken. I know that I have had a terrible time this week just coping with a fat lip, with a small split in the skin. I also find that my playing is altered considerably by having a small strip of EZO over my lower teeth.
Allen Cole
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Author: DalbergiaJosh
Date: 2003-11-17 20:09
In addition to Moyse's "De la Sonorite" that was previously suggested, I highly suggest/recommend/plead that you utilize Taffanel & Gaubert's Exercises Journaliers. It's dull, boring, and scalar, but will whip you back into shape like nothing else. For a bit of variety, throw in a few Andersen etudes and you should be fine in a few weeks...if you're feeling particularly technically ambitious and need to be in shape for difficult playing, you might want to try some Karg-Elert etudes. Good luck, and STOP PLAYING if you get tired
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2003-11-17 21:17
Taffanel & Gaubert!!
To spend heaps of practice time on these long notes and exercises is a luxury that is probably not possible in the time frame.
We must keep in mind the situation "I just found out that I have 2 weeks to find my long-lost flute chops again, since I agreed to this gig yesterday!
That doesn't give me much time at all......I'll have to double for the gig, too... "
This is why I say, from much experience of being in exactly this situation, just get on with practising the performance as it is to be performed. It will not be a Galway performance, but that was never going to be possible! And overdoing the exercises in such a short time frame may well result in collapse of the flute embouchure.
The doubling issue is a major one here. The player must quickly get used to changing, probably many times, between instruments. That is the biggest challenge for the rusty doubler. Hence the need to practise the doubling at the same time as regaining some flute chops. There will be long notes and all manner of exercises incorporated in the gig music itself, so specialist exercises are hardly needed.
This situation is real life; time-consuming, idealistic approaches to practice
do not seem too relevant to me.
Just MHO.
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Author: justwannaplay
Date: 2003-11-17 21:43
Can I interrupt with a beginner's question? What is the difference between the flute emboucher and the clarinet? I've been thinking about taking up the flute sometime and wanted to in the past, but always thought (as this thread suggests) that the two aren't very compatible.
Elizabeth
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Author: Lisa
Date: 2003-11-18 01:00
Thank you Gordon! I have good news and bad news.
The bad news is that I agreed to another flute/clarinet gig as long as I'm playing flute again.
The good news is that I was allowed to bail out of flute on the first doubling gig, and am transposing the flute pieces to clarinet. (This is a concert of 3 pieces as accompaniment to a choir, not a Broadway show, thank goodness!)
The bad news is the reason why I asked to bail out of flute was that I have little patience right now for the third octave of the flute, which is the range of the pieces I was supposed to play.
The good news is that I'm learning Notepad, a free download of Finale, to transpose the flute music to clarinet music.
The bad news is that I still have that OTHER doubling gig I agreed to, also accompaniment for a choir. However, this folder is for solo clarinet and 3rd flute, which is okay by me!!!
Thanks again for all of the great suugestions! I'll print them out and check out some of the flute studies you all mentioned.
Sorry, justwannaplay, I see your question but I can't really answer it directly. When I was in my doubling prime (actually tripling with tenor sax), I was practicing each instrument quite a bit, and got to be proficient enough on the flute to have a local flute teacher observe that I was a better flute player than almost half of the flautists in our community band. He didn't know I played flute at all, and was surprised that I had full range and played with vibrato. Uh, yeah, that's part of playing the flute, huh?
Playing flute will not hurt your clarinet embouchure. Each instrument is different. But I stand corrected...
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Author: Gordon (NZ)
Date: 2003-11-18 10:04
<<What is the difference between the flute embouchure and the clarinet? >>
There is almost nothing that they have in common.
A couple of years ago a sax player regular on a sax forum started asking me questions about flute playing. To cut a long story short, we corresponded for about a year, in what amounted to flute lessons by email, without me ever having heard him. at the end of this time he had become proficient enough on flute to very much impress two newly-acquired, real-live teachers at his great progress over one year, even though they did not know his teacher had never heard him play.
I edited this correspondence a little and put it all together in an email form that is about 190 KB long. If anybody is interested in being sent this, they are welcome. Its form is still clumsy, and I do not intend spending time editing it further. Much of it is specific to the problems of a sax player expanding to flute, and therefore quite applicable to a clarinet player going to flute.
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Author: justwannaplay
Date: 2003-11-18 12:37
Thanks Lisa for answering my ? in someway, especially as you've got enough on your plate at the moment — it sounds like the added experience of clarinet/sax playing in fact helped your flute playing, which is encouraging. Virtual pat on the back for being so good (doing us clarinetists proud!).
Thanks too Gordon, I'd like to read that (I've sent you an email).
Isn't the flute embouchure just like tooting into the neck of a bottle?
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