• Achieving an ideal tone

    ByBret Pimentel

    A lot of the questions people have about woodwind playing center on tone: how can I get a better tone? a darker tone? a tone like _____’s? There’s not a lot of clarity on this, for a few reasons:

    • Firstly, of course, “good” tone is subjective, and trying to communicate clearly about tone in more dispassionate terms is problematic due to inconsistent vocabulary.
    • Tone is made from a recipe of factors, so it’s hard to isolate individual ones. Will adding another egg improve your cake? Depends on what else is in it. Will a certain warm-up exercise or piece of equipment have a specific effect on your tone? Depends on what other equipment and playing techniques you are using.
    • Much of what affects tone is difficult or impossible to observe and measure.

    Let’s look at the physical factors that influence tone:

    • Yes, of course, equipment. It’s axiomatic in woodwind playing that your equipment does affect your tone, but not as much as you affect your tone. Still, your particular combination of headjoint, reed, mouthpiece, ligature, barrel, bocal, instrument, and various other parts and accessories does influence in some way the sound that you make. Equipment of good design and construction, and within typical parameters, will contribute to an essentially characteristic tone quality. (By characteristic I mean easily identifiable as a specific instrument by someone with a musically-educated ear.)
    • Basic woodwind-playing techniques, including most notably breath support, voicing, and embouchure. Assuming these are well-trained, they also contribute to a characteristic tone quality.
    • Some subtle aspects of those woodwind-playing techniques that are hard to pin down. These small things determine how the tone fits into the larger world of characteristic tone qualities, usually described poorly in vague terms like “good” or “pure” or “rich” or “buttery” or “vocal.” For example, an oboist’s embouchure puts different pressures on different parts of the reed. Those pressures can be adjusted very subtly using the small and flexible muscles of the embouchure, but most oboists probably aren’t very aware of exactly what adjustments they are making (though they may know what it feels like). Most are also not very capable of passing that wisdom (i.e. a feeling) along to a student or colleague. Some of them can be described in too-general terms (“bring the corners of your mouth in more”), or can be evoked with spotty accuracy through metaphor or through tone exercises.
    photo, Tom Page
    photo, Tom Page

    So, how do you ever develop a tone that is characteristic, personal, and beautiful?

    • Use appropriate equipment.
    • Employ solid fundamental woodwind-playing techniques.
    • Listen frequently, widely, and at length to good music, particularly on your instrument, to develop a tone concept—an aural impression of your ideal tone. In early stages, that might be based on how deeply you have absorbed the sound of a favorite musician, perhaps your teacher. In later stages, it might be a sort of composite of your favorite aspects of many tones that you have internalized, perhaps even things that inspired you about a performance on an instrument other than your own (or a voice). Ultimately, it might be a tone that you have never heard before, but which you can imagine.

    Here’s why tone concept is so crucial:

    All those subtleties of woodwind technique that affect tone, the ones that are so hard to understand and communicate? You can find them with patient and dedicated practice, if you know what you are listening for. As you have already discovered, your tone tends to change from day to day. This inconsistency can be a problem, but can also be a way of stumbling, even subconsciously, onto something positive. (When it’s a conscious process, your thought might be, “when I hold my embouchure this way, I get a sound that is more _____.”) Additionally, a clear tone concept may aid you in intuitively pursuing it; you already use the muscles of breathing, voicing, and embouchure to intuitively produce a huge and subtly-differentiated set of speech sounds, and for most of those you would be hard-pressed to explain how you make them. If you get comfortable and familiar enough with your instrument through years of practice, you can begin to tap into that intuitive control, but again: only if you know what sound you want to make.

    An ideal tone is a lifelong pursuit—invest in yours by listening and practicing daily.

  • Practicing and breathing

    ByBret Pimentel

    When I play woodwind instruments in a stress situation, such as a performance (or, back in my student days, a lesson), one of the first things affected is my breathing.

    Maybe you have had this experience. The performance begins, and the breathing seems somehow off. You find yourself breathing in awkward or unaccustomed places, ending up either short of breath or too full of stale air. You end up skipping notes or whole measures of music to reset your breathing and get back on track, but panic has already set in and things spiral.

    Most of our favorite practice tips and tricks are about finger technique or articulation or tone, and are meant to help ensure solid performance even when the stress kicks in. But sometimes we forget to practice breathing. Don’t let your performances be derailed by panicky breathing—practice the breaths just like you practice the notes.

    photo, jean-daniel pauget
    photo, jean-daniel pauget

    Make breaths part of the process from day one. Don’t assume they will fall into place once you have learned the notes—by the time that is done, you may have unwittingly “practiced” breaths in less-than-ideal spots. Make thoughtful breathing decisions the first time you practice a new étude or repertoire piece, and mark them in. Create a habit of breathing only at the places you have marked.

    You are hopefully starting your practice of the piece below tempo, so your breathing needs may change as you approach performance tempo. That’s okay—you can always change the markings as your tempo and interpretation progress. Be flexible about moving breath marks around, but disciplined about observing them.

    This approach makes your chosen breaths habitual, so hopefully they are less likely to change when you are nervous or distracted. It also creates a mindset of breathing purposefully, rather than winging it.

    It’s worth pointing out, too, that controlled breathing can actually reduce your body’s stress response, so practicing deliberate, relaxed breathing can help prevent the panic-breathing spiral.

    Breathe easy!

  • Follow @woodwindtips on Twitter

    ByBret Pimentel

    If you follow me on Twitter (@woodwindninja) you know I have not been a terribly active tweeter, mostly just auto-tweets of my newest blog posts. But I have started up an additional account, @woodwindtips, which I encourage you to check out for several-times-per-day tips on woodwind playing. Enjoy!

    TwitterLogo

  • Favorite blog posts, March 2016

    ByBret Pimentel

  • Woodwind doubling for flutists

    ByBret Pimentel

    Here is a cleaned-up version of my lecture notes from a presentation on woodwind doubling I gave last week at the Mid-South Flute Festival:

    Woodwind doubling for flutists

    • What is doubling?
      • Primary-to-secondary doubling: Playing multiple instruments within a family, such as flute (primary), piccolo (secondary), and alto flute (secondary)
      • Primary-to-primary doubling: Playing instruments from different families, such as flute (primary), clarinet (primary), and saxophone (primary) [The idea of primary-to-secondary or primary-to-primary doubling comes from a web article by Mary AllyeB Purtle.]
    • Why double?
      • More (and more varied) gigs. Also, doublers can sometimes get bonus pay.
      • More teaching opportunities
      • Larger network
      • Fun; expanded horizons
    • Flute with non-flute woodwinds
      • Doubling opportunities in musical theater, backing up singers, jazz big bands (requires strong saxophone). With strong enough skills on secondary instruments, gigs on those instruments become a possibility. Employers often value musicianship over virtuosity.
      • The flutist’s advantage: flute and especially piccolo are often weak spots for woodwind doublers. A strong, soloistic flutist with at least basic reed skills can be a hot commodity.
      • For maximum pre-existing gig opportunities, add alto saxophone first, then clarinet. Convincing swing style is also helpful. For create-your-own opportunities, any combination can work!
      • To do multiple-instrument teaching really well, you need to play all of your teaching instruments well! To do this at a lower level, you will at least need to be familiar with current/respected pedagogical literature, a variety of repertoire (including method books, etudes, and solos), a variety of excellent recordings, and a variety of equipment options.
    • Flute with other flute-like instruments
      • Doubling opportunities in situations that increasingly call for “other” flutes: recent musical theater, studio recording, even recent orchestral music. Check out my dissertation on this topic.
      • “World” transverse flutes: bansuri, dizi, “Irish” flute. Also non-tradition-linked bamboo, wooden, or plastic flutes
      • Historical transverse flutes (baroque, etc.)
      • Fipple flutes: recorders, pennywhistle (tinwhistle)
      • Endblown flutes: quena, shakuhachi, panflutes (Romanian, South American)
    • Getting started
      • Be a beginner (but an informed beginner). Get a good teacher. Buy quality instruments within your price range. Do thorough work from good method books. Give yourself all the advantages you wish you had had when you started the flute.
      • Work out a practice schedule that reflects your priorities. If you are juggling a lot of instruments, it may not make sense to practice each one each day, but do practice each one at least a few days in a row to get some momentum.
      • What to practice? If your goal is maximum gig employability, prioritize intonation, rhythm, tone, and sight reading. Practice scales, arpeggios, and other technical drills in all keys, through the full range of the instrument. (Musicals are notorious for “singer” keys and unforgiving tessituras!) Begin working methodically through time-tested etude and technique books. Start learning the easier standard repertoire if that suits your goals.
    • Will doubling hurt my flute playing?
      • Some flutists believe that doubling can damage your embouchure. Realistically, if reed playing is leaving your embouchure swollen, numb, or sore, you need to reexamine your reed-playing approach. Embouchure muscles are agile, flexible, and accustomed to doing varied tasks: playing the flute, eating, speaking, facial expressions. If your tone production on all instruments is based on solid principles, embouchure is not an issue.
      • The real issue: doubling diverts time, money, and mental energy away from flute playing. Committing to “serious” doubling means committing to less time with the flute.

  • Repair or buy new?

    ByBret Pimentel

    Should you have your old (woodwind) instrument repaired, or put the money toward a new one? Here are a few things to consider.

    First, you should understand the difference between having “playing condition” repairs done and having a full overhaul done. The overhaul is an expensive service, often costing a significant percentage of what you would spend on a new professional instrument. A good overhaul will make your instrument play like brand new, or better. It generally includes any necessary repairs to the instrument’s body, straightening/realigning/refitting of keywork and tenons, replacement of all or most pads/corks/felts/springs, and thorough cleaning and lubrication. The overhaul makes sense about every 5-10 years for a well-made, professional quality instrument that you love and intend to play long-term. It’s generally not worth the money for a student-quality or so-called “intermediate” instrument.

    photo, Keith Jenkins
    photo, Keith Jenkins

    Playing condition repairs are cheaper, à la carte services to get the instrument back into a baseline playable state, maybe replacing a few pads or corks as needed, or fixing anything that is broken enough to make the instrument unplayable. If you are low on cash, a good repair shop can help you prioritize what needs to be done within your budget. Even if you are playing your dream instrument and getting it overhauled on a regular schedule, playing condition maintenance is usually needed on at least an annual basis to keep things working well.

    If your instrument is of less-than-professional caliber, or if you want qualities that your current instrument does not possess, you may be better served by having playing-condition work done for now, and saving toward a new instrument. Bear in mind that “professional” is a term applied by makers and retailers to sell instruments; if you’re not sure, it wouldn’t hurt to check in with a real professional (such as your private teacher) to see if what you are playing on is really suited to professional use.

    If you are playing on an older professional model, you might want to explore the improvements made to more recent instruments, especially with regard to ergonomics, intonation, and evenness of tone. (Some musicians make these comparisons and decide to stick with what they’ve got, and that’s okay, too.)

    A high-quality, well-maintained instrument makes playing easy and a pleasure, and the instrument’s career might even outlast yours.

  • Thoughts on musicians’ websites

    ByBret Pimentel

    I first set up a personal website in about 2000 or 2001. There wasn’t much reason for me to do so—I was a college undergraduate, with virtually no worthwhile content to share. But it was a start, and fifteen or sixteen years later I have a few hundred blog posts and some other resources, plus a few college degrees and a university teaching position to perhaps bolster my reputation, and I enjoy a modest flow of web traffic. For what it’s worth, here are a few thoughts on websites for individual working (or aspiring) musicians, particularly those in non-“pop” genres and whose reputations exist primarily regionally or within specialized circles (such as academia).

    photo, Markus Tacker
    photo, Markus Tacker

    “Home” page: Put some content here. Why have a “landing” page that is nothing but a menu/obstacle to the meat of your site? Put your professional biography here, or maybe a recent blog post (the actual text, I mean, not just links to blog posts).

    Biography: Ask yourself, are your site visitors really interested in your life story? (“Bret Pimentel started playing the saxophone at the tender age of ten…”) Keep it simple, professional, and brief. Let people know what you do.

    For “who I have played with” lists, I suggest keeping it to 10 or 12 entries, tops. When you play with someone famous/interesting enough to add to your list, drop someone else.

    Résumé/vita: Potential employers (for gigs, teaching positions, etc.) aren’t harvesting résumés from websites. Your short bio is probably enough. If you insist on posting your résumé or curriculum vita, strongly consider posting it as a web page, not as a PDF or word processing document. (As a general rule, use a word processing document—preferably an “open” format—if people will want to download and edit it, a PDF if they will want to save or print it without editing, and a web page if they will just want to read it online.) And I suggest removing your address and phone number for safety and privacy.

    Blog entries: Not everybody needs or wants a blog, and that’s okay. But if you are hoping to use your website to build an online audience, it helps to have an avenue for publishing new stuff. (Nobody is coming back to read and re-read your bio.) I strongly suggest real blog software (such as WordPress, or a link to a WordPress.com or Blogger.com hosted blog), rather than just typing new entries into a plain web page. That way you can benefit from built-in syndication feeds and other technologies that make it easy for people to find and follow your content in their favorite apps, leave comments, etc.

    It’s okay to post only occasionally. Many, many of the musicians’ blogs I follow consist of annual apologies for not posting lately and promises of great stuff coming soon, and nothing more. Just post if you have something to post.

    Even if you are planning mostly to use social media sites to connect professionally, bear in mind that those can come and go quickly, and it’s nice to have a home base for your content where it will remain under your control. By all means, post your new web content to the social networks you use yourself, as those connections are the ones most likely to reshare and amplify your content.

    Articles/resources: For content that you intend to update or improve over time, it probably makes sense to publish it as a “static” page rather than a blog post. If you are old enough to remember these things, you might consider a blog post to be like a newspaper article, which you probably read once and then look for fresh content the next day, while “resources” are more like phone books, which you refer to on an ongoing basis and which get replaced by newer editions.

    Audio/video: I think it makes sense to host these elsewhere (YouTube, SoundCloud, etc.) and link or embed them on your site, since putting them in places where people are already looking for music and video gets them to a larger audience and boosts their search engine juice. They should never play automatically—only when your site visitor intentionally starts them.

    Photos: I used to have a photo gallery on my site, but I have removed it. Ask yourself: are you famous or interesting enough (yet) that people are going to have an interest in seeing your career’s visual history? Are you hoping they will be impressed by something related to your physical appearance? Consider using one or two photos on your bio page, and put the rest on Facebook for your friends and relatives to enjoy.

    Equipment: I am on record as believing that listing what brands and models you play is useless at best.

    (Also, if you have endorsement deals you want to brag about, remember that the correct wording is that you endorse the brand, not that the brand endorses you.)

    Contact info: Contact forms are kind of a pain. I suggest providing a real email address so that people can communicate with you using the software or webmail of their choice. Worried about spam? Use a free webmail account with powerful spam filtering.

    Social links: You don’t have to link to all the social media sites, just the ones you use and see as good places to connect with internet strangers.

    Instructions on how to use a website: If your website includes instructions on how to use your website, either your website is poorly designed or you are talking down to your visitors.

    In general, look at each page of your website and ask, is this here because it is potentially of use or interest to my site visitors, or is it only interesting to me? Would I read this content on someone else’s site?

  • Favorite blog posts, February 2016

    ByBret Pimentel

    Some woodwind blog posts I liked in February:

    • Bassoonist Barry Stees shares an interesting idea about reed autopsies, plus a method for practicing the Rite of Spring solo.
    • Oboist Patty Mitchell has some advice for students who think they have unfixable technique problems.
    • Rachel Taylor Geier has some suggestions if you need more flute etudes to work on.
    • Saxophonist Andy Austin discusses the role of passion in pursuing a musical career.
    • Specific instrument brand/model recommendations should always be taken with a grain of salt, but woodwind doubler Josh Johnson discusses the importance of backup instruments, plus some of the issues involved with choosing instruments for situations where crack-proofness is important.
    • Clarinetist Meri Dolevski-Lewis shares a process for developing sight-transposition skills [update: link dead].
    • Flutist Jennifer Cluff offers some ideas on increasing success on the problematic high B.
    • Jolene Harju plays the flute with her feet. (Okay, it’s really a post about having “a grounded, rooted connection between the feet and the floor.”)
    • Gaenor Burchett-Vass discovers some favorite treasures of the English horn repertoire [update: link dead].
    • Clarinetist Sandy Herrera seeks a new balance between a musical career and family life after having a baby. (Congratulations, Sandy!)

  • Trevor Wye’s “Flexibility I” flute exercise

    ByBret Pimentel

    One of my favorite flute warmups is “Flexibility–I (after Sousseman)” from Trevor Wye’s Tone book. (Just buy the whole omnibus edition and thank me later.) This exercise is value-packed and meticulously thought out, and leads inevitably to some fundamental truths about flute playing.

    The exercise is slurred arpeggiated figures, like this:

    wye-1

    As you might expect, the figure gradually expands to larger intervals and notes in the third octave. It’s challenging to make the intervals smooth and accurate, but especially so if your approach to flute tone production is based on unclear or faulty pedagogical concepts. Wye provides some very crucial advice that is key to getting the most out of the etude, and to developing a solid approach to tone production.

    Wye suggests first playing the etude omitting the highest notes, and dynamically shaping the figures as follows:

    wye-2

    The forte dynamic on the lowest notes demands a low, open voicing and strong breath support, feeding into an aperture that is “focused” (small). The dynamic shape, stretched mostly across a single note (B-flat here), also requires the aperture to be agile and flexible, opening slightly for the loudest notes and closing slightly as the volume decreases.

    The next step is to “work up” to the high note, “so that it sounds softly, but not flat:”

    wye-3

    There is a lot going on here. The aperture has to continue to move flexibly in order to produce the dynamic effect. Voicing has to be low and open to make the low notes full and responsive. Breath support has to remain powerful and steady to keep the pitch buoyed up. And something has to happen to produce the register change.

    Many flute teachers suggest making the aperture smaller to achieve the higher registers, but this ties register to dynamics—the larger aperture makes the low notes loud, and the small aperture makes the high notes soft. Others suggest something like increasing air pressure or using “faster” air. This can be accomplished by increasing breath support and/or by using a higher voicing; changing these has a destabilizing and register-bound effect on pitch and tone. It also creates the opposite dynamic problem from aperture-based register changes: the higher notes are always loud, and the low notes are always soft.

    The most effective approach is to allow the embouchure to push forward for notes in the upper registers, and to relax back for lower registers. This allows breath support, voicing, and aperture to function separately, and intonation, tone, and dynamics to be manipulated independently. The Wye exercise demands all of this from the flutist.

    This is a great exercise to incorporate into a daily warmup. I especially like it for its coverage of several flute tone production concepts, since doubling on several instruments means I don’t have as much time to devote to the flute as I would like. Work on it slowly and deliberately—as Mr. Wye points out, “this may take time.”

  • Beginners, parents, and making double reeds

    ByBret Pimentel

    I am in touch fairly often with parents (and school band directors) about their young oboists and bassoonists. Obtaining suitable reeds at an affordable price is of course an Ongoing Problem for beginning double reed players and their adjacent adults. Invariably my advice is that they connect with a private teacher who can supply and adjust reeds. But there aren’t many of those in the area, and, of course, they cost money, so sometimes the conversation turns toward reedmaking, which they may have read about on the internet and which seems to them like a promising solution.

    If you are a parent or band director, here is what you need to know about reedmaking:

    photo, Javier
    photo, Javier
    • Making oboe or bassoon reeds is an art that takes many years to master.
    • While there are some fine books, videos, etc. that teach reedmaking concepts, there is no substitute for studying reedmaking with an oboe or bassoon teacher.
    • Reedmaking ability is very dependent on playing ability. Most of reedmaking is an iterative process of testing the reed, making a tiny adjustment, testing again, adjusting again, and so forth. A beginner’s playing level isn’t enough for reedmaking, even if they somehow manage to master the physical reedmaking techniques. (At youngest, I might start reedmaking with a very dedicated and talented high school junior.) This is also why it won’t work to learn to make reeds yourself for your child or student, unless you already happen to be a fine oboist or bassoonist.
    • Reedmaking is expensive! Someone studying the art of reedmaking will make many, many, many reeds before it starts to be a good deal financially. A minimal set of tools can be had for maybe the cost of a couple of car tires, but will require the purchase of cane that is already partially prepared. Each piece of prepared cane costs about as much as a large order of French fries, and a beginning reedmaker may ruin dozens or hundreds of them before making their first somewhat usable reed, and hundreds or thousands more before they can make reeds as good as ones from an excellent private teacher. (Cane purchased in its raw tube form is cheaper, but requires additional equipment costing as much as a transatlantic flight, plus extra hours of work.)
    • It may be worth pointing out, too, that reedmaking involves razor-sharp tools. These can of course be handled safely with proper training, but it’s still a concern where small hands are involved. Pieces of cane can be dangerous, too—I’ve cut myself more times with sharp or jagged pieces of cane than I have with knives or razor blades.

    The best thing you can do for your beginning oboists or bassoonists is to pair him or her with excellent teachers who can help them improve their skills on their instruments, make and adjust reeds for them, and lay the groundwork for future instruction in reedmaking.