Category: Harmonics

"The most important part of any instrument is the person playing it."

12/1/2016

We were on the subject of headjoints and all the different ways people can alter their headjoints (metal types, crown materials, embouchure hole cuts, etc.) and how some inventions are really more like a placebo. But one tactic that does make a difference and is SUPER cheap is to use regular scotch tape as an embouchure hole changer. Placing a piece of tape slightly over the side of the tone hole that isn’t by your lip changes the edge and the way the air interacts with it, which can sometimes help a not-so-hot headjoint have more body. If you have a good headjoint, this probably isn’t the tool for you, but if you have a student playing on a mediocre instrument, this could be an easy way to boost their sound!

I played through most of the piece I’ll be performing on the recital for Robert. It was the first time he’d heard me play it, and he had some awesome suggestions. Multiple times in the piece, the composer calls for the flutist to move the fingerings randomly (without playing). Robert pointed out that it’s actually more effective to move fewer fingers strategically than all at once chaotically. For me, I experimented with using mainly the third and fourth fingers on each hand as the movers while keeping the other fingers stationary, to maintain a deep, resonate chamber for the movement.

At other points in the piece, the composer notated whispering into the flute in such a way that the words are still discernable. Robert’s tip for this was to add in the voice just a bit to help the sound carry further. Varying how much of the tone whole is covered is another great thing to mess around with.

A large portion of the piece is played on bass flute. I’ve been keeping the bass flute pretty low on my face, but Robert suggested going even LOWER. Low enough that the edge of the lip plate touches my chin, no joke. But, once again, Robert knows what he’s talking about, and this placement made harmonics waaaaaay easier. Is #blessed appropriate for this situation?

Until next time!

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"If you try to do something because you should, it's not going to work; it's not coming from within."

11/17/2016

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We played the tambin today! The tambin is a type of transverse flute from Guinea. The ones we played were diatonic, while many related flutes are pentatonic. There are a few main differences between the western flute and the tambin that alter the overall sound. The tone hole of the tambin is quite large and is square shaped. On traditional instruments, there are three holes, spaced somewhat far apart, covered by your left hand ring finger, right hand pointer finger, and right hand ring finger. Use of harmonics provides the pitches. Also pretty nifty, you can play the tambin either to the right or left – whatever floats your boat!

Sylvain Leroux, the tambin player that was working with us, brought a variety of tambin sizes, which means the modes each played also differed. Phrygian mode was common though. One of the main sonic aspects of the timban is its reliance on multiphonics and the “chuff” of the sound; this is very different than the pure sound we often strive for on western flutes. Typically the low register is not played on the tambin (though it is available), and the style of playing is upbeat/quick. Additionally, singing while playing, or even singing in between playing, is common.

Related to the singing and playing, Sylvain demonstrated that this technique of singing certain pitches to highlight the line works well even in traditional western music. He played some Bach as an example. We also listened to a recording of Sylvain’s mentor, Bailo Bah, playing that employed the interspersed singing technique. He was rockin’.

The coolest thing to me is that you can adapt the western flute to mimic a tambin! If you remove the footjoint and use the fingerings for D, F, and A, you essentially have a makeshift tambin! How awesome is that???

Other things:
- Robert encouraged us to question fundamental assumptions with flute playing to discover new things.
- I’ve been playing piccolo A LOT these past few days. Switching from bass flute to piccolo is really an experience.

This is a tiny part of the Kate Soper piece Only the Words Themselves Mean What They Say for flutist and soprano.
(Come to our recital December 11 for the entire piece!)

- I went to the Japanese place Sake Bar Hagi with a friend; it was delicious! I don’t remember the names of the food we ate, but it was tasty. I also tried a plum sour vodka drink, and it was pleasant too
- I’m about to fly to Michigan for the wedding of one of my best friends! Can’t wait!
- I bought a plane ticket to return to Texas!!!!

Until next time!

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"I play the meanest 'Daphnis' this side of the Mississippi."

11/12/2016

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Once again, improv was the name of the game. We did a couple of rounds, trying to be as different as possible between them. The first focused on sustained tones with everyone blending to build one texture. The next started with Robert “laying down a beat” on bass flute and Jenn, Sarah (the coordinator for the studio), and I played one short note at a time, varying the articulation, color, and air quality of the notes. It was helpful to have the goal in mind at the outset of the improv session. Robert also suggested exploring aspects of our personality when we’re away from the flute to then bring that side of us to our improvisations. His comment regarding this was, “Your identity is based in the totality of who you are.” So when you’re going through your day and you feel something or react in a certain way, you can think, “How would I play that?” and then use that information in your improv. Just an idea.

We also talked about whisper tones again, focusing on the harmonic series available from the low notes. It turns out that there is a such thing as the thirteenth partial cutoff when it comes to whisper tones done through harmonics. So there is a limit to how high you can get with the whistle tones. To practice the available harmonic range, which is still significant, imagine playing very soft harmonics to achieve the correct embouchure.

The mechanization of different flutes and fingering systems was another thing we touched on. For example, an extension for the flute has been made that allows the instrument to reach low B-flat (though you do have to sacrifice the B-natural). This came about to better play jazz, which is often in “flat” keys. Related to this low end of the flute, there is a mechanism that can be attached to the flute called the left hand C-sharp trill key addition. It is played by the left hand pinky to hold down the low C-sharp key, allowing one to use the right hand pinky to trill quickly and cleanly between C-sharp and B. We also talked about and played the Kotato contrabass flute; the lip plate and embouchure hole was inspired by the pipe organ.

One of the things I’ve been struggling with is sustaining multiphonics. Robert had a few suggestions to help with this. A few of his ideas will work well for my general flute playing, even without multiphonics: open my mouth more, use a strong air support, and have a narrower embouchure. My flute embouchure is slightly off center, so we discussed the possibility of shifting the flute over to better accommodate that. To work on the narrower embouchure, one tactic is to hold match sticks in your mouth to almost bookend the sides of the embouchure hole. All of these things helped me sustain multiphonics as well.

Other things:
- Robert made the statement “If I fall, I’m going to fall on my face.” This implies a forward motion, an urging to continue discovering and moving forward, not leaning back. It really stuck with me.
- We talked about the need for supportive musical communities, rather than those fostered by competition alone. I'm looking at you, Texas schools.
- The comedian Fred Newman wrote a book, Mouth Sounds, that explains how to create certain noises (such as a dripping water faucet). Some of them can be applied to flute playing (like the water sound one can to circular breathing), and it also gives the vocabulary to talk about different areas in the mouth and the combinations there.
- I FINALLY GOT A HAIRCUT. And for only $20. #blessed

Until next time!

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“Part of the creative process is knowing when to stop.”

10/27/2016

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Another student (named Anna Maria, fittingly enough) sat in on the first part of class. We again started with some free improv. After the first session, we were advised to avoid runs, as this is usually an indicator of going on autopilot. Instead, Robert’s advice was “It happens because it needed to.” We did another session, this time with Robert and Anna Maria playing piccolo while I stayed on flute. There were definitely less notes in this second round, and it had a very different feel from the first improvisation we had done. The other word of wisdom from Robert was when you’re not sure what to play, the best choice is space.

I requested doing some work with octave multiphonics, as it was something I was struggling to do consistently in my practice. We started with C (in the staff and two lines above the staff). I was moving the vowel shape in my mouth from “ooh” on the low note alone, “ahh” on the high note alone, and something like “eye/ö” for the octave sounding together. Robert helped refine those vowel shapes and the lip placement as well. For the low note, he suggested feeling the air and sound more in my sinuses while funneling the air deeper into the flute, which gave the low C a much more colorful and individualized sound. For the octave together, I needed to open my mouth more while maintaining the ö-type vowel, and also keep my top lip down. It’s important to practice these at a soft dynamic to avoid using purely the air speed as the “oomph” to achieve the multiphonic. From there, we moved on to large multiphonics. The key to these is to start loud, getting the intervals sounding simultaneously through the use of a lot of fast air. It is much easier to back off from that beginning point than to build up to the loud.

We listened to part of an album by Otha Turner and the Afrossippi Allstars, which was pretty legit. Otha also plays more traditional drum and fife music, and the recordings have a very field-recording vibe. The ethnomusicologist in me appreciates them. And speaking of ethnomusicology, Robert shared a way to make the western flute sound more like a Chinese flute: by putting cigarette/pad paper under the open-holed keys. This essentially makes the flute act like a kazoo. Robert may or may not have secretly tuned once in high school using this method and tone quality.

There were some parts of Sequenza I wanted to work on as well. We started with transitioning from a normal note to its whisper tone, as is found with high B-flat in the piece; I am here to tell you that if you practice your whistle tones in a variety of ways and for a variety of notes, it will work wonders when put into context. I surprised myself with how smoothly I could transition from the normal note to the whisper tone.

There is a gesture in the sixth system on the third page of the piece where the bar extends past the last note in the group; this is the only time this occurs in the entire piece, and Robert interprets the marking as crescendo-ing to an abrupt stop, possibly even using the tongue to stop the sound. Later on page three, there is our first harmonic, to be played at pppp. Because we don’t want to give away the quality of sound for the upcoming multiphonic based on the same fundamental note (C), Robert suggests using a variation other than the low C fingering for this harmonic. The one I’ve chosen to use is the low C fingering without the left thumb depressed. There is a high F-sharp halfway through the fourth page where altering the fingering again aids with its context; in this case, using the middle finger instead of the ring finger on the right hand is an apt choice. A few notes later, there is a high C, which can be colored by using the low B foot keys with the right hand pinky.

We also discussed grouping the grace note figures. Especially in the cases where there are more than four grace notes at a time, planning out how they belong together will help in executing them.

Some of the notes that are fluttertongued throughout the piece also have accents or other articulation markings. If you’re able to use uvular fluttering, then each note, marked or not, will be tongued regardless, so this is not an issue. But if you’re still practicing the uvular flutter (like me), re-tonguing the accented notes while using the tongue flutter is the best way to achieve the desired effect.

On the last page of Sequenza, we see again the notation of four dots above a note head to indicate that it should be tongued four times. Robert prefers to elongate the four repetitions of the note (if it is long, like the last B-natural) instead of tonguing consistently through the duration of the note. For the last line, his words of wisdom are to stay engaged physically, especially in the abdominals, before the attack of the low C-sharp. And continue that support while decrescendo-ing to properly sound the very last, and surprising, C-natural grace note.

Other things:
- It’s time to invest in some actual winter boots
- My mom is shipping me another blanket
- I consistently practice with hand warmers
- The above list makes me think that … winter is coming.
- And so is Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life!!!

Until next time!

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"The most important part of any instrument is the person playing it."

"If you try to do something because you should, it's not going to work; it's not coming from within."

"I play the meanest 'Daphnis' this side of the Mississippi."

“Part of the creative process is knowing when to stop.”

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