I’m a rank beginner playing on a homemade flute (from Doug Tipple’s Online Instructions). I was wondering what my goal should be for phrase or note length. I can sing a single note for about 30 seconds. Currently on the flute I can manage about 8 seconds. Thanks.
lips…
search on embouchure & ignore the ones about blow holes
I’ve been playing Irish flute for about 12 or 13 years. I just picked up my bamboo flute and after several tries, kept a low D note for 25 seconds. That was really pushing it and feeling uncomfortable the last 5 seconds.
Hope that helps.
Michael
It’s nothing you need concentrate on. The more you play, the more wind you’ll have; it just comes with the territory. The real trick is when to breathe, since there are no rests in ITM. You have to make your inhales part of the articulation and ornamentation. This means skipped notes, shortening note values, using things like rolls to as an opportunity to grab a breath, and overall phrasing.
Listen to Matt Malloy. He is generally considered the best, but his breaths are actually the easiest to hear, especially on his solo albums. Learn from the master.
Cheers, and enjoy your flute!
Don’t do it! Breathe, that is - and save yourself a lifetime of heartache and self-excoriation, not to mention expensive FlAD.
But if you absolutely must… as others have said, its mostly about developing embouchure control so as not to waste air, with a healthy side helping of learning to breathe properly - both with the instrument and away from it. With it, you have to breathe for both it and you: this fairly quickly becomes second nature, even if you don’t work on optimum technique for it; it will develop given time. I fondly ( 
) remember my first fortnight on Boehm flute as a 17 year old with little to do in the summer hols, sitting on my bed making horrid noises with a headjoint and getting hyperventilation headaches.