Years ago I had lessons from a great flute player who was able to get a great tone from a very relaxed embochure. You could not see any sign of tightening on his mouth, and he pointed out that the space between his lips was almost non-existent, claiming that the air coming out pushed the lips apart just a couple millimiters, creating the needed gap, then closed up again when no note was played. He did not press the flute against the lower lip like I see a lot of players do, but kept minimal pressure. I have tried over the years to relax my embochure, but it has occured to me that this could be an anatomy thing. I’ve had a great sound sometimes with a firm embochure too, and other times with the relaxed. I even saw the guy from Lark in the Morning in San Francsico (Mickey?) play on his instructional video with air coming out of the corner of his lip, and he sounded great. Any thoughts? Brian
Hi Brian,
I’ve only been playing for about three years and there are many on the board more qualified than I to guide you but as I’ve progressed I’ve found my lower lip to be more and more relaxed and my embouchre opening to be smaller.
Terry McGee recently posted a thread on Nicholsons’s theory of tone production. It was great stuff.
http://chiffboard.mati.ca/viewtopic.php?t=26509
Skip Healy’s website (skiphealy.com) has a section on pointers called “Skip’s tips”. there are some things on embouchre there.
http://skiphealy.com/frames/fr_tips.htm
Also Rob Greenway has a website that has some great stuff.
http://www.geocities.com/feadanach/
Patrick
I’ve been struggling with the same thing–sometimes I can just relax and I get a strong tone, and then others times I get a good tone by tightening up a little. Very strange.
M