hi guys,
i’m sure this subject has been broached on numerous occasions, but that ain’t gonna stop me…
i’ve been playing my flute every day for about 2 years and still find that my mouth is getting lactic-acidified if i play a tune constantly for a couple of minutes…is there something dramatically wrong with my embouchure, or does this happen to everyone & just require me playing through the ‘pain’ barrier.
any advice will be much appreciated.
tim
It sounds like you have way too much tension. If you’ve been playing regularly for 2 years, you should have well-developed embouchure muscles. I expect that you’re working much harder than you need to. Often, all that lip muscle tension can be self-defeating, and make tone production much harder than it needs to be. In a case like this, a good teacher (Irish or Boehm) would be able to help you with the fundamentals of embouchure.
I’ve always told my students that the tone eminates from the abdomen muscles. You push it out from there. The embouchure is mainly a focusing device.
Dana