Hey folks. Enjoying my flute a great deal, although my lips have been vibrating all month.
I’m wondering about getting C-nat from half covering. Do you do this much on the flute? Moving that finger produces trouble for me. I can get it, but it is not smooth at all and often jerks the flute in my hands. Should I just be sticking to cross-fingering or do I just practice, practice, practice?
Oh! Another thing. Still can’t really get my 2nd octave. Does anyone know of any audio online where I can hear the 2nd clearly? I want to know what I’m aiming for.
Good question. I have been blowing my flute for about a month and Im working on the second octave also. I get a lot of squeeks and some funny overtomes which make those notes muddy. I fugure its a matter of embouchure and breath control. I have a tendency to want to overwhelm the note by blowing harder. Im hoping practice will lead me to where I need to get.
Don’t worry, I was exagerating slightly. But my flute does vibrate a tad… I actually kinda like it, I can ‘feel’ the sound
But yeah, it’s tough going from the whistle 2nd octave to the flute. You expect it to be the same deal, but when you blow harder it just screeches at you.
It’s possible to half hole the c nat, but IMO it’s a good idea
to postpone this for a good while and get the
crossfingered C nat down very well.
It’s much harder to half hole the c nat on the flute
than on the whistle, I’ve found, and I think
it’s much less common. But when one has good
control of the c nat by other
means, you might venture into halfholing it
in certain positions in tunes.
Patience. The second octave will come.
Flute is the beast from hell, but worth it anyhow.
Expect to struggle hopelessly for awhile.
It’s official, I’m a fool.
I had this funny feeling that I was doing something wrong since I kept on reading stuff like “Turn to flute inwards”, “Blow across the hole more” and the kicker was “Check in the mirror to make sure the hole is centred”
Check in the mirror???
The flute’s in the way… oh nuts, I’m blowing the flute upside down.
I was holding the flute with the emb. hole beneath by upper lip and blowing down into the bottom wall of the bore.
I’ve corrected that, did a little re-learning and can now make a much better 2nd (and 1st) octave.
Ugh. :roll:
[/quote]… oh nuts, I’m blowing the flute upside down.[/quote]
Wow, Brian! That is a first. I have no worries about your potential if you have been able to get notes out of the flute upside down. This speaks well of your tenacity! Any chance of your getting a teacher in your area? Even a few lessons to get you off on the right foot can help.
If you ever find yourself going down to Toronto during the week, you might really enjoy a lesson or two from Loretto Reid. I say during the week because she doesn’t really do weekend lessons . . . she’s a busy lady!
But she’s wonderful, friendly, and an excellent player. PM me if you’re interested and I’ll put her in touch with you.
You have to keep faith! I’m certain there is a reasonable explanation for things.
I’m dying to find out what it is . . .
Fortunately, in my case, I’m not in any rush. I’ve been working on my lesson since . . . oh . . . July . . . and really can’t see when I might be finishing up with it. I make progress and I have fun, which is the most important thing.
Besides, my students want me to post the clip for them. I’m more afraid to do that than to send it to Scoiltrad, so I think I’ll keep practicing.
Patience is a good thing, you know. This little glitch might be nature’s way of giving you a chance to grow! And roll the flute over!
C nat. can be played without half-covering. Cover the key that is second from the top and the key below that. I have the Feadog D whistle, and the book that came with it claimed it could be done that way. So far, I have heard no difference between the two.
elsewhere on the board, JessieK has recommended fingering Cnat as oxo|xxx. i’ve been trying this out & on my flutes it has some advantages over oxx|ooo. i can get a reedier tone for one thing, that better matches the 1st octave tone i’m working toward these days. you can use the same fingering in both octaves w/ oxo|xxx. AFAIK, oxx|ooo doesn’t work very well in the 2nd octave. a trade off is that oxo|xxx doesn’t have the nice, percussive sounding taps that oxx|ooo does. oxo|xxx taps are quite tonal and need really quick, sharp taps to sound good, imo.
as others have pointed out, there are also techniques that are only possible with half holing the Cnat. i think eventually we need to know all three ways to finger it.
flutes: a lifetime of entertainment from a stick of wood with holes!
Don’t worry, I was exagerating slightly. But my flute does vibrate a tad… I actually kinda like it, I can ‘feel’ the sound 
