I am sooooo bored with the way that I’m playing. Not being funny, I’m playing well, but I know that I could improve.
I’m bored with hearing my tone. I play loud but I would like a tone that, let’s say, Dave Sheridan (flute player) has. More sweet sounding.
Suggestions please? I’ve feeling it might be that the embouchure is not tight enough.
Go raibh maith agaibh.
Relax and enjoy it.
Tá fáilte romhat.
Regards,
Harry.
… the embouchure is not tight enough
Isn’t that almost always the issue regarding purity of tone?
Volume isn’t the same as projection. Trying for volume generally means you’re overblowing, which results in intonation problems in the high notes in the second octave, as well as a raspy, airy, unfocused tone.
The trick is to relax and not blow so hard, trying instead to be clear, with a focused tone. While you might think you’re playing with less volume you’ll be projecting much better.
I think I just had one of those moments of enlightenment.
Grma!!!
What did flautists do to make progress in their playing?
It would be a simple thing -like above - or something that took a lot of work. I look forward to reading what others have to say… 
Have you messed around with pulsing? (the ol’ huff n puff technique).
I’ve recently started employing rythmic pulsing. All my old tunes I was tired of are like new tunes to play now. Some tunes that I considered boring have a whole to feel to them.
What is projection? I have a good handle on the physics of sound, but “projection” seems to be one of those nondescript qualities.
it helps to experiment…embouchure, posture, grip, breathing…you use it all to find the tone you like and how you want to play.
there is nothing, I found, like ONE thing that would work for everybody, since every body is different.
there are exercises you could do to improve things, mainly meaning work on things separately: do rolls, do octave jumps, one handed scales etc.
with time you will find improvements.
as for projection: a friend described it to me to make the sound come out of the flute as a laser and try to project that across the room to hit a certain point.
it is all up to you and where you want to be in a few years time.
practice is the only thing and will only work if being done for a given amount of time daily.
berti
only three years into this game…
That’s a good description. I know flute players who play “loudly” or have “loud flutes” and yet their sound is so diffuse and unfocused that you can’t hear them when they’re playing with others, or else what you hear is a sort of obnoxious hooting sound. But a player with a focused tone can be heard clearly in a session full of fiddles and accordions regardless of what flute they’re playing (I’ve heard experienced players with old German flutes who can be heard more clearly in a session than people with big Pratten-style cannons).
I’m not so concerned about being heard above other instruments in a session, personally; what I love and strive for is when the flute blends in with the fiddle and their timbres intertwine; it’s magic. You can really only get that kind of interplay if your tone is focused – like a laser – otherwise the flute sounds wooly compared with the clarity of the fiddle.
So a loud-breathy-dark tone (large fundamental, weak harmonics but with excessive white noise) will be less audible from distance than a focused-medium-volumed-warm/bright tone (good emphasis of the overtones with less white noise). Doesn’t that just mean a poor tone versus a good tone?
I think frequency modulation is another important aspect in characterizing timbre, but I’m guessing this may have more to do with the flute rather than the player.
Doesn’t that just mean a poor tone versus a good tone?
Yes, to my mind. But that would also depend on what you meant by “good tone.” Most players don’t worry about tone, instead trying to be as loud as they can. Hence they overblow and make ugly noises.
Brad’s point (and mine) is that good tone is clear and focused rather than loud and breathy. And that good tone is more important, and more audible, than big volume and bad tone. To my mind good tone – and good rhythm – are the most important factors. Everything else (like ornamentation and speed) will come in time.
What is frequency modulation in reference to flute playing?
Here ya go:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FM_synthesis
I am interested in addressing the problem of describing flute tone using everyday language (including flute jargon) rather than resorting to scientific terms. For example folks will say a flute “honks”, which is somewhat meaningless to me. I am able to produce equally “bright” tones on two rather differently constructed flutes and yet they sound quite different. Timbre cannot be explained with only the instantenous overtone content of the signal (i.e., a snapshot Fourier/frequency domain analysis). People talk about a “complex” tone, but elaboration ends there, well because it’s “complex”.
I find this short video clip is often helpful at times such as this. Afterwards, I can relax and redouble my efforts of understanding.
This is particularly helpful when the dynamic framus of your embouchure modulation wave is logarhythmically skewed. Happens to me all the time. 
Doc
The problem of synchronization of vocabulation on these sites with a meta-static alignment of enjoumentation would lead one to think that framuses have nothing to do with pedicularity.
I’m of the opinion that the aural concept of what good tone is should be left to personal aesthetics, rather than saying it should be clear and focused etc. For example I wouldn’t say Kevin Henry’s flute tone is clear and focused but it certainly works remarkably well in the context of his playing.
Excellent point.
Kevin Henry does have great energy, rhythm, and style. Infectious playing, with lots of lift.
Because of the great energy and lift of the old puffers we don’t mind their breathy sound. We’re the same way with many of the old fiddlers- we don’t care about the scratchiness or the bad intonation because there is so much else going on.
But if you want to improve your playing a good place to start is with your tone. I don’t think you want to say, “Kevin Henry has a breathy tone therefore it’s ok if I have a breathy tone.”
(edited to include second thoughts)
Right. Performance and preference are mutually exclusive yet often mentioned in the same breath, for example, your last sentence. If a person’s tone is dry and dark, well it’s dark and dry, regardless of whether I like it or not.
I agree with Cocusflute’s advice and perhaps that is all that is needed to be said to most students of flute or whatever instrument. I’m obviously mystically dysfunctional, as evidenced by my proclivity for Rockwellian-speak (please, this is not flame). For those of us who are not proficient in Flutetonespeak, please elaborate.