Intonation again

Irish Flute
1

Hi all,

I have been at this for a few years now. I am getting frustrated because I can’t play in tune, and I can’t get a strong low D, even after many hours of practice.

Here’s what I have to do to play a G scale in tune:

High D: OXX XXX
C nat: OXX XOX, rolled in a bit (OXX OOO is way sharp)
B: XOO XXX, rolled in a lot (XOO OOO is way sharp)
A: XXO OOO, rolled in
G: XXX OOO, rolled in
F#: XXX XOO
E: XXX XXO, rolled in a little
Low D: XXX XXX, rolled OUT as much as I can go.

There is no way I can do all this in a fast tune, especially the rolling in and out. Plus, my Low D is either weak and in tune or strong and flat. I also find it hard to keep the low D from popping up into the next octave.

Help! I need some encouraging words.

2

Curious what flute you are playing.

3

Looks like you’re sharp on most notes except low D . So maybe you’re just unable to get the right low D, and for the rest of the notes just open the tuning slide a bit (and F# is usually a bit flat, and not in tune as you said, so it makes even more sense)… What flute a are you playing?

4

Sorry, forgot the flute: I have two Casey Burns flutes, a folk flute and a blackwood keyless with tuning slide. The blackwood has the strongest tone, but it is way sharp around A, B and C. The folk flute is closer to in tune around A, B and C, but I still struggle to get an in-tune low D.

5

I take you’re using middle D as a reference note? Choose low G or A instead. Focus your tone practice on the low notes.
How open is the tuning slide?

6

Last one he’s posted about was a Casey Burns blackwood. Since I have considerable confidence in the tuning of Casey’s flutes (have had a few go through here), I’d look to tuning cork issues, leaks, or a tin ear. Tin ear, as discriminatory hearing is the player’s feedback system for training the embouchure, breath support and flute position to approach the intended pitch.

Revised after seeing Jumbuk’s last message after I composed this one:

I suspect that the problem with the tuning slide flute is in part due to a combination of improper cork position and finding the right tuning slide extension.

My guess as to the low D situation with regards to the folk flute is that D is flat, and Jumbuk can’t yet play it up to pitch, which can take substantial effort to hit it hard enough.

7

double post..

8

What I dont understand is what exactly he is comparing his pitch against? a crapy digital tuner perchance!?! [bad] or a drone?[good] :smiley:

9

What helps me play my Burns in tune is lining up the embouchure/blow hole turned in; mine is, if you’re looking up from the tone/finger holes, at 10-11 o’clock if 12 o’clock is straight in line.

Also, try playing the notes at the lower end of the possible intonation, i.e. aim your air a little bit lower. Each note has a wide range of possible intonation; I aim mine a bit lower on the Burns.

The low D–here’s my thoughts on sounding that elusive note (may be “bad” technique, but it’s what I’ve found works best for me): don’t try to push the air all the way down the tube and expect to get a “pure” note like A, G, etc. Let the air rebound from the bottom and have it sound out the embouchure/blow hole. The tone that is produced is complex and should be closer in tune.

Hope that helps.

PS–about the cork placement, I think between 23 to 25 mm should do the trick. But could experiment as close as 21mm, but no closer.

10

I’ve found tuners to be somewhat unreliable for pitch. I use Korg tuners and generally tune my flutes with them only as an aide, my ear being the ultimate authority. Tuners are meant for a tempered tuning system where the 5ths are flattened and the 4ths are sharpened. On a tuner, the flute scale will look way off, with the upper parts of the scale looking way sharp. This is normal, but shocking when people first play their instruments into a tuner! Rely upon your ear.

Check the plug placement. Should be 23-24mm from center of embouchure. Modern flutes are usually around 19mm and many make the mistake of thinking it should be the same for these. This will affect the bottom D. Also, the fingers must seal well on the holes or the bottom D will pop up to the middle D. If you play guitar a bunch, the calluses on your fingers will hamper this. I have had to adopt a grip using pads on my left hand rather than the fingertips. Similarly, if the wrappings are loose, this will sometimes contribute to this.

The embouchure should be rolled towards you just a bit, so that the far edge lines up with the middle of the top fingerhole, or maybe not just quite, per your preferences. It should be set where you get the strongest bottom D.

Test the pitch first with your ear, using D or G as a drone on your tuner. You should find that you can adjust notes to sound fine on the scale without really thinking about it.

On a tuner, the 2nd octave should look something like 20-30 cents sharp relative to the 1st. Otherwise, it sounds flat. This gets more extreme up the scale.

Using my Korgs (I have an older one and a new one), the scale for the 1st octave usually looks something like this:

D - 0 cents (the bottom D is the note to use as your reference)
E - 0 to 5. Note that this note is very easy to blow sharp
F# - 0 to 5 More if I can get it.
G - Minus 5 to 0
A - Plus 5
B - plus 5 to 10
C# - Plus 10 to 15
C natural fingered 0XX 000 - plus 5 to 10
Middle D - plus 20

Now go up the scale starting at the bottom D and blow octaves - thus blow to the middle D and then the high D. Play these so they sound in pitch to you. Then look at what these look like in a tuner. You might try 0XX 000 or 0XX00X for the high D, 0X0 XXX for the C just below it (this is the standard).

Same with all the other notes. You will see the 2nd octave stretched 20-30 cents or more depending upon how you blow. Again, how it sounds is much more important than how it looks on a tuner! Your blowing pressure, posture and how you hold the flute when going up and down the scale will also affect tuning. Many play with the fixed stare method, keeping a rigid posture. Actually, as you go up the scale the head should be raise a tiny bit which rolls the flute out, in order to punch the upper notes.

If some notes such as the C#, B and A in the first octave feel a little high to you (hearing-wise), you can try adjusting these down just a bit with a little bit of soft beeswax smeared onto the edge of the hole to effectively reduce the diameter.

Hope this helps.

Casey

11

I’m also an intermediate player, and have found that I have to work on my tone before trying to straighten out my intonation. Have you looked at Terry McGee’s article on tone? ( http://www.mcgee-flutes.com/Getting_the_hard_dark_tone.htm ) Before reading this, I had thought that the correct tone on the low D was the same sweet, clear, and centered one I would strive for on a silver flute. This required a tight embouchure with the air stream directed diagonally down, as if it were aimed at a spot on the floor a few feet in front of me. After reading the article, I switched to a more relaxed embouchure that directs the air almost vertically down. It completely changed the sound of my low notes to something darker and reedier. It also flattens my intonation, more at the bottom of the scale than on the higher notes, which require the more standard embouchure. I’m not going to start working on my intonation until I can play with this variable embouchure consistently.

You might also want to check out Flutini, a free application that can listen to you play, then show you afterwards your complete tuning tendencies over your whole range. It’s better than working with a tuner because it analyzes the intonation of your actual playing, not when you play individual long tones. It also lets you use “just” temperament (based on D) as a reference, which is much more appropriate to simple-system D flutes than the equal temperament used for pianos.

12

I’m not too sure that the lips should be relaxed when directing the air down on low notes. Mine are still tight and pushing quite a bit a thin stream of air to get that stong and reedy low D. It takes practice though…

13

McGee’s article does a much better job explaining the embouchure than I did here. It definitely feels more relaxed than my silver flute embouchure, though it could just be that it is tensing a different set of muscles.

14

I wonder why everyone mentions the cork position when someone’s talking about tuning of individual notes. Moving the cork won’t affect the tuning of the low register at all, and will set the octave width, i.e. octave sharp or flat relative to first register. This is most audible in the second register high notes and the entire third. It also sets the flute’s performance for an individual player, especially how the lowest notes (E, D, C) react to the player’s way of blowing the flute. I have my cork at 18mm on my flute and am playing in tune and with a tone and response I like, so the “by no means less than 21mm” rule can’t be true. It really depends on the player, and it doesn’t hurt to try a few different positions. A friend of mine needs my flute’s cork at 25mm to be able to play it properly, it won’t work for her at 18mm.

Regarding the tuning of the flute in question, I never played one of Casey’s flutes long enough to really be able to judge about them, but his reputation must come from something. Plus, with an undeveloped embouchure, most if not all of our wooden flutes sound mistuned. To my experience every flute needs a certain degree of firmness in the player’s embouchure, a loose, large lip aperture won’t work. Those things have to be forced into tune. Don’t mean to discourage Jumbuk by this…it’s just my experience. I’d recommend to work on long notes and your ear, don’t trust tuners. I can make my flute sound totally out of tune in front of a tuner if I want to, but without the tuner it sounds just fine…again, don’t trust tuners, trust your ear.

15

The cork position on my flutes is important for best tone production first. If the cork is adjusted wrong, then the bottom D maybe doesn’t play in as well, causing all sorts of mischief to the intonation there and elsewhere. This 23-24mm is the “factory setting”. Outside of those parameters and the player is on his or her own. This is why.

16

Sure it will, at least indirectly. If you have your slide set for your tuning pitch and good octaves but the cork is wrong, the bore length is simply wrong for the hole layout, including in the lower register. Which can produce bad note-to-note intonation, and tone/response issues as Casey describes.

17

Gabriel, I’m using this sort of non-flutemaker’s logic: IMO, there is a relationship between cork position, slide position, and response. Response (how the flute blows) is going to affect the player’s ability to control the instrument, and thus the intonation (assuming a well-designed, functioning flute). And yes, cork positions can vary, and sometimes around 19mm works OK.

18

It is a common error to think that the space from cork face to embouchure axis contributes to the sounding length of the flute. It does not. Try and set your cork at a ridiculously far point, say 40mm, and play low D. It’s still low D, not C# (low C#-C hole distance usually about 40mm, so sounding length of embouchure axis to low C#, which gives D, plus 40mm = sounding length for C#). Draw out the slide 40mm and you have C#. Same vice versa, set cork to (embouchure width)/2 and play D: still D, not something like Eb. Saw barrel off: Eb. Try it, it’s like that (I’m not responsible for divided barrels). Internal tuning within one register doesn’t change at all. Performance does, though. The higher register goes a bit sharp relative to the lower register the farther the cork is at the embouchure, and vice versa. At 40mm, the second register is quite flat. But that is the one and only influence the cork has on tuning. Individual notes can NOT be tuned with the cork.

All this is nicely summarized (and explained with complicated equations) in Otto Steinkopf’s “Zur Akustik der Blasinstrumente”. I’m sure there’s a similar book written in english.

Kevin, of course you’re right. A flute that works not very well for me will likely not play in tune as well as a flute that works great for me, as I feel uncomfy on it and don’t put much effort into it. Moving the cork can change response (performance, that’s how I call it), thus changing the flute to one that works better for me, and voila, tuning better as well. However, still, internal tuning is not changed by the cork. If F# is horribly flat relatively to its neighbors G and E, the cork can’t be blamed for that. Hole size, position and undercutting can.

19

Gabriel, thanks for adding that last paragraph when you revised. Now I think I can agree with you :stuck_out_tongue:

In a flute or a whistle, the player adjusts intonation with their embouchure, slide position, and supporting air column (breath). Given a reasonably well-tuned and setup instrument, we depend on our ears to target the notes to where we want them. Mess with that, by having improper setup, leaks, foreign objects in the bore, stupid hole positions, or a badly cut embouchure hole, and it makes considerable work to play satisfactorily in tune.

Performance/response characteristics affect the player, who is going to have difficulty dialing in the notes reliably. Such struggles could make the player overblow, underblow, roll in, roll out, and screw up their embouchure to the point of tone and/or intonation suffering horribly. I think we usually do an amazing job considering all the usual little adjustments to be made during playing, but you don’t get any improvement over time when the instrument won’t make any sense. I think once Jumbuk gets his flute back to a proper and reliable setup, he’s going to finally, and probably quickly, develop that improvement and general consistency that makes flute playing and practice a rewarding activity.

20

Interesting … Thanks for the explanation, Gabriel. It seems very counterintuitive, but I’m always willing to learn something new. I have to think/read more about this (vielleicht wäre das Steinkopf-buch mit meinem Schuldeutsch lesbar).

As a Gedankenexperiment, if the distance from embouchure axis to bell determines the acoustic length … What would happen if you could extend the distance to the cork to, say, 1 meter? Apart from performance, and ignoring the octave registers, would the intonation of the fundamental register be unaffected?